When discovering more about the life of one of Ireland’s most prolific female composers, Ina Boyle (1889-1967), it's only right to also pay tribute to another incredible female composer whose steadfast friendship and loyalty have been crucial in preventing Boyle's works from remaining hidden. This piece pays tribute to the timeless friendship of Ina Boyle and the remarkable composer, Dame Elizabeth Maconchy (1907-1994).
Elizabeth Maconchy and Ina Boyle, 1955.
IBSL would like to thank and acknowledge Nicola LeFanu for providing the photograph.
As a woman navigating the major historical, social, and political shifts of 20th-century Ireland, Ina Boyle persevered despite personal family commitments that kept her mainly residing in rural Ireland and making few musical contacts. She left a significant body of work, including chamber, vocal, orchestral, and choral works, as well as opera and ballet.
Thankfully, Ina’s mentor, the great Ralph Vaughan Williams' prophecy – ‘I think it is most courageous of you to go on with so little recognition. The only thing to say is that it sometimes does come finally’ – is now coming to fruition. However, without the crucial support of Maconchy, Boyle’s works may have remained unheard.
Born to Irish parents in Hertfordshire, England, Elizabeth Maconchy spent a significant period of her childhood in Ireland. Maconchy ‘was composing for the piano from the age of six and received lessons in piano and music theory in Dublin’ (Source: Dictionary of Irish Biography). Sadly, in 1922, her father, Gerald, passed away. Following this sad time and supported by her mother, who recognised her enormous musical talent, Maconchy ventured to London, where she studied at the Royal College of Music under another champion of Ina Boyle, Ralph Vaughan Williams.
Maconchy most certainly experienced the challenges faced by women in the 20th century who sought to compose. Writing in the ‘Composer’ journal in 1971, under the article titled ‘A Composer Speaks’ (Composer, 1971), she recalled, “So coming to London as a music student was a first plunge into life, and once I had found my feet I enjoyed my time at the R.C.M. immensely. I was lucky enough to win prizes and scholarships and even had a work played by the college orchestra, which was a rare event in those days. But what did one do next, particularly if one were a girl? Sir Hugh Allen said, "If we give you the Mendelssohn Scholarship, you will only get married and never write another note." (Reference: Maconchy, Elizabeth. (Winter 1971-72). A Composer Speaks. Composer, 42, 25-29)
“But what did one do next, particularly if one were a girl?
Sir Hugh Allen said, “If we give you the Mendelssohn Scholarship you will only get married and never write another note.” ”
Dame Elizabeth Maconchy.
IBSL would like to thank and acknowledge Nicola LeFanu for providing the photograph.
As with Boyle, Vaughan Williams was also a great supporter of his pupil, Maconchy, of whom she commented, regarding studying with RVW, ‘it was like turning on a light’. This special bond can be seen in their many correspondences. Signing a number of his letters to her as ‘Uncle Ralph’, the Vaughan Williams Foundation is a treasure trove of those letters and shines an invaluable light on both their professional and personal relationship with a sense of realism and support. One such letter to Maconchy in 1944 illustrates that sense of realism and just how difficult it was to work as a composer.
“But, dearest Betty, you know how impossible it is to judge of a brand new work absolutely on first hearing.
So we want to hear it several times
All my love
Uncle Ralph ”
Our dear friend, the late Dr. Ita Beausang, wrote about this difficulty for composers, particularly women, citing the support Ina had from Elizabeth: ‘After Vaughan Williams’s death, Boyle continued to compose, although women composers faced many challenges from concert promoters and publishers. Her friend Elizabeth Maconchy provided safekeeping at Downton Castle for some of Boyle’s scores which could not be posted to Ireland during the war and acted as an intermediary between her and publishers and other agencies. In August 1967, Maconchy listed Boyle’s music in a small green notebook under four categories: ORCHESTRAL, CHORAL, CHAMBER MUSIC, OPERA.’
“Boyle left instructions in her will for her trustee to consult Elizabeth Maconchy ‘as to all matters relating to her music as she is the only person who is intimately acquainted with it and my wishes about it.”
Her personal tribute, Ina Boyle: An Appreciation, with a Select List of her Music, was published for Trinity College by the Dolmen Press in 1974. Boyle left instructions in her will for her trustee to consult Elizabeth Maconchy ‘as to all matters relating to her music as she is the only person who is intimately acquainted with it and my wishes about it.’
IBSL thanks David Byers for kindly supplying the image.
For further information, please visit ByersMusic.com
Maconchy wrote of Boyle, “Ina’s inspiration almost always came from poetry: even her purely instrumental works were usually headed by a quotation, a few lines, perhaps, which had set off a train of thought and fired her musical imagination.
Her choice of words reflected her wide reading, from translations of early Gaelic poems or medieval Latin lyrics through the poetry of John Donne to that of Edith Sitwell, for which she had a particular affinity. She was always faithful to the mood and meaning underlying the words and to their shape and rhythm, never distorting them for musical effect, but allowing them to speak more fully through her music.”
For further information, please visit ByersMusic.com
Professor Nicola LeFanu
In 1997, Maconchy’s daughter, IBSL Patron, composer, teacher, director, Professor Nicola LeFanu, presented a collection of Boyle’s manuscripts, sketches, and printed music dating from 1922 to 1966 to the Library of Trinity College Dublin. The Boyle archive, which can be accessed online on TCD Digital Collections, has proved invaluable for researchers and performers of her music.
IBSL is hugely grateful to Professor Nicola LeFanu, who wrote, “My mother held Ina’s music in high regard and often tried to get more attention paid to it. After Ina’s death, my mother arranged for the manuscripts to go to the library at TCD, and she also published a short memoir of Ina, since at that date people knew all too little about Ina and her music.”
Writing in 2007 for the Journal of the British Music Society, Professor LeFanu gave a remarkable insight into the life of her mother, a fascinating source for readers, researchers, and musicians alike. Professor LeFanu too shines a further light on the friendship between Ina and Elizabeth, writing that when the latter’s "ballet ‘Puck Fair’ (1939/40) was performed in Ireland, of which Elizabeth was absent, it was Ina who orchestrated the piece for her."
To read more by Professor Nicola LeFanu, please visit here.
“My mother held Ina’s music in high regard and often tried to get more attention paid to it. ”
Affectionately known as ‘Betty’, Maconchy’s musical legacy includes a significant contribution to string music, notably her thirteen string quartets composed throughout her career, a lasting legacy of her chamber music work. She also penned a substantial output of choral and vocal music and three one-act operas. Notable works include, but are by no means exhaustive, String Quartet No. 5, The Land (1929), Proud Thames (1953), Héloïse and Abelard (1978), and the aforementioned one-act operas: The Sofa, The Departure, and The Three Strangers.
Writing for the British Music Collection, Martin Anderson celebrates the life of Maconchy, whose “accomplishments are to be marvelled; she chaired the Composers’ Guild of Great Britain, was President of the Society for the Promotion of New Music, and in 1987 was appointed Dame of the British Empire.”
Please see this link to read more, and Maconchy’s music records are listed here also on the British Music Collection website.
The timeless friendship of ‘Ina and Betty’ is not only heartening, as they so clearly meant so much to one another on a personal and professional sphere, but they also demonstrate how each championed women in music in a period of history that, regardless of their efforts to succeed, placed so many obstacles in their way. To look back on both legacies of Boyle and Maconchy is to acknowledge and celebrate two remarkable women who pursued their passions for music, gifting future generations with timeless pieces that will live on.
Boyle and Maconchy’s composer contemporaries include greats such as Joan Trimble and Rhoda Coghill, and at IBSL our mission is to champion female composers, past, present, and future. We have so much more to learn from Boyle, Maconchy and all of these remarkable women, and hope you will join us at IBSL as we continue to champion their work.
This is just the beginning!
IBSL would like to pay particular thanks to Professor Nicola LeFanu.