Bernard Heinze

Sir Bernard Thomas Heinze AC (1 July 1894 - 10 June 1982) was an Australian Professor of Music, conductor and Director of the New South Wales State Conservatorium of Music.

He conducted all the orchestras run by the ABC, most particularly the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, of which he was chief conductor from 1933 to 1956. He was also Guest Conductor of the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra in 1939. Discouraged by Australian audiences' lack of interest in music, he founded Children's Concerts. He also initiated the Young Performers Awards, which continue to showcase emerging international talent. [ [http://www.abc.net.au/dimensions/dimensions_in_time/Transcripts/s560048.htm ABC: Dimensions in Time] ]

He introduced Australian audiences to the works of Anton Bruckner, Dmitri Shostakovich, Béla Bartók and William Walton, and promoted Australian composers. He was the first Australian to be knighted for services to music, in 1949. He played a central role in shaping Australia’s musical life through teaching and performance, habits of listening, broadcasting and composition. At his retirement, Bernard Heinze was hailed as the most influential figure in Australian music, critics declaring: 'there is not a fibre of our musical life that has not been modified by his career.'

Biography

Bernard Heinze was born in Shepparton, Victoria on 1 July 1894, the son of a German born brewer and his Yorkshire wife, Minnie née Greenwell. Heinze received violin lessons at an early age at Ballarat under the guidance of Walter Gude (1904-12) and at the University of Melbourne under Franklin Peterson before being awarded the (Sir William) Clarke Scholarship at the Royal College of Music in London (1913).

But World War I interrupted his studies and his career was put on hold; he received a commission in May 1916 with the British Royal Garrison Artillery Special Reserve Regiment and fought at Arras, Ypres, the Somme and Passchendaele.

Heinze returned home in 1923. He turned down posts in Europe and, at the age of 32, he succeeded William Laver as Ormond Professor of Music at the University of Melbourne (1926-57). He was instrumental in the creation of the Faculty of Music, and was thereby able to influence state education policy for the successful introduction of music to the state curriculum.

One of Heinze’s great achievements came with the advent of wireless radio. As director-general of music with the new National Broadcasting Service at 3LO-3AR (forerunner to the ABC), he was able to inspire a generation of Australians to the love of orchestral music that was until then largely a luxury confined to the upper classes.

Heinze envisaged a central professional full-time orchestra in Melbourne, and with funding from Sidney Myer he achieved this by gaining control of two rival orchestras: Alberto Zelman’s Melbourne Philharmonic Society (1927); and Fritz Hart’s Melbourne Symphony Orchestra (1933). These merged with the University Symphony Orchestra to form the Victorian Symphony Orchestra, with Heinze as head conductor (1933-56). It was renamed the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra in 1964.

In 1929 Heinze was appointed music adviser to the Australian Broadcasting Commission. There he oversaw the inception of its State orchestras, celebrity concerts, youth concerts and fine music broadcasting.

His last appointment of significance was as director of the New South Wales State Conservatorium of Music (1956-66) succeeding Sir Eugene Goossens, who had resigned in scandal.

He died on 10 June 1982, aged 87, in Bellevue Hill, Sydney, survived by his wife Valerie née Hennessy.

Honours

Bernard Heinze became a Fellow of the Royal College of Music in 1931.

He was knighted in 1949, the first Australian musician to receive this honour. [ [http://www.itsanhonour.gov.au/honours/honour_roll/search.cfm?aus_award_id=1083375&search_type=advanced&showInd=true It's an Honour: Knight bachelor] ]

Sir Bernard was named the 1974 Australian of the Year.

On Australia Day 1976, he was appointed a Companion of the Order of Australia for his services to Australian music. [ [http://www.itsanhonour.gov.au/honours/honour_roll/search.cfm?aus_award_id=869777&search_type=advanced&showInd=true It's an Honour: AC] ]

The Bernard Heinze Award

The Sir Bernard Heinze Award Award, in the form of a Medallion, was inaugurated following the death of Sir Bernard Heinze in 1982, and is given to a person who has made an outstanding contribution to music in Australia. The Award is jointly administered by the Friends of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and the University of Melbourne School of Music. It is presented each year at a Sir Bernard Heinze Memorial Concert held in the Melbourne Town Hall, now given by the University of Melbourne Faculty of Music Orchestra. In 1992, the Friends of the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra were invited to suggest a possible recipient for the award, and have nominated one person per year since then.

Recipients of the award have included: Sir Frank Callaway, Beryl Kimber, John Hopkins, Yvonne Kenny, Don Burrows, Richard Mills, Peter Sculthorpe, Richard Gill, Jonathan Mills, Graeme Koehne, Richard Divall, Richard Tognetti and Graham Abbott.

References

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* [http://www.abc.net.au/dimensions/dimensions_in_time/Transcripts/s560048.htm ABC: Dimension in Time]
* [http://www.brightoncemetery.com/HistoricInterments/150Names/heinzeb.htm Brighton Cemetery]
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* [http://voice.unimelb.edu.au/view.php?articleID=3961]
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* [http://voice.unimelb.edu.au/news/3637/]
* [www.binaryblue.com.au/LPA/bernardheinze3.html]
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* [http://www.slv.vic.gov.au/programs/literary/pla/adprize/judges2003.html]
* [http://www.musicaustralia.org/apps/MA?function=showDetail&currentMapsRecord=ANL:MA~1182619&itemSeq=1&total=9&returnFunction=viewTheme&]