Alice Verne-Bredt 1868-1958

[giles.enders]

On 30 March 2014, I am having Alice Verne-Bredt's Phantasie Trio performed at Conway Hall.  I have been unable to find out much about her later career or her other compositions.  I believe there is a cello sonata.  This is part of an all women composers concert and will be performed by women.  I am hoping that this will become an annual event.

[giles.enders]

Alice Verne-Bredt Born Southampton  9.8.1868 -  Died 12.4.1958

Alice Barbara Verne, the sixth of ten children born to Bavarian parents with the surname Wurm, who had settled in Southampton, England.  Her father was a music teacher specialising in violin, piano, organ and zither. She was married to the amateur conductor William Bredt.  Her mother was a violinist.  Her eldest sister was the composer and pianist Mary (Marie) Wurm 1860-1938.  The family name was Wurm but Alice and two of her sisters¹ angilcised their name to Verne.

Known compositions:

Chamber

Piano Quintet
Piano Quartet  1908
Phantasie Piano Trio in C minor 1908  pub. by Schott   Cobbett prize winner - performed at Aeolian and Bechstein Halls ( this is a delightful piece lasting about ten minutes and is well worth hearing.  At the time it was written a critic described it as 'high class salon music'  it is more than that though.)
Piano Trio No.2
Piano Trio No.3
Wiegenlied (lullaby) for violin and piano  1911
Cello Sonata

Piano

An arrangement of Pavane: from King Henry VIII's  Pavyn 1924
Valse  1913
Valse Miniature for two pianos  1913
Four easy inventions for young pianists  1920


¹
Mathilde Verne  1865 -1936
Adela Verne  1877 -1952

Adela Verne composed some songs, two of which are in the British Library:
'For me'
'I wonder who'

[eschiss1]

Is it the Phantasie-Trio or one of the other two that's recorded on Meridian, btw?

[Alan Howe]

Copied from Meridian's website:

ALICE VERNE-BREDT - PHANTASIE TRIO (1908)
Moderato – Andante cantabile – Allegretto – Maestoso – Adagio doloroso – Andante cantabile – Allegretto – Maestoso

Alice Verne-Bredt: born Southampton 1868, of German musicians who had settled in England in the 1850s; sister of Marie Wurm (1860–1938), who returned to Germany and enjoyed success as a pianist and composer; Alice had violin lessons early on from her mother, and piano lessons later from Marie Schumann (daughter of Robert and Clara); died London 1958. Phantasie Trio: composed 1908; dedicated to Mrs Fritz Rommel; no record of a contemporary performance found (though the parts used for this recording have pencil markings); first modern performance given by the Summerhayes Trio, 24 April 2002, Culzean Castle, Scotland.

One of ten children, Alice harboured ambitions at an early age of becoming a singer, but sadly, her voice was permanently ruined by typhoid. The family anglicized its name from Wurm to Verne in 1893, and Alice married William Bredt, a keen amateur musician. Alice and William contributed substantially to the success of the piano school set up in London in 1909 by Alice's sister Mathilde (1865–1936). Alice took on sole responsibility for the school's junior department, where her many pupils included Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, later Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, for whom she composed a wedding march.

Despite Alice's compositional fluency, she was mainly self-taught, and although quite prolific, few of her works were published. The Phantasie Trio is a immensely lyrical and dramatic work and won a supplementary prize in the annual chamber music competition inaugurated in 1906 by Walter Cobbett, a wealthy businessman and another keen amateur musician. Entries for Cobbett's competition had to be works of one movement in several contrasting sections. The Phantasie Trio is in the form A-B-C-A2-B-C-Coda, and there are contrasts between dramatic, lyrical and playful music. The work's focal central section is a slowed-down version of the opening theme, presented with a new rhythmic emphasis. The players asked to play in a doloroso manner, invoking a pathos typical of the Romantic period. The reappearances of the B and C sections are somewhat shortened, and the coda dies away with one last utterance of the opening theme.
http://www.meridian-records.co.uk/acatalog/info_422.html

[giles.enders]

If any one knows where her other works can be found, I would be interested to see them.. The other trios for instance.

[eschiss1]

5 other items are at the British Library or elsewhere (via Worldcat) (an arr. of "Pavane : from King Henry VIII's Pavyn (MS. in British Museum)" for solo piano, pub.1924; "Wiegenlied (Lullaby) : für Violine oder Violoncello und Pianoforte" (pub. Leuckart, 1911); "Valse miniature, for two pianos" (pub.1913); "4 Easy Inventions for young pianists" (pub.1920); and a "Valse" (pub.1913, possibly the same as the Valse miniature though different publisher).) Don't know where the trios are at, though. The article in "the Music-Student" in 1914 does mention specifically that the piano quintet is in MS. The piano quartet seems not to have been premiered until 1914, though it is mentioned as having been one of the earliest of the works.