- Gerald Moore
Gerald Moore CBE (30 July 1899 – 13 March 1987) was an English pianist best known for accompanying many famous singers in the performance and recording of
Lieder . Moore was born inWatford but received some of his musical education inToronto ,Canada , to which country his family emigrated when he was a child, and where he was organist at St Thomas' Church, Huron Street.He accompanied notable instrumentalists such as
Pablo Casals and the child prodigyJosef Hassid , but became better known for his work with singers, among themElisabeth Schumann ,Maggie Teyte andKathleen Ferrier . He is credited with doing much to raise the status of accompanist from a subservient role to that of an equal artistic partner, in part through his influential 1943 book "The Unashamed Accompanist".Moore also gave lectures and wrote about music, publishing his much-admired memoir "Am I Too Loud?: Memoirs of An Accompanist" in 1962. He published two other volumes of autobiography: "Farewell Recital: Further Memoirs" (1978) and "Furthermoore" (1983).
Moore retired from public performances in 1967, with a farewell concert in which he accompanied three of the singers with whom he was long associated:
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau ,Victoria de los Ángeles andElisabeth Schwarzkopf . This famed concert at London'sRoyal Festival Hall concluded with Moore playing alone - he chose Schubert's "An die Musik ". He made his last studio recording in 1975.In his memoirs Moore wrote that his services were not needed at
Benjamin Britten 'sAldeburgh Festival , 'as the presiding genius there is the greatest accompanist in the world.' Moore would therefore have been interested that, when in 2006 "Gramophone" magazine invited eminent present-day accompanists to name their 'professional's professional', the joint winners were Britten and Moore himself.Moore was appointed a Commander of the
Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1954. He died inBuckinghamshire in 1987.References
"Am I too loud?", Memoirs of Gerald Moore, Hamish Hamilton Ltd, London, 1962
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