Spotlight: Derek Bourgeois (Music)

Derek David Bourgeois was born on 16^th October 1941 in Kingston upon Thames, the oldest of three children. His sister Linda was born in 1947 followed by another sister, Wendy, arriving in 1953. Derek began composing music at the age of five and by the age of thirteen he had written his first piano sonata. He was educated at the independent Cranleigh School, based in Surrey, between 1954 and 1959.

Bourgeois studied at Magdalene College, Cambridge University between 1959 and 1963, graduating with a first class honours degree in music. He then spent two years at the Royal College of Music studying composition and conducting. During his time at Cambridge he composed music for a unique collaboration between Cambridge and Oxford acting societies which resulted in the staging of a production of Sophocles Oedipus the King at Cambridge Guildhall from 6^th to 11^th February 1963. Bourgeois married Jean Berry, an accomplished violinist for both the Halle Orchestra and the Welsh National Opera, in 1965.

Between 1970 and 1984 he was a lecturer in music at Bristol University, but gave up this role to take up the position of director of the National Youth Orchestra. He held this role from 1984 until 1993. Shortly after his appointment BBC 2 screened a documentary profile on him entitled Derek Bourgeois – Composer (1^st September 1984). Bourgeois was also appointed as the chairman of the Composers Guild of Great Britain and was a member of the Music Advisory Panel for the Arts Council. He held both positions between 1980 and 1983. In 1988 he founded the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain and was appointed the Artistic Director of the Bristol Philharmonic Orchestra in 1990. During 1994 he was appointed as the Director of Music at St Pauls Girls School in London following respected previous post holders such as Gustav Holst and Ralph Vaughan Williams. In 2002 he retired and moved to Mallorca in Spain where his wife was diagnosed with motor neurone disease. He spent the next few years nursing his ailing spouse until she passed away in 2006. After meeting and marrying his second wife, Norma Torney, the couple moved back to the UK in 2009 and settled in Dorset.

Bourgeois has composed over ninety symphonies as well as concertos, orchestral works, operas and musicals. He has composed for stage, film and television and in particular has collaborated with the director Don Taylor on several productions including the Beasts episode ‘Buddyboy’. His earliest screen credits were for British Transport Films and the Central Office of Information in the form of scores for a pair of short documentary films. The first was Thirty Million Letters (1963) which earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary Short. This was directed by James Ritchie who also co-directed the second short film which Bourgeois worked on. The Driving Force (1966) examined the transition from steam power to diesel and electric locomotives and the impact it had on the passengers.

For the theatre Bourgeois provided music for stage productions including Oedipus Rex (1963) for the Cambridge University Players, Anthony and Cleopatra (1967) at the Cranleigh School Dramatic Society, Don Taylor’s play A Long March To Jerusalem (1980) at Watford Playhouse, Tom Stoppard’s On The Razzle (1983) for The National Theatre and King Lear (1987) starring Anthony Quayle for a touring Compass Theatre production.

During 1976, after two years of planning, Bourgeois staged the opera Rumpelstiltskin, which he had composed following a commission from Bristol Cathedral School. The two-act opera, based on the Brothers Grimm fairy tale, premiered on 23^rd March 1976. His next credit was the Beasts episode ‘Buddyboy’ which established his collaborations with the director Don Taylor. Post-‘Buddyboy’ Bourgeois also worked on a score for the unrealised Nigel Kneale project Crow during 1978 with Don Taylor on boards to direct. He later provided the music for the radio drama A Flight into the Wilderness (1979) which was written by Don Taylor.

He reunited with Taylor for the 1980 BBC drama The Crucible which was adapted from the Arthur Miller play set during the Salem witch trials. His next project was providing the score for all seven episodes of the BBC period drama The Barchester Chronicles (1982) which were adapted from the novels by Anthony Trollope. He also scored the television documentary A Prospect of Kew (1981).

He reunited with Don Taylor for The Theban Plays by Sophocles (1986) which formed a trio of classical drama which Taylor also translated. He had previously worked on Theatre Night in 1985 and returned to the programme with a pair of Don Taylor directed editions; ‘Bingo: Scenes of Money and Death’ (30^th June 1990) and ‘Iphigenia at Allius’ (21^st July 1990). His final TV credit was for the documentary series Wildlife On One with the score for the episode ‘Little Leviathans’ (1991). Bourgeois died from cancer on 6^th September 2017 aged 75 and left behind a body of work that numbered over 390 compositions including 17 concertos and 116 symphonies.

TV Credits
1976                            Beasts – ‘Buddyboy’
1980                            The Crucible
1981                            A Prospect of Kew
1982                            The Barchester Chronicles
1983                            Mansfield Park
1984                            The Father
1985                            Theatre Night – ‘The Father’
1986                            The Theban Play by Sophocles
1989                            Bingo
1990                            Theatre Night – ‘Bingo: Scenes of Death and Money’ / ‘Iphigenia at                                   Aulis’
1991                            Wildlife on One – ‘Little Leviathans’

 

Cinema Credits
1963                            Thirty Million Letters (British Transport Films short)
1966                            The Driving Force (British Transport Films short)