Sir Arthur Sullivan: His Life and Music

Abstract

It will be remembered that, a few months before leaving Leipzig, Sullivan wrote, in a letter to his mother: ‘My great hobby is still conducting. I have been told by many of the masters here that I was born to be a conductor.’ To the youthful musician there is ever something peculiarly attractive in controlling an orchestra. Apart from the feeling of command and the sense of power it gives, there is the keen artistic pleasure to be derived from intimate association with the interpretation and direction of the works of the great masters.

Benjamin William Findon (b. 1859) was Sullivan’s cousin. He achieved distinction both as an organist and as a journalist. His reviews of musical events were read and respected by a large public. In addition to lecturing frequently on Sullivan’s works, he wrote several successful plays, and published volumes of poetry. These two selections document the bitter-sweet relationship of Sullivan to the Leeds Festival, and the manner of his death and interment in St Paul’s Cathedral.