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3 unusual facts about Joseph Holbrooke


Joseph Holbrooke

Holbrooke had spent extended periods of time at Harlech, Wales, since around 1915, Scott-Ellis having provided him with a number of residences, and in the early 1920s he moved with his family to a house which he appropriately named Dylan.

Collaboration on two further operas, The Children of Don (first performed at the London Opera House, conducted by Thomas Beecham, on 12 June 1912) and Bronwen, brought about the completion of Holbrooke's most ambitious project, a trilogy under the collective title The Cauldron of Annwn setting Scott-Ellis' versions of tales from the Welsh Mabinogion.

Holbrooke was fascinated by the writings of Edgar Allan Poe which deal with the supernatural and the macabre, eventually producing over thirty compositions which he referred to as his "Poeana".


Herbert Trench

In 1908 a Dramatic Symphony, opus 51, written by Joseph Holbrooke setting Trench's poem Apollo and the Seaman was performed, under Thomas Beecham.


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