Eric Blom
Encyclopedia
Eric Walter Blom CBE
(20 August 188811 April 1959) was a Swiss-born British-naturalised music lexicographer
, musicologist
, music critic
, music biographer
and translator
. He is best known as the editor of the 5th edition of Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians
(1954).
, Switzerland
. His father was of Danish
and British
descent, and his mother was Swiss. He was educated in German-speaking
Switzerland, and later in England
. He was largely self-taught in music. He started in music journalism
by assisting Rosa Newmarch
in writing program notes for Sir Henry J. Wood’s Prom Concerts
, which were notable for their abundance of accurate information. From 1923 to 1931 he was the London music correspondent for the Manchester Guardian
. He then went to the Birmingham Post
(1931-46), and returned to London in 1949, as music critic for The Observer
. He retired as chief music critic for The Observer in 1953, but still wrote weekly contributions right up till his death.
He was the editor of Music & Letters
from 1937 to 1950, and again from 1954 until his death. He withdrew in 1950 because of his preoccupation with the preparation of Grove's Dictionary. He returned in 1954 only because the proprietor and then-editor, Richard Capell, died. In his capacity as musical adviser to the Dent publishing firm, he also edited the Master Musicians series, of which he wrote "Mozart". He discovered a number of young authors and gave them their first opportunities to write music biography.
Eric Blom's first lexicographical work was Everyman's Dictionary of Music (1947), which went through several editions (it was revised in 1988 by D. Cummings as The New Everyman Dictionary of Music).
He succeeded H. C. Colles as editor of Grove's Dictionary
for the 5th edition (usually referred to as "Grove V"). Colles had confined the dictionary to five and six volumes for Grove III and IV respectively (1927, 1940). Blom expanded it to nine volumes for Grove V (1954). As well his overall editing responsibilities, Blom personally wrote hundreds of entries, including Arthur Sullivan
. He also translated many entries by foreign contributors (he was fluent in German, Danish, Italian and French as well as English). A Supplementary Volume was published in 1961, after Blom's death, but he had done most of the work on it. His introduction and acknowledgments were included, and he is credited as Editor, with Denis Stevens
as Associate Editor. His own biography, written by Frank Howes (the chief music critic of The Times
), appeared in the Supplementary Volume. Grove V was reprinted in 1966, and remained the standard edition of Grove until the New Grove
was released in 1980.
Blom was forthright in his opinions. He could be almost gushing about his favourites, particularly Mozart
, and most especially his operas. He wrote that Benjamin Britten
's Peter Grimes
was "so impressive and original that only the most absurd prejudice will keep it out of the great foreign opera houses". Equally, he did not shrink from criticising composers he thought less of, and introduced some of his own prejudices. He wrote, for example, that the solo part of the Sibelius
Violin Concerto
"is closely interwoven with the symphonic tissue, and is therefore neglected by the average virtuoso" (it is in fact one of the most popular and frequently played and recorded of all violin concertos). Notoriously, he wrote that Rachmaninoff
"did not have the individuality of Taneyev
or Medtner
. Technically, he was highly gifted, but also severely limited. His music is ... monotonous in texture ... The enormous popular success some few of Rakhmaninov's works had in his lifetime is not likely to last, and musicians never regarded it with much favour". To this, Harold C. Schonberg
, in his Lives of the Great Composers, responded, "It is one of the most outrageously snobbish and even stupid statements ever to be found in a work that is supposed to be an objective reference".
Blom translated many documents for Otto Erich Deutsch
's Mozart: A Documentary Biography (published 1965).
Blom assisted Gervase Hughes
in the writing of his book The Music of Arthur Sullivan. In 1956, for the Mozart bicentenary, Blom published a selection of Mozart's letters, translated by Emily Anderson.
He died on 11 April 1959, and is interred at Golders Green Crematorium
.
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
(20 August 188811 April 1959) was a Swiss-born British-naturalised music lexicographer
Lexicography
Lexicography is divided into two related disciplines:*Practical lexicography is the art or craft of compiling, writing and editing dictionaries....
, musicologist
Musicology
Musicology is the scholarly study of music. The word is used in narrow, broad and intermediate senses. In the narrow sense, musicology is confined to the music history of Western culture...
, music critic
Critic
A critic is anyone who expresses a value judgement. Informally, criticism is a common aspect of all human expression and need not necessarily imply skilled or accurate expressions of judgement. Critical judgements, good or bad, may be positive , negative , or balanced...
, music biographer
Biography
A biography is a detailed description or account of someone's life. More than a list of basic facts , biography also portrays the subject's experience of those events...
and translator
Translation
Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. Whereas interpreting undoubtedly antedates writing, translation began only after the appearance of written literature; there exist partial translations of the Sumerian Epic of...
. He is best known as the editor of the 5th edition of Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians
Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, it is the largest single reference work on Western music. The dictionary has gone through several editions since the 19th century...
(1954).
Biography
Blom was born in BerneBerne
The city of Bern or Berne is the Bundesstadt of Switzerland, and, with a population of , the fourth most populous city in Switzerland. The Bern agglomeration, which includes 43 municipalities, has a population of 349,000. The metropolitan area had a population of 660,000 in 2000...
, Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
. His father was of Danish
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
and British
British people
The British are citizens of the United Kingdom, of the Isle of Man, any of the Channel Islands, or of any of the British overseas territories, and their descendants...
descent, and his mother was Swiss. He was educated in German-speaking
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
Switzerland, and later in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. He was largely self-taught in music. He started in music journalism
Music journalism
Music journalism is criticism and reportage about music. It began in the eighteenth century as comment on what is now thought of as 'classical music'. This aspect of music journalism, today often referred to as music criticism , comprises the study, discussion, evaluation, and interpretation of...
by assisting Rosa Newmarch
Rosa Newmarch
Rosa Newmarch was an English writer on music.-Biography:Rosa Harriet Jeaffreson was born in Leamington in 1857. She settled in London in 1880, when she began contributing articles to various literary journals. In 1883 she married Henry Charles Newmarch, thereafter using her married name in her...
in writing program notes for Sir Henry J. Wood’s Prom Concerts
The Proms
The Proms, more formally known as The BBC Proms, or The Henry Wood Promenade Concerts presented by the BBC, is an eight-week summer season of daily orchestral classical music concerts and other events held annually, predominantly in the Royal Albert Hall in London...
, which were notable for their abundance of accurate information. From 1923 to 1931 he was the London music correspondent for the Manchester Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
. He then went to the Birmingham Post
Birmingham Post
The Birmingham Post newspaper was originally published under the name Daily Post in Birmingham, England, in 1857 by John Frederick Feeney. It was the largest selling broadsheet in the West Midlands, though it faced little if any competition in this category. It changed to tabloid size in 2008...
(1931-46), and returned to London in 1949, as music critic for The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
. He retired as chief music critic for The Observer in 1953, but still wrote weekly contributions right up till his death.
He was the editor of Music & Letters
Music & Letters
Music & Letters, also known as Music and Letters, is an international journal published quarterly by Oxford University Press with a focus on musicology. Its ISSN is 00274224...
from 1937 to 1950, and again from 1954 until his death. He withdrew in 1950 because of his preoccupation with the preparation of Grove's Dictionary. He returned in 1954 only because the proprietor and then-editor, Richard Capell, died. In his capacity as musical adviser to the Dent publishing firm, he also edited the Master Musicians series, of which he wrote "Mozart". He discovered a number of young authors and gave them their first opportunities to write music biography.
Eric Blom's first lexicographical work was Everyman's Dictionary of Music (1947), which went through several editions (it was revised in 1988 by D. Cummings as The New Everyman Dictionary of Music).
He succeeded H. C. Colles as editor of Grove's Dictionary
Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, it is the largest single reference work on Western music. The dictionary has gone through several editions since the 19th century...
for the 5th edition (usually referred to as "Grove V"). Colles had confined the dictionary to five and six volumes for Grove III and IV respectively (1927, 1940). Blom expanded it to nine volumes for Grove V (1954). As well his overall editing responsibilities, Blom personally wrote hundreds of entries, including Arthur Sullivan
Arthur Sullivan
Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...
. He also translated many entries by foreign contributors (he was fluent in German, Danish, Italian and French as well as English). A Supplementary Volume was published in 1961, after Blom's death, but he had done most of the work on it. His introduction and acknowledgments were included, and he is credited as Editor, with Denis Stevens
Denis Stevens
Denis William Stevens CBE was a British musicologist specialising in early music, conductor, professor of music and radio producer....
as Associate Editor. His own biography, written by Frank Howes (the chief music critic of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
), appeared in the Supplementary Volume. Grove V was reprinted in 1966, and remained the standard edition of Grove until the New Grove
Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, it is the largest single reference work on Western music. The dictionary has gone through several editions since the 19th century...
was released in 1980.
Blom was forthright in his opinions. He could be almost gushing about his favourites, particularly Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
, and most especially his operas. He wrote that Benjamin Britten
Benjamin Britten
Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
's Peter Grimes
Peter Grimes
Peter Grimes is an opera by Benjamin Britten, with a libretto adapted by Montagu Slater from the Peter Grimes section of George Crabbe's poem The Borough...
was "so impressive and original that only the most absurd prejudice will keep it out of the great foreign opera houses". Equally, he did not shrink from criticising composers he thought less of, and introduced some of his own prejudices. He wrote, for example, that the solo part of the Sibelius
Jean Sibelius
Jean Sibelius was a Finnish composer of the later Romantic period whose music played an important role in the formation of the Finnish national identity. His mastery of the orchestra has been described as "prodigious."...
Violin Concerto
Violin Concerto (Sibelius)
The Violin Concerto in D minor, Op. 47, was written by Jean Sibelius in 1904.-History:Sibelius originally dedicated the concerto to the noted violinist Willy Burmester, who promised to play the concerto in Berlin...
"is closely interwoven with the symphonic tissue, and is therefore neglected by the average virtuoso" (it is in fact one of the most popular and frequently played and recorded of all violin concertos). Notoriously, he wrote that Rachmaninoff
Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...
"did not have the individuality of Taneyev
Sergei Taneyev
Sergei Ivanovich Taneyev , was a Russian composer, pianist, teacher of composition, music theorist and author.-Life:...
or Medtner
Nikolai Medtner
Nikolai Karlovich Medtner was a Russian composer and pianist.A younger contemporary of Sergei Rachmaninoff and Alexander Scriabin, he wrote a substantial number of compositions, all of which include the piano...
. Technically, he was highly gifted, but also severely limited. His music is ... monotonous in texture ... The enormous popular success some few of Rakhmaninov's works had in his lifetime is not likely to last, and musicians never regarded it with much favour". To this, Harold C. Schonberg
Harold C. Schonberg
Harold Charles Schonberg was an American music critic and journalist, most notably for The New York Times. He was the first music critic to win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism...
, in his Lives of the Great Composers, responded, "It is one of the most outrageously snobbish and even stupid statements ever to be found in a work that is supposed to be an objective reference".
Blom translated many documents for Otto Erich Deutsch
Otto Erich Deutsch
Otto Erich Deutsch was an Austrian musicologist. He is known for compiling the first comprehensive catalogue of the works of Franz Schubert, first published in 1951 in English, new edition in 1978 in German...
's Mozart: A Documentary Biography (published 1965).
Blom assisted Gervase Hughes
Gervase Hughes
Gervase Alfred Booth Hughes was an English composer, conductor and writer on music. From 1926 to 1933, Hughes pursued a career as a conductor and chorus master, principally at the British National Opera Company, and also co-produced Shakespeare plays...
in the writing of his book The Music of Arthur Sullivan. In 1956, for the Mozart bicentenary, Blom published a selection of Mozart's letters, translated by Emily Anderson.
He died on 11 April 1959, and is interred at Golders Green Crematorium
Golders Green Crematorium
Golders Green Crematorium and Mausoleum was the first crematorium to be opened in London, and one of the oldest crematoria in Britain. The land for the crematorium was purchased in 1900, costing £6,000, and was opened in 1902 by Sir Henry Thompson....
.
Other writings
His other books include:- Stepchildren of Music (1923)
- The Romance of the Piano (1927)
- A General Index to Modern Musical Literature in the English Language (1927; this indexes periodicals for the years 1915–26)
- The Limitations of Music (1928)
- Mozart (1935; part of the Master Musicians series)
- Beethoven’s Pianoforte Sonatas Discussed (1938)
- A Musical Postbag (1941; collected essays)
- Music in England (1942; rev. 1947)
- Some Great Composers (1944)
- Classics, Major and Minor, with Some Other Musical Ruminations (London, 1958)
- Translated Richard SpechtRichard SpechtRichard Specht was an Austrian lyricist, dramatist, musicologist and writer.Specht is most well known for his writings on classical music, and in his time was seen as a leading music journalist...
’s Johannes Brahms: Leben und Werk eines deutschen Meisters - Translated Weissman’s Music Come to Earth
- Translated the libretto of MozartWolfgang Amadeus MozartWolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
’s Die Entführung aus dem SerailDie Entführung aus dem SerailDie Entführung aus dem Serail is an opera Singspiel in three acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The German libretto is by Christoph Friedrich Bretzner with adaptations by Gottlieb Stephanie...
, which he rendered as The Elopement from the Harem - Tchaikovsky Orchestral Works
- Piano Music of Beethoven
- The Trouble Factory
- The Music Lover’s Miscellany
- Schubert
- Strauss: The rose cavalier
- Diccionario de la Musica
- Bach (The Mayfair Biographies)
- "Delius and America", in The Musical QuarterlyThe Musical QuarterlyThe Musical Quarterly is the oldest academic journal on music in America. Originally established in 1915 by Oscar Sonneck, the journal was edited by Sonneck until his death in 1928...
- Blom contributed the article on Arthur SullivanArthur SullivanSir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...
in the International Cyclopaedia of Music and Musicians (New York, 1939) - He revised H. C. Colles’s "The Growth of Music: a Study in Musical History" (1959)
Sources
- online encyclopedia
- Frank Howes, "Blom, Eric (Walter)" in Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 5th edition, Supplementary Volume, 1961
External links
- Eric Blom at Find-A-Grave