Their house was silent, almost eerily so. Mary kept it that way so nothing would disturb William as he composed. She was completely dedicated to William and his work \u2013 guests remembered her as quiet and unassuming, and terrible at making tea.<\/p>\n
Few realised that Mary Alwyn had once been a famous composer herself, and a quite different woman altogether. Born Doreen Mary Carwithen, she changed her name after she and William eloped to Suffolk in 1961, eventually becoming his wife in 1975. It\u2019s at least partly because of this relationship that Carwithen\u2019s name is still relatively unfamiliar today. She put her career aside to promote his.<\/p>\n
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<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>It was only after William died in 1985 that she allowed herself a small re-emergence as a composer, and in the 1990s oversaw the recording of her string quartets, Violin Sonata and some of her orchestral works. Carwithen\u2019s fame has been slowly growing since then, and her centenary this year has been celebrated with the first ever festival dedicated to her, and country-wide performances including at the BBC Proms<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n It\u2019s unsurprising that Carwithen\u2019s music is enjoying a renaissance. Her style is utterly captivating. She can just as easily write energetic, rhythmically driven music as she can intimate, introspective pieces built on luminous harmonies and lingering chords. And shining through in all her works is a pure, unadulterated love of melody. She never embraced atonality or experimentalism \u2013 she belongs to the same brand of 20th-century British composition as William Walton<\/strong><\/a>, Grace Williams and Benjamin Britten<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n <\/p><\/div> <\/section> Carwithen received her first musical training from her mother, Dulcie. She had wanted to be a concert pianist herself, and gave music lessons to her two daughters, Doreen and Barbara. Both went on to study at the Royal Academy of Music, where Doreen started out as a pianist and cellist in 1941. Judging by her works that feature the cello and piano, she was clearly an accomplished performer on both instruments, but it was at the Academy that she began the harmony lessons that would change the direction of her life.<\/p>\n It was these classes that ultimately resulted in her shift of focus to composition \u2013 and they were also where she first met William Alwyn. He was assigned as her harmony tutor, and even though he was already married, the two began a passionate relationship that would be conducted in secret for nearly 20 years.<\/p>\n Presumably, at least part of what attracted Alwyn to Carwithen was her obvious compositional talent. He recognised her abilities from the songs that she brought to her first lessons, and encouraged her to continue writing larger works. Much of her student pieces have been lost, but those which survive show that Carwithen had a remarkably assured, original voice from very early on. The 1943 Nocturne <\/em>and Humoresque <\/em>for cello and piano already have many of the trademarks of her later works \u2013 bold rhythms are mixed with piquant harmonies, always with an eye for virtuosic flair.<\/p>\n The most remarkable work of these years is perhaps the Piano Sonatina (1945-6). This is very much a pianist\u2019s piece; its sprightly outer movements that whizz and snap along like firecrackers demand a formidable technique, but they are balanced by a meditative second movement that is so economically constructed that it allows the performer a real interpretative flexibility. The Sonatina was premiered by Carwithen\u2019s classmate and lifelong friend, pianist Violet Graham. She was an important interpreter of Carwithen\u2019s early works, and also premiered some of Carwithen\u2019s songs with the soprano Elizabeth Cooper.<\/p>\n![\"""\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/24\/2022\/10\/GettyImages1088131236cmyk-c976708.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C349"\" "\\"\"\"\\"\/")
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