Composer, flautist, teacher, painter and writer, born in Northampton, who from the age of 15 studied flute with Daniel Wood and composition with John McEwen at the Royal Academy of Music. In 1926 he became professor of composition there, in 1927 joining the London Symphony Orchestra as a flautist, combining the two careers for a decade. From 1936 Alwyn was a prolific composer of film scores, by his death having worked on 86 feature films, notably with the director Carol Reed, and 107 documentaries. The former included The Way Ahead, 1944, with Reed, and with him also The Fallen Idol, 1948, and The Running Man, 1963. Among the documentaries were the director and artist Humphrey Jennings’ 1942 Crown Film Unit classic Fires Were Started and the David MacDonald-directed Desert Victory, 1943, which Variety called “The greatest battle film of the war”.
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Composing for films honed Alwyn’s technique, which was well demonstrated in his five symphonies plus additional instrumental, choral and vocal works. As a composer Alwyn was self-critical, some of the major pre-World War II scores which had been suppressed by him being revived and recorded only after he died. Strength of emotion was a strong characteristic of Alwyn’s music, painting and writing. After his death his work was promoted by The William Alwyn Foundation. In 1979 Alwyn showed his paintings with sculpture by Lesley Scott at Halesworth Gallery in Suffolk. In addition, when Chandos issued its long series of compact discs of his music it astutely chose to feature Alwyn’s pictures on the cover. Thus in 1993 CHAN 9155, of the first symphony and first piano concerto, featured his painting Dartmoor; CHAN 9187, of the third symphony and violin concerto, his picture Stubble Field; and CHAN 9196, of the fifth symphony and second piano concerto, his painting The Magic Mountain. Alwyn’s wife was the composer Doreen Carwithen. CHAN 9524, issued in 1997, featuring her orchestral works, was accompanied by Alwyn’s Portrait of my Wife, and CHAN 9596, 1998, of her first and second string quartets and violin sonata, illustrated Alwyn’s Portrait of Doreen Carwithen.
Text source: 'Artists in Britain Since 1945' by David Buckman (Art Dictionaries Ltd, part of Sansom & Company)
