ROSALIND ELLICOTT : British Composer 1857-1924

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ROSALIND ELLICOTT by Dr David C.F. Wright

© David Wright Ph.D
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During the lifetime of Rosalind Frances Ellicott (1857— 1924) a woman composer was regarded as a freak and an intruder into a male preserve. The criticism of her choral works, made by male critics incidentally, were that they were not masculine enough for the subject matter she chose.
It may largely have been the fact that her father, the Right Reverend C. John Ellicott, was the Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol from 1893 that enabled Rosalind to have works performed at the Three Choirs Festival held in rotation at Hereford. Worcester and Gloucester. She was as also a very determined and ambitious person. In 1883, the year of Wagner’s death, her song, To The Immortals, was encored at Gloucester. In September 1886 her Dramatic Overture was performed there as well. Earlier that year her Overture to Spring had been performed elsewhere. Elysium, for soprano, chorus and orchestra was the First of two large-scale cantatas to he heard in Gloucester in 1889 and three years later The Birth of Song, for soprano, tenor and orchestra was performed. The influence of church music is evident in these works and yet, curiously he father was not at all interested in music. Her mother was a singer, a member of the Handel Society which served as an encouragement to her talented daughter.
The Cheltenham Festival premiered Radiant Sister of the Dawn in 1887 and A Festive Overture in 1893. Following a successful performance of her part-song Bring the Bright Garland at the Bristol Madrigal Society in 1890 she was elected to membership of the Incorporated Society of Musicians. In 1895 a Fantasie in A minor, for piano and orchestra was given its first performance at Gloucester and repeated at the Crystal Palace the following year then at the Westminster Orchestral Society concert in 1897.
From the turn of the century Ellicott turned her attention to chamber music very little of which has survived such as the Quartet in B flat, although this had been written in 1883-4, two Piano Trios. a Sonata for
violin and piano and a Piano Quartet first given in London in May 1900. A Sketch for violin and piano was published by Schott and a Reverie for cello and piano appeared with Novello along with Elysium and The Birth of Song’. This change of direction was probably prompted by the Philharmonic Society in London rejecting her orchestral works. Having only seen two scores I can only say that her music, devoid of pomposity and tedious sequences, bears some resemblance to that of her almost exact contemporary Elgar.
To complete the details of her life, Rosalind was born in Cambridge on 14 November 1857. She entered the Royal Academy of Music in 1874 studying the piano for two years. She took subsequent composition lessons from Thomas Wingham until 1881 and enjoyed some early successes with performances of her work. In 1896 she gave a series of highly successful concerts of her music in the Queen’s Hall, London and established her own series of chamber music concerts in Gloucester in the earls 1900s. She is lived in London until the early 1920s when she moved to the seaside in Kent. She died in London on 5 April 1924. She is buried with her parents in the churchyard at Birchington on Sea, Kent.
It was largely due to activities of Ethel Smyth, and then to Ruth Gipps, to establish, in this country equality for women composers. It is readily accepted that there are many excellent women composers who have more than proved their worth. Perhaps there is call to investigate women composers of previous generations such as Rosalind Ellicott.
© David Wright

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