# Unknown Composer #7: Cyril Scott



## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

*Cyril Scott (1879-1970)*

I. Life and Works
II. Recommended Listening

Life and Works:

Cyril Scott was born in Oxton, Cheshire in 1879. During his childhood and early adolescence, he wanted to become a concert pianist. At age 12, he enrolled in a music conservatory in Frankfurt to study piano performance. However, by the time that he reached his late teens, he had decided to become a composer instead. At that point, he returned to the conservatory and met several leading composers, including Percy Grainger.

Scott's first major composition was his Symphony No. 1, published in 1900. Two years later, he published his Second Symphony (1902). Largely on the basis of these two works, he quickly achieved fame as one of the leading composers in the UK. Many other works soon followed, including numerous piano miniatures, many of which evoked exotic images and locales. These works include Lotus Land, Indian Suite, Impressions of the Jungle Book, and A Song From the East. He also wrote tone poems, a piano sonata, songs, operas, a cello concerto, choral works, and many chamber pieces.

His style was heavily influenced by French Impressionism. Much of his music makes use of whole-tone scales, parallel harmonies, and pentatonic harmonies. However, some of his works depart from the Impressionistic aesthetic through their emphasis on counterpoint. His contrapuntal works include his Piano Sonata No. 1, Op. 66, in which the last movement is a fugue in a highly chromatic idiom.

Scott was a polymath who engaged with many diverse fields. His interests extended far beyond music. He was passionate about alternative medicine. He wrote several books about the therapeutic benefits of various foods, herbs and sauces - an unusual endeavor for a composer, but consistent with his interdisciplinary, eclectic approach to knowledge. Another prominent feature of his personality was his obsession with occult beliefs. He believed in reincarnation, and he even dedicated some of his pieces to his former self!

Scott's artistic projects also encompassed poetry and painting, two fields which he pursued avidly when he wasn't busy composing or writing about medicine. In fact, he prefaced some of his piano works with poems that he himself had written. Many of his poems, like his piano pieces, describe exotic and mystical images. His poetic style is highly ornate and descriptive, with frequent references to Eastern philosophy and spiritual beliefs.

His music (as well as his non-musical works such as poems and medical books) were well received in his lifetime. However, he is not very well-known nowadays. Perhaps his compositional style came to be viewed as old-fashioned or excessively derivative from Debussy. In any case, I believe that his music deserves more attention. His charming blend of exoticism and mysticism appeals to me, and I hope that some of you on TC share my interest in this eccentric Impressionist!


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

*Recommended listening:*

Impressions from the Jungle Book:





Lotus Land:





Neptune, Symphonic Poem:





Cello Concerto:


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

> He believed in reincarnation, and he even dedicated some of his pieces to his former self!


This bit is hilarious.


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

eugeneonagain said:


> This bit is hilarious.


Yes, it is! I suspect that he must have been aware of the humor; he couldn't have been _entirely _serious about those wacky dedications of his. I'm assuming that he was being a bit tongue-in-cheek about his obsession with reincarnation. :lol:


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

With regard to his serious composition though, I've really started to enjoy Scott. I love his piano pieces, especially _Vistas_. I hadn't heard the _Impressions from the Jungle Book_ you posted.

I read on another site that he carried on composing until his nineties, right up to his death, but that he was still only remembered for Lotus Land and even that was a faded memory. A pity really. Years back when I was learning piano or talking to people about music I never heard his name mentioned or came across his works in books of piano music.


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