“To be human” program note
The name Dulcie Holland to many Australian music students and musicians conjures up memories of music theory, harmony writing and musicianship training materials, however her career was rich and multi-faceted: she was an active performer, composer, author, teacher, arranger, adjudicator and examiner, besides her personal life as a wife and mother. Dulcie Holland was born in Sydney in 1913, and studied piano (with Frank Hutchens), cello (with Gladstone Bell) and composition (with Alfred Hill) at the New South Wales State Conservatorium, before travelling to England to study composition at the Royal College of Music under John Ireland. At the outbreak of WWII she returned home to Sydney, although revisiting England some years later, with her young family, to study with serialist composer Matyas Seiber. In 1940, Holland married conductor Alan Belhouse, and while she continued to compose under her maiden name, she also published a number of children’s books under her married name of Dulcie Belhouse. Holland composed a broad range of solo and chamber instrumental works, choral and orchestral works, as well as film music for over 40 documentaries on Australia with the Department of Interior. Amongst other awards, Holland received the AO in 1977, and together with life-long friend Miriam Hyde she was awarded an honorary doctorate from Macquarie University in 1993.
Cradle song for a special child was originally written as a string quartet, dedicated to Douglas Emery, son of Sydney-based musicians Leone Ziegler and Pierre Emery, and was premiered on 11 July 1993 during Douglas’ christening, by the Gagliano Quartet, in Mosman, Sydney. The work was arranged for piano trio by the composer for cellist, Cedric Ashton (1910-2001) in 1995. It features a simple, harmonically static melody in the violin, accompanied by a rocking quaver ostinato in the piano and F pedal drones in the cello. As the texture develops, fragments of the material travel through various modulations and there is frequent use of richly chromatic harmonies. The coda is built on fragments of theme, gradually relaxing into F major, the final chord coloured by a flattened 7th.
Photo credit: David Franklin, 1988