Thomas Gray

New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 799, 12 November 1954, Page 21

Thomas Gray

"T HERE’S an old army joke about the volunteer pianist who was told off to dig slit trenches, but fate was a little kinder than that to Thomas Gray when he enlisted during the First World War. He already had a considerable musical life behind him, including study at the Royal College of Music, and he was lucky enough to serve as a trumpeter in the cavalry band of the Seventh Queen’s Own Hussars. When he came to New Zealand in 1939 and settled down as orchestrator and arranger to the Centennial Symphony Orchestra, he told a newspaper reporter, "You mustn’t expect anything too highly-coloured from me, you know." But Thomas Gray is a modest man, and his Festival Overture which was performed by the National Orchestra last December is a gay and colourful work. It was described by one critic as "boisterous, hearty, holiday fun." In addition he has written a symphony, a ’cello concerto, a tone poem and several instrumental works on a smaller scale. But perhaps Thomas Gray has made his greatest mark in music as an arranger. His orchestrations of arias and songs for such artists as Heddle Nash, Oscar Natzka, and Isobel Baillie, who sang with the Centennial Orchestra, | were highly regarded. In 1940, with the formation of the NBS String Orchestra, he was engaged to build a library of orchestrations particularly suited to this

group. He created over 200 arrangements, transcriptions and compositions that were featured in dinner music and more serious programmes by the orchestra. He has arranged for all musical combinations from solo voice to symphony orchestra, and has also reconstructed works for orchestra from the piano score. In the current Music by New Zealand Composers series his Ques- ) tions and Answer suite, and his arrangements of two folk songs, "Jock o’ Hazeldean" and "Bonnie Wee Thing," are played by the Alex Lindsay String Orchestra. =