Herman Finck

Herman Finck (November 4, 1872 - April 21, 1939) [ [http://www.brainyhistory.com/events/1939/april_21_1939_97331.html Brainy History] ] was a British composer of German extraction.

Born Hermann Van Der Vinck [imdb name|0277483|Herman Finck] in London, he began his studies training at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and established a career as the musical director at the Palace Theatre in London (from 1900 until 1920), [ [http://www.arthurlloyd.co.uk/Archive/January2005/PageSeven.htm Palace Theatre Feature] ] with whose orchestra he made many virtuoso recordings. He also acted in the same position in the Queen's Theatre, Drury Lane and at Southport. Finck was a prolific composer throughout the 1910s and 1920s. He composed around thirty theatre shows of most types - operettas (such as "Decameron Nights"), ballets (like "My Lady Dragon Fly"), incidental music, revues (annual revues "Round the Map" and "The Passing Show" were especially popular), plus songs, "mood music" for the silent cinema and many light orchestral pieces - suites such as "Vive La Danse" and "Marie Antoinette", marches such as "Pageant March", "Guards Parade March", "Splendour and Victory" and the individual genre movements "Dancing Daffodils", "Dignity and Impudence", "Land of Roses", "Penguin Parade" and "Queen of the Flowers".

The Palace Theatre was famous not only for its orchestra, but also for the beautiful Palace Girls, who had many dances composed by Finck in their honour. In 1911 the Palace Girls performed a song and dance number, which was originally called "Tonight", but became hugely popular as a romantic instrumental piece "In The Shadows". This is the most enduring composition of Finck, largely because "In The Shadows" was one of the last numbers played on the Titanic and has thus made its way into several Titanic-collections.

Another popular song during the World War I was "Gilbert the Filbert" (also called "The K-Nuts"). It was performed in "The Passing Show" of 1914 by the popular Basil Hallam, who became Captain B H Radford and was tragically killed in 1916 when he fell to his death because his parachute failed to open.

In 2007, Divine Art label in the UK released the first album dedicated to the music of Herman Finck, performed by the orchestra and principals of the Bel-Etage Theatre in Estonia, conducted by Mart Sander. In addition to Finck's most popular tunes "Gilbert the Filbert" and "In The Shadows" (vocal version), this CD also includes several popular dances, patriotic World War I songs and hits from the revues and musicals, as well as two full orchestral suites - "My Lady Dragonfly" and the magnificently symphonic "Decameron Nights", which had not had a revival since 1923.

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