Revisiting Alfred Hill (1869–1960): Examining Issues of Reception and Compositional Approach

Abstract

Alfred Hill has been described as ‘conservative’ and ‘anti-modernist,’ and as a composer with an ‘anachronistic’ musical language which lacks ‘originality.’ While some of these descriptions may accurately represent particular genres or specific works among his output, assessments of Hill to date fail to represent adequately the impact of historical and geographical context on Hill’s music. This has resulted in an incomplete picture of his musical contribution. I argue that the variability of Hill’s musical reception needs to be understood in terms of aesthetic notions prevailing within his historical and cultural context, namely originality, individuality, innovation, novelty, sincerity and tradition. Furthermore, I also argue that these ideas are central to a more nuanced understanding of the development of Hill’s aesthetic views and, by extension, his compositional approach.

In this study I draw on a range of primary source data previously unexamined in studies of Hill, and also provide a re-examination of better-known data from different perspectives. In particular, a reception history of Hill’s music is constructed through newspaper criticism, scholarly writings, recordings, publications, broadcasts and performances in order to show how the changing attitudes evident in responses to Hill’s music reflect the changing concepts of the key aesthetic notion of originality. In order to understand better why these changes occur, related concepts within the broader Australian and European contexts of Hill’s time are also examined, particularly by drawing on the writings of critics, music commentators and scholars. Then, as a means to establishing reasons for the continuity of Hill’s compositional approach, the development of his aesthetic views through documentary analysis of his own diary, letters, interviews, autobiographical writings and performance repertoire explored. The dynamics between continuity and change in Hill’s compositional approach are explored in case studies of two works—the string quartets (1911–1939) and the Mass in E flat (1931).