Alfred Hill

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Alfred Francis Hill (16 December 1870 – 30 October 1960) was an Australian composer, conductor and teacher.

He was born in Melbourne, but spent most of his early life in New Zealand. He studied in Leipzig at the Royal Conservatorium of Music between 1887 and 1891, under Gustav Schreck, Hans Sitt and Oscar Paul. Later he played second violin with the Gewandhaus Orchestra, under the conductorship of Brahms, Grieg, Tchaikovsky and Max Bruch.

Hill returned to New Zealand, and worked as a violin teacher, recitalist, chamber musician, and conductor of choirs and orchestras. Hill returned to Australia in 1897 where he remained, teaching, for a number of years.

After several years regularly traveling between Australia and New Zealand, Hill settled in Sydney in 1911, becoming the principal of the Austral Orchestral College, and viola player of the Austral String Quartet. In 1913 Hill founded the Australian Opera League with Fritz Hart, as part of an attempt to create an Australian operatic tradition. Hill was also a founder of the Sydney Repertory Theatre Society, and a foundation council member (later president) of the Musical Association of New South Wales. While in New Zealand, Hill had been active in the push for a New Zealand Conservatorium of Music, and for the foundation of an institute of Māori studies at Rotorua.

In 1916 Hill became the first Professor of Theory and Composition at the NSW State Conservatorium of Music. From 1937, Hill devoted himself fulltime to composition.

Alfred Hill died at the age of eighty-nine. During his lifetime he wrote more than five hundred compositions, including twelve symphonies, numerous concerti, a mass, seventeen string quartets and eight operas.