Cedric Thorpe Davie

Prof Cedric Thorpe Davie OBE FRSE FRAM RSA LLD (1913-1983) was a British musician and composer, specialising in film scores, most notably The Green Man in 1956. A high proportion of his film and documentary work and compositional work has a Scottish theme.

Life

He was born in Lewisham in south London on 30 May 1913,^[1] the son of Thorpe Davie, a music teacher and choir master.^[2] The family moved to Glasgow early in his life and he attended Glasgow High School.^[3]

He studied at the Scottish National Academy of Music in Glasgow and the Royal Academy of Music in London. In London he was instructed in piano by Egon Petri and Harold Craxton, and horn by Aubrey Brain. He was instructed in composition by Vaughn Williams and Dr R.O. Morris. In 1935 he travelled to both Helsinki and Budapest, for further training under Yrjo Kilpinen and Zoltan Kodaly. He returned to Glasgow in 1936 and began lecturing in music.^[4] Early works included creation of operas such as Gammer Gurton’s Needle.^[5]

In the Second World War he served in the National Fire Service covering the Glasgow docklands (an area of intense bombing). After the war he moved to St Andrews University as Master of Music, being raised to full Professor of Music in 1973.

He was involved heavily in the newly created Edinburgh Festival in the 1950s, and oversaw production of important new Scottish musical works such as Ane Satyre of the Threi Estaites.^[6] He was very fond of putting Scottish literary works to music, including: Sunset Song, Cloud Howe, The Beggar's Benison, A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle , Ramsay’s The Gentle Shepherd ^[7] etc.

In 1955 he was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE). In late life (1978) he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were Sir Thomas Malcolm Knox, J. Steven Watson, Sir Norman Graham, Norman Gash, GWS Barrow and Anthony Elliot Ritchie.^[8]

He died on 18 January 1983.

A substantial collection of his manuscripts and scores are held by the University of St Andrews.^[9]

Family

In 1937 he married Margaret Russell Brown (d.1974).

Recognition

In 2013 St Andrews University held a special event to mark the centenary of Davie’s birth.^[10]

Film Scores by Davie

• Scotland Speaks (1940) documentary
• This Modern Age (1946)
• The Brothers (1947)
• Snowbound (1948)
• The Future of Scotland (1948) documentary
• The Bad Lord Byron (1949)
• The Adventurers (1951)
• You’re Only Young Twice (1952)
• Highland Laddie (1952) documentary
• Rob Roy, the Highland Rogue (1953) a Disney film usually now simply called Rob Roy
• The Miner’s Widow (1954) documentary
• The Dark Avenger (1955)
• Jacqueline (1956)
• The Land of Robert Burns (1956) documentary
• The Green Man (1956)
• The Kid from Canada (1957)
• The Enchanted Island (1957)
• Wales (1957) documentary
• Scotland (1957) documentary
• Rockets Galore! (1958)
• The Bridal Path (1959)
• A Terrible Beauty (1960)
• Kidnapped (1960)
• Disneyland (1963)

Publications

• Music Structure and Design (1966)
• The Oxford Scottish Song Book (1969) joint editor
• Scotland’s Music (1980)

References