Summary
MALCOLM Williamson, the last Master of the Queen's Musick, became a figure of fun after failing to produce works for royal occasions.
Starting with the Queen's Jubilee in 1977, when a fourth symphony was delivered one movement short and rejected by conductor Bernard Haitink, the troubled composer got into repeated deadline difficulties and other public scrapes, on one occasion being removed in handcuffs from a plane at Sydney Airport after imbibing too liberally in business class. His music dried up and, by the time of his death in March 2003, Williamson was a lost cause, forlorn and unperformed.See the full content of this document
Extract
Queen's Master Who Wrote No Musick
A clinical biography by Anthony Meredith and Paul Harris, out next week ...
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