William G. James

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name = William Garnet James


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birth_date = 28 August 1892
birth_place = Ballarat, Victoria, Australia
death_date = 10 March 1977
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nationality = Australian
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occupation = Pianist, composer, broadcaster
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William Garnet ("Billy") James (28 August 1892-10 March 1977) was an Australian pianist and composer and a pioneer of music broadcasting in Australia.

Early years

James was born in Ballarat in 1892. He studied piano at the Melbourne University Conservatorium of Music, graduating in 1912. Subsequently, he headed overseas to study in London and Brussels with Arthur de Greef, a former pupil of Franz Liszt.Music Australia website.] It is around this period that James composed his "Six Australian Bush Songs", which were dedicated to Dame Nellie Melba.

After being rejected for military service, James worked for the British Red Cross Society during the First World War. In 1915, he made his public debut as a pianist with the Queen's Hall Orchestra. By this time he had begun to publish his compositions, and in 1916 his ballet music "By Candlelight" was performed in concert at the Savoy Theatre, London.

ABC career

In 1923 James returned to Australia, eventually taking up a teaching position at the Melbourne University Conservatorium. In the late 1920s, he joined the newly formed Australian Broadcasting Company, the forerunner of the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC). He became the latter's first Director of Music in 1931, a position he would hold until his retirement 1957. It was during his tenure that the ABC established its well-known state orchestras.

From 1935, James made regular overseas trips to persuade international artists to perform in Australia with the newly formed ABC orchestras. During World War II, when such exchanges became impractical, the ABC organized local talent competitions instead, which James adjudicated. James' selection of repertoire for concert performances was conservative, possibly because he felt contemporary composers might not have a broad enough appeal for radio audiences.

Compositions

James wrote many pieces for voice, choir and piano, but his most enduring pieces are still his six sets of "Australian Christmas Carols", in which traditional Christmas themes were given "outback" settings, such as "The Three Drovers" (ABC staff writer John Wheeler wrote the lyrics for these). The "Australian Christmas Carols" can still be found in music catalogues today. Outback themes were common in his secular songs as well, in compositions such as "Bush Song at Dawn", familiar to many Australian children of the 1950s and 1960s through the school songbooks of the period. Other compositions by James have rustic English themes ("A Warwickshire Wooing") or claim Māori inspiration ("Six Maori Dances").

Personal life

James was married twice. His first marriage, on 14 September 1921, was to Russian opera singer Saffo Buchanan, née Drageva (known professionally as Saffo Arnav), by whom he had a son and a daughter. After Buchanan's death in 1955, he married again, to widow Caroline Mary Dally-Watkins, née Skewes. The marriage took place at St Mark's Anglican Church, Darling Point, Sydney, on 25 June 1960. They divorced in 1967.

Footnotes

References

* [http://www.amcoz.com.au/composers/composer.asp?id=4201 William Garnet James] , Australian Music Centre website.
* [http://www.musicaustralia.org/apps/MA?function=showDetail&currentMapsRecord=ANL:MA~000001180661&itemSeq=1&total=1&&returnFunction=searchResults&term1=James%2C+William+G.&location1=Anywhere&scope=scope&parameter1=phrase&boolean1=and&sessionId=reuseSearch6732C1A1FE2A155C0642EC7C88C940921204222942554 William G. James] , Music Australia website.
* [http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A140632b.htm?hilite=william%3Bgarnet%3Bjames James, William Garnet (Billy)] , Australian Dictionary of Biography online edition.