Gareth Morris; flautist & teacher
Hyfler/Rosner
February 27, 2007
Gareth Morris
Flautist and teacher whose students at the Royal Academy of
Music included some of the finest players in Britain
May 13, 1920 - February 14
Gareth Morris was professor of flute at the Royal Academy of
Music for 40 years from 1945 and first flute in the
Philharmonia Orchestra (later the New Philharmonia) from
1948 to 1972. He also played with the Boyd Neel Orchestra,
the London Chamber Orchestra and the Reginald Jacques
Orchestra, among others.
Morris performed on the great Philharmonia recordings of the
1950s under such conductors as Karajan, Klemperer,
Furtwängler, Toscanini, Giulini and Cantelli, and was proud
to have played at the Queen's Coronation in 1953.
When in 1964 the Philharmonia was disbanded by its founder,
Walter Legge, Morris enlisted the assistance of Klemperer
(to whom he was close) in reestablishing the ensemble as the
New Philharmonia, whose chairman Morris subsequently became.
Gareth Charles Walter Morris was born at Clevedon, Somerset,
in 1920. As a schoolboy he travelled to London for lessons
with Robert Murchie, the professor of flute at the Royal
College of Music, where he hoped to study. A confusion over
deadlines led to his application to the college being
rejected; instead, he applied for and received a scholarship
to the Royal Academy of Music.
This, he said, was the best thing that could have happened
as the academy orchestra was conducted by Sir Henry Wood, an
unsurpassed trainer of orchestral musicians. Some of Morris's
fellow students would become the leading players in Britain,
including his friend, the horn virtuoso Dennis Brain.
While still a student Morris was offered important
professional engagements. When the academy refused to
release him from a rehearsal to accept one such engagement,
he resigned his scholarship and left. He returned to the
academy as professor a few years later, at the age of 24.
During the war he served in the RAF Symphony Orchestra, a
superb ensemble that included some of the finest young
musicians in Britain, among them Brain, the bassoonist Cecil
James, the violinist Harry Blech and the members of the
Griller Quartet.
After the war, Morris enjoyed success as a freelance
orchestral musician and soloist. When the Philharmonia was
founded, Walter Legge attempted to persuade Morris to join.
Morris refused, claiming to be happy playing in those
chamber orchestras in London in which standards were higher
than in the big orchestras.
Legge instead employed Arthur Gleghorn as first flute, but
when Gleghorn left to play in Hollywood studios, Legge
approached Morris again and succeeded in hiring him after
promising that there would be no bad conductors. Legge was
true to his word; the Philharmonia only employed conductors
of the first rank, and the orchestra was held by many to be
the best in the world.
The Philharmonia recorded some of the finest performances of
the 1950s: Toscanini's electrifying Brahms symphony cycle of
1951; Karajan's Sibelius cycle; and Klemperer's recordings
of Mahler, Beethoven symphonies and Bach orchestral suites,
Brandenburg concertos and oratorios.
Morris's work in these represents a model of orchestral
playing; never obtrusive and never with an unnecessary
vibrato - he could not abide the sound of a wobbly flute
above a solid orchestral chord and was pleased that in
recent years the wobbly style had lost favour. His sound was
solid and orchestral rather than flashy and soloistic; the
listener does not notice the flute player in a Philharmonia
recording, or indeed any other individual player, except in
places where that player is expected to be noticed.
Gareth Morris was a great raconteur and had countless tales
about the musicians with whom he worked. He recalled that
Toscanini, notorious for his bad temper, was charm itself
with the members of the Philharmonia, who could do what he
asked of them so well that he cut short his rehearsals and
sent the orchestra home.
He had the highest regard for Klemperer, who did not, as is
often claimed, perform Beethoven at a lugubrious tempo, and
also for Karajan, but with Guido Cantelli he had a fiery
relationship.
Gareth Morris's students at the Royal Academy of Music
included some who became the finest players in Britain,
among them David Butt, first flute in the BBC Symphony
Orchestra; David Haslam, of the Northern Sinfonia; Sebastian
Bell, of the London Sinfonietta (who succeeded him as
professor at the academy); Alan Lockwood, of the BBC
Northern Symphony Orchestra; and three successive first
flute players in the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic: Fritz
Spiegl, Atarah Ben-Tovim and Colin Chambers.
His better students found him musically inspiring, if
occasionally somewhat frightening, but many of the weaker
ones found him difficult, and he admitted to having no
sympathy for those students who merely wanted to be
congratulated on their achievements.
He considered himself primarily a musician who happened to
play the flute, and he frankly disliked much of the flute
repertoire. However, he gave the first British performances
of a number of solo works, including the Poulenc sonata and
the Gordon Jacob flute concerto, which was written for him.
In 1972, when he was in New York on tour with the New
Philharmonia, a mugger punched Morris in the mouth, ending
his playing career. He continued to teach and in 1991
produced a small volume, Flute Technique. He also
adjudicated at international competitions and was a trustee
of the Loan Fund for Musical Instruments, a member of the
Arts Council Music Panel and a former warden of the
Incorporated Society of Musicians soloists section.
Gareth Morris was the brother of Christopher Morris, the
former music editor at Oxford University Press, and of the
travel writer Jan Morris.
He is survived by his wife, Patricia, one son and three
daughters, one from a previous marriage.
Gareth Morris, flautist, was born on May 13, 1920. He died
on February 14, 2007, aged 86
nixi...@earthlink.net
He wath greath on "Thaturday Night Live"