“THEN PEOPLE SAID THAT THEY DIDN'T THINK THE PIECE WAS AS BAD AS THEY THOUGHT IT WOULD BE, AND I GUESS THAT WILL HAPPEN AGAIN!” Pop, jazz, rock, classical…it all seems the same for David Bedford, whose life as a composer seems to have encompassed just about every style and genre known to musicians in the Western world. Whether it be his eclectic style, his early collaborations with Mike Oldfield or his later work with Elvis Costello, Billy Bragg and Enya, this one-time pupil of Luigi Nono has been a leading British composer for over a quarter of a century. His new composition, Like a Strand of Scarlet, commissioned by The Academy of Ancient Music, seems set to raise a few eyebrows in the often-fussy period-instrument world. MusicTeachers.co.uk contacted him to find our more…

“I suppose I was lucky”, said David Bedford at the time of our conversation, “that I came from a very musical background. My mother was an opera singer who premiered several Britten works, including Albert Herring and The Little Sweep, and my paternal grandmother, Liza Lehmann, was a famous composer who wrote Edwardian parlour ballads and song cycles. Although they weren’t written in the style I would personally choose, the fact that there was a composer in the family was very encouraging.” Given this, it is hardly surprising that both David, and his brother Steuart, showed aptitudes for music from an early age. But rather than learn an instrument, Bedford seemed committed to becoming a composer, the first forays into which came at the age of seven when he set about writing an opera. “I only got as far as the overture – my mother showed me how to notate it – but I guess that even then composing was fairly instinctive.” With evident potential, he was provided with lessons from a local organist, who was to guide and shape his interest through his teens.

Thoughts of higher education, however, had to wait. Opting to become a conscientious objector rather than do two years’ compulsory National Service, he worked as a hospital porter, making sure that he got onto the late shift so that he would have time to compose music. A scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music followed, where he was to study for three years with the composer Lennox Berkeley. “Musically, it was a stimulating time…although we did little other than play Bach cantatas with me knocking out the bass line whilst Lennox played the other parts; he didn’t force his students to write in any particular style, but allowed them to find their own voice. Both Brian Ferneyhough and I were his students, so you can see how successful his approach was.

“The first two years went fine – for the end-of-year examinations, we had to do strict counterpoint exercises which I passed quite easily. But for my finals, I was required to do an original composition and someone on the panel obviously didn’t like it. I still have it in my desk with fail written all over it in big red letters. Surprisingly, however, I received an invitation to go to the prize-giving ceremony where I was given an award for foreign study! It was almost as if they were saying ‘we don’t know quite how to deal with you, so you’d better clear off and study somewhere else!’” To use his words, his style was exceptionallyavant-garde, mirroring, to some extent, the dodecaphonic techniques of Schoenberg and, more importantly, Luigi Nono, with whom he chose to study. “The training I received from him was quite rigorous: I was started off by only being allowed to use one note and one instrument for my composition and had to investigate all its rhythmic possibilities. I thoroughly enjoyed it and was very influenced by his style of writing – it was very mathematical and precise and, although it had little to do with feeling, at the time it seemed to be a very good thing to do.”