RICHARD ADDINSELL.

RICHARD ADDINSELL was born in London on the 13th of January 1904, one of his many popular compositions was from the movie DANGEROUS MOONLIGHT, for which the composer penned the dramatic, haunting and now classic piece called The Warsaw Concerto, which was brought to greater life by the wonderful orchestration of Roy Douglas. The films producers told Addinsell that they wanted a piece that sounded similar to Rachmaninov and Addinsell obliged them with The Warsaw Concerto,  the music became an instant success and was recorded by numerous artists and has to date sold well over five million copies, the piece was released on many recordings and appealed to three sets of fans, the classical market, the popular market and also admirers of film music and it is still to this day performed regularly as a standard concert/film music piece. Addinsell studied at Oxford University and then later at The Royal College of Music in London. The composer began his career by writing songs for revues and also providing stage productions with incidental music. In 1928 Addinsell wrote the incidental score for ADAMS OPERA which was by writer Clemence Dante,which was the beginning of a collaborative partnership that was to endure until Dante,s death.  Addinsell also on many occasions  wrote music for and accompanied singer Joyce Grenfell, who became a close friend.  During the early 1930,s the composer traveled to the United States and there began to write music for a number of Hollywood motion pictures.  The composers first major film score was to be GOODBYE MR CHIPS in 1939, but his greatest success however was to be his music for the film Dangerous Moonlight, which included the aforementioned Warsaw Concerto for piano and orchestra. On the actual film score the concerto was performed by Louis Kentner with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by the great Muir Mathieson. Adinsell,s film scores included, Amateur Gentleman (1936 for Alexandre Korda), Fire Over England (1937), South Riding (1937), Goodbye Mr Chips (1939), Gaslight (1940), The Lion Has Wings (1940), Men of the Lightship (1940), Love on the Dole (1941), Suicide Squadron (1941), The Avengers (1942), Blithe Spirit (1945), A Diary for Timothy (1945), Passionate Friends (1949), Under Capricorn (1949), The Black Rose (1950), A Christmas Carol (1950-aka SCROOGE) ,Highly Dangerous (1951), Tom Brown’s School Days (1951), Encore (1952), Sea Devils (1953), Beau Brummel (1954), Out of the Clouds (1957), The :Prince and the Showgirl (1957), A Tale of Two Cities (1958), Loss of Innocence (1961), Macbeth (1961), The Roman Spring of Mrs Stone (1961), Waltz of the Toreadors (1962) and Life at the Top which was the composers last film score in 1965.He passed away on November 14th 1977.