TRANSCRIPTION
24th April 19483
Dear Anthony Wegworth,
Because of April 21 and
April 23 -- two crowded days for
me -- this is the first chance I
have had to thank you for April 20
and I seize it. You provided
not only an admirable dinner, but
anything that goes to make a
happy evening; and if I were given
Page Two
to jealousy, I should be jealous of
any man who had such a son
and such a daughter! Thank
you, sir; and may the (___) glide
on to continue giving us all
the pleasure of knowing so well how
to impart.
Yours ever,
Thomas Wood
If you feel like
a Royal Philharmonic
Society4 concert sometime
will you tell me?
Dr. (_______) -Cobb
NOTES:
1)
L.N.E.R = London Northern Eastern Railway
2)
"Parsonage Hall" in Bures, Suffolk is a "listed" timber framed house
built
(ca.
1400-1499). Bures is a small town northeast of London, near Ipswich.
3) April 24, 1948 was a Saturday
4)
Wood was chairman of the Royal Philharmonic Society
ABOUT THE
COMPOSER
Thomas Wood was born in
Chorley, Lancashire on November 28, 1892. Mus.B (1913), Royal Academy
of Music 1918, M.A. (1920) and later a doctorate. Taught five years at
the Tonbridge School, a boys' school founded in 1553.In 1947, Wood
became chairman of the Royal Philharmonic Society,
Chairman of the Arts Council's Music Panel in 1949 and was a member of
the BBC's Music Advisory Committee.
Wood died at Bures, England on November 19, 1950.
Philip L Scowcroft has compiled an [incomplete] list of
Wood's works (Ref: http://www.musicweb.uk.net/garlands/woodT.htm):
Choral: Comfort, A Country Lullaby, Hay Harvest, Mally O,
Old Winter, Trip and Go and The Seaman's Compass (for
mixed voices), Milking Pails for women's voices, Early Morning
Drinking Song, Together (Marching Song), Salt Beef,
and the Swazi Warrior (for male voices), This England for unison
voices and settings of folk or popular tunes like Bobbie Shaftoe and
Waltzing Matilda for various groupings.
Choral with orchestra: A Ballad of Hampstead Heath (1927), Daniel
and the Lions (premiered on the BBC in January 1939), Over the Hills
and Far Away (1949) based on nursery rhymes. Forty Singing Seamen
(1925), for baritone, chorus and orchestra, Master Mariners (1927)
and Merchantmen (1934) for similar forces and the posthumously
published (1951) The Rainbow: A Tale of Dunkirk for tenor, baritone,
male chorus and brass band.
Unaccompanied: Chanticleer: A Tale for Singing (1947).
Instrumental:
March "with bugles" St. George's Day (ca. 1950), March Six Bells
for brass band, concert overture Suffolk Punch (1930); Daniel and the
Lions (choral and orchestral) was premiered by the BBC in January 1939; a
setting of Greensleeves for strings; two Fanfares entitled General
Salute and C-in-C's Salute for flute, piccolo, E flat clarinet, three
trumpets, three trombones, cymbals and side drum; woodwind quintet entitled
The Brew House at Bures.
REV. 08/06/2004
Back to English Room
1
2