Thomas O'Brien Butler

Thomas O'Brien Butler (3 November 1861 – 7 May 1915; lost on the Lusitania), Irish composer whose chief claim to fame is the Irish-language opera Muirgheis (1903).

Biography

O'Brien Butler, as he was generally known, was born in Caherciveen, County Kerry, the youngest child of Pierce Butler (c.1804-1873), a shopkeeper in the village, and Ellen Webb (c.1818-1876). There is no source for his correct surname. Baker's Dictionary[1] indicates that his surname was Whitwell; when he registered at the Royal College of Music in London, his name was noted as Thomas Whitwell-Butler. He does not seem to have been directly related to another O'Brien Butler family from Ireland who lost three brothers in World War I.[2]

Before going to London he grew up in an environment steeped in traditional music. His musical education began in Italy,[1] but it is not known when and where exactly. He enrolled at the Royal College of Music in February 1897 at the rather advanced age of 35 and stayed for three terms only, studying composition with Charles Villiers Stanford and Walter Parratt. Baker's Dictionary also says that Butler travelled extensively and spent some time in India, where his opera Muirgheis was written, but it is not certain whether these travels took place before or after his London studies. A song composition published in Dublin in 1900 is dedicated to "His Highness Rajendrah Singh, Maharajah of Patiala" (see 'Selected works'). In an obituary, the Kerry Evening Post confirms that Muirgheis was written in Kashmir, northern India.[3] After around 1900 he mainly lived in Rathfarnham, Dublin, in a house he had called Muirgheis.

Butler died during World War I, when a German torpedo hit the passenger vessel Lusitania on 7 May 1915 just off the southern Irish coast near Kinsale. Butler was on his way back from New York. Baker's Dictionary (1958 edition) claimed that he was on his way home from a concert performance of Muirgheis in New York, while other sources suggest he was returning from making "tentative arrangements for the production of his opera the following year".[4] A photograph of the composer from the Cork Examiner, 11 May 1915, was reprinted in a 2004 documentary book.[5]

Music

Butler wrote a number of songs and some chamber music, but Muirgheis remained his only major score. The plot of the opera abounds in Celticist clichés featuring "names redolent of Irish mythology such as Diarmuid, Donn, and a number of sea fairies", taking place "at the dawn of Christianity".[6] The music makes use of pentatonic scales and numerous melodic and rhythmic allusions to Irish traditional music, but only once quotes from an original Irish lament in a tune Butler claimed he had known from his childhood.[7] Muirgheis was promoted as "The first Irish opera", i.e. the first opera in the Irish (Gaelic) language. This is true for the printed score (and probably for the original intentions), however at the first performance in 1903 an English translation was used, in which George Moore was involved. Since the opera was not repeated, the first opera that was really performed in Irish became Eithne (1909) by Robert O'Dwyer.

The reception of the work, particularly in terms of its musical quality, was highly controversial – both after a performance of excerpts in June 1902 and after its full performance in December 1903. A critic in the Irish Times wrote: "One would fain encourage Irish art, but it must be confessed that Muirgheis does not possess the elements of popularity. We do not think that it is more characteristically Irish than Stanford's Shamus O'Brien. […] Mr O'Brien Butler has not yet attained the art of writing a good opera."[8] Another critic wrote "We are very sorry to have to criticise so severely a work intended to be thoroughly Irish. But it would be a bad service to Irish music to praise a composition merely because it is Irish."[9] Others including John Millington Synge[10] and Edward Martyn had more positive views.

The few other compositions by Butler that survived are small-scale chamber music pieces and songs, which, like the opera, make obvious attempts at reconciling Irish and European musical traditions. His Irish Sonata (1904) for violin and piano was championed by Arthur Darley for many years, while the song Kincora from the Seven Original Irish Melodies (1903) was a test piece for soprano at the Feis Ceoil (Irish competitive music festival) in May 1915.

Selected works

Bibliography

External links

References

  1. 1 2 Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians (New York: Schirmer, 1940; also in 5th edition, 1958)
  2. ↑ See webpage "A tragic loss".
  3. ↑ "The Lusitania Tragedy – A Kerry Victim", in: Kerry Evening Post, 12 May 1915.
  4. ↑ "An Echo of the Lusitania", in: The Irish Times, 7 September 1929, p. 4.
  5. ↑ Senan Molony: Lusitania. An Irish Tragedy (Cork: Mercier Press, 2004), p. 65.
  6. ↑ Quotes from Klein (2005), p. 55; see Bibliography.
  7. ↑ See published score of Muirgheis, p. 170; quoted in Klein (1996), p. 150.
  8. ↑ "Irish Opera at the Theatre Royal", in: The Irish Times, 8 December 1903.
  9. ↑ Heinrich Bewerunge, in: Irish Musical Monthly, 1 July 1902, p. 58.
  10. ↑ Klein (2005), p. 56; see Bibliography.
  11. 1 2 3 See score at IMSLP.
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