Delius, Frederick (1862-1934), composer, of Dutch and German ancestry, born Bradford, Yorks. educated at Bradford Grammar School and the International College, Isleworth.

He at first entered his Father's business of wool importing, travelling to Germany, Sweden and France, but in 1882 he went to Florida to grow oranges. Here he bought a piano and received instruction from the Brooklyn organist, Thomas F. Ward. Delius had played the piano as a small child, and when about 7 years of age had been given violin lessons. After a period of music teaching in America, he returned to Europe in August 1886, and at the Leipzig Conservatoire studied under Hans Sitt, Reinecke and Jadassohn. His orchestral suite, Florida, was performed in 1888, with Grieg and Sinding in the audience.

In 1890 be made Paris his home, where his friends included Ravel, Strindberg and Gauguin, and he met and married the Danish painter, Jelka Rosen. In 1897 he provoked a storm in Norway by his satirical rendering of the national anthem in the incidental music he wrote for Heiberg's play Folkeraadet. In May 1899 his music was performed at the old St James's Hall, London, meeting: with both adverse and enthusiastic criticism. In the same year he settled down on a small property at Grez-sur-Loing, near Fontainebleau, where he lived and composed until his death.

At a Delius festival, organized by Sir Thomas Beecham in London in 1929, aroused much enthusiasm, performances being given of A Mass of life,Appalachia and extracts from the operas Fennimore and Gerda and A Village Romeo and Juliet. A Mass of Life (from Nietzsche's Zararthustra), perhaps his most ambitious composition, was composed in 1904-5. The incidental music for Flecker's Hassan became well known in London by the long run of the play in 1923. His last years were tragically saddened by blindness and paralysis.

Last updated 1st September 2005

And now for the Music