He GIVES THE PUBLIC WHAT IT LIKES

New Zealand Listener, Volume 11, Issue 284, 1 December 1944, Page 10

He GIVES THE PUBLIC WHAT IT LIKES

Fred Hartley For ABC RED HARTLEY, who is due to arrive in Australia soon to supervise light music for the Australian Broadcasting Commission, is considered by fellow-musi-cians to be the only man in Britain who can put on music that appeals equally and consistently to both young and old, to dance enthusiasts and elderly fireside listeners, The music he plays (says the ABC Weekly). ranges from Puccini to Eric Coates and Cole Porter. He doesn’t go in for hot jazz, but includes novelty dances such as "Chicken Reel" and "The Irish Washerwoman." As well as orchestrating and broadcasting other people’s music, Hartley does a lot of composition himself, some of it under the name of Iris Taylor. sapien) His own instrument is the piano, but he has studied violin, viola and ’cello, and though he doesn’t play them, musicians say he has "everything under his fingers" when he comes to write for strings. It is possible to play any Hartley composition, they claim, because he writes with actual, not merely theoretical, knowledge of the capabilities of the instrument and the performer. (continued on next page)

(continued from previous page)

Hartley is 39, of medium height, and speaks with a slight Scottish burr, a telic of his home town, Dundee. In the 20 years he has been broadcasting, millions have heerd him, but few outside the BBC have seen him-he has refused to give "live" performances in night clubs or theatres. Took in Washing Before he became Director of Light Music for the BBC’s Overseas Service he had a varied career, mainly musical, but with one excursion into the handlaundry business and another into his own music-publishing house, ‘A violinist at the age of four, tare ley went over to the piano, and at 16 was the official accompanist at the Royal

Academy of Music. He has played concerts under Sir Henry Wood and Sir Alexander MacKenzie. For the next two years he played in dance bands and music halls. After conducting for a time at the biggest music hall in Stockholm, he returned to Britain and was engaged as an accompanist in the BBC’s Dundee studio. Five years later, he went to London, where he formed his Novelty Quintet. All Serious Musicians He was among the first to use singers as an integral part of a Jight music ensemble. When Vera Lynn won success on the BBC, Hartley was her accompanist. For his own programmes he does almost everything, including the writing of scripts. His sextet consists of first violin, viola, ’cello, saxophone, and

clarinet, bass, and Hartley at the piano. The players are all frontrank ‘serious musicians, _and at one time the ‘cellist was also a professor at the Royal Academy of Music. Outstanding singers who have performed with the sextet have included Cavan O’Connor, the "Vagabond Lover," Webster Booth, one of England’s leading ~ tenors, who is now appearing in musical comedy, and (for six years) the. Australian Brian Lawrence. Brian Lawrence, dance band leader at one of Sydney’s best known night clubs, says. of ‘Hartley: "He is a very exacting leader, but a grand person to work with. He is very punctual himself, and very strict at rehearsals. Anyone who talks too much or makes a habit of being late is out. He is quiet — never boisterous — thorough and stubborn--he has his own set ideas. I wouldn’t even suggest

"what key I should sing in, because he knew exactly what it should be, and he was always right. He is never satisfied until a number is played the way he wants it, and he expects the performance to be the same as the rehearsal." During Lawrence’s association with Hartley, each year on June 22 the sextet held a stag party to which no one outside the sextet was invited. The occasion was the anniversary of Lawrence’s first broadcast with Hartley.