Alan Bush

Alan Dudley Bush (22 December 1900 – 31 October 1995) was a British composer and pianist.

Bush was born in Dulwich, London, first attending Highgate School and then the Royal Academy of Music.Later he studied musicology and philosophy in Berlin and later still had lessons with the composer John Ireland.He also studied the piano under Benno Moiseiwitsch and Artur Schnabel. From 1925 to 1978 he taught at the Royal Academy of Music.

He was known as an outspoken advocate of Marxism, holding posts as conductor of the London Labour Choral Union and in 1936 was co-founder of the Workers' Music Association, and later its President.This influence can also be seen in many of his works, including the operas "Wat Tyler" (1948-50) and "Men of Blackmoor" (1954-55), and his piano concerto which has a communist text declaimed by a male chorus in the last movement.

Other works include four symphonies: No.1 in C; No.2,'The Nottingham'; No.3, 'Byron Symphony' and No.4, 'Lascaux Symphony', "Variations, Nocturne and Finale on an English Sea-song", Op. 60, for piano and orchestra; and "Songs of the Doomed". He died in Watford in 1995 after a short illness.

One if his most notable students was Michael Nyman.

References

*Richard Stoker, ‘Bush, Alan Dudley (1900–1995)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/60406, accessed 17 February 2008]

External links

* [http://www.alanbushtrust.org.uk Alan Bush Music Trust]
* [http://www.claudiorecords.com/alan_bush.html Violin Concerto, Six short pieces & Dialectic - Review & Track Listing]