Biography

Peter Pope was born in London in 1917 an was educated at Uppingham School

Uppingham School

Uppingham School is a co-educational independent school of the English public school tradition, situated in the small town of Uppingham in Rutland, England...

 and at the Royal College of Music

Royal College of Music

The Royal College of Music is a conservatoire founded by Royal Charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, England.-Background:The first director was Sir George Grove and he was followed by Sir Hubert Parry...

, where he studied composition with John Ireland

John Ireland (composer)

John Nicholson Ireland was an English composer.- Life :John Ireland was born in Bowdon, near Altrincham, Manchester, into a family of Scottish descent and some cultural distinction. His father, Alexander Ireland, a publisher and newspaper proprietor, was aged 70 at John's birth...

 and R.O. Morris, singing with Freda Swain

Freda Swain

-Biography:Freda Swain was born at Portsmouth, England. She studied with Dora Matthay and at the Royal Academy of Music with Stanford and Arthur Alexander. She earned awards including the Sullivan Prize in 1921....

 and piano with Cyril Smith

Cyril Smith (pianist)

Cyril James Smith OBE was a virtuoso concert pianist of the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, and a piano teacher.-Personal life:...

.
In 1939 he won the Octavia Traveling Scholarship to study composition with Nadia Boulanger

Nadia Boulanger

Nadia Boulanger was a French composer, conductor and teacher who taught many composers and performers of the 20th century.From a musical family, she achieved early honours as a student at the Paris Conservatoire, but believing that her talent as a composer was inferior to that of her younger...

 at the American Conservatoire in Fontainebleau, Paris and it was clear from subsequent documentation that he was one of her inner circle of favoured students. His studies were, however, cut short by the German invasion of Paris in 1940 and, when Nadia Boulanger emigrated to the United States, he had to flee across France, returning to England on a Spanish trawler. He later saw service in the Royal Army Medical Corps

Royal Army Medical Corps

The Royal Army Medical Corps is a specialist corps in the British Army which provides medical services to all British Army personnel and their families in war and in peace...

 and was attached to the 8th Army

Eighth Army (United Kingdom)

The Eighth Army was one of the best-known formations of the British Army during World War II, fighting in the North African and Italian campaigns....

 as it advanced from North Africa through Sicily and Italy.

After the war he composed several chamber works and his major break came in April 1948 when a piano quartet of his was performed at Wigmore Hall

Wigmore Hall

Wigmore Hall is a leading international recital venue that specialises in hosting performances of chamber music and is best known for classical recitals of piano, song and instrumental music. It is located at 36 Wigmore Street, London, UK and was built to provide London with a venue that was both...

. It was favourably reviewed by William Mann, then assistant 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...

, who opined that the new composer's work would be 'watched with expectancy.' Subsequently Augener, the music publisher, offered to publish anything he wrote, but to the great disappointment of his music friends, the new composer turned down the offer and joined an exclusive religious sect, The Brethren

Exclusive Brethren

The Exclusive Brethren are a subset of the Christian evangelical movement generally described as the Plymouth Brethren. They are distinguished from the Open Brethren from whom they separated in 1848....

, which prohibited any involvement with the creative arts. Whilst among the Brethren, he composed very fine hymn tunes for hymns in the Little Flock Hymn Book some of which were published in the Little Flock Tune Book Supplement, 1965.

Pope left the sect in 1971 but was never in a position to re-launch his nascent career. He did however continue to compose prolifically and to this period belong several exquisite song cycles, a Communion Service dedicated to the choir of Liverpool Cathedral

Liverpool Cathedral

Liverpool Cathedral is the Church of England cathedral of the Diocese of Liverpool, built on St James's Mount in Liverpool and is the seat of the Bishop of Liverpool. Its official name is the Cathedral Church of Christ in Liverpool but it is dedicated to Christ and the Blessed Virgin...

, several piano sonatas and works for flute, clarinet, violin, cello and saxophone.

He died in 1991 leaving a large corpus of unpublished and relatively unknown music.

Selected recordings

• Heaven-Haven - Nimbus Alliance NI6135