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Basil Cameron CBE (18 August 1884 – 26 June 1975) was an English Conducting.
During the war, Cameron served in the British Army from November 1915 to August 1918, where he rose to the rank of lieutenant and was wounded in action at Bullecourt in 1918.Palmer, Russell. British Music (1947), pp. 52-3 After the war, Cameron led orchestras in many other British seaside resorts, including Brighton, Hastings (from 1923) and Harrogate (from 1924, succeeding Howard Carr). Laudatory reviews by George Bernard Shaw and Percy Grainger increased his renown, and led to London engagements from the Royal Philharmonic Society. Eric Coates, who had been a violinist with Cameron in the Queen’s Hall Orchestra, dedicated his Four Ways Suite of 1927 to him. It had been commissioned by Cameron and was premiered in Harrogate that year.Ponder, Michael. Notes to Naxos CD 8.223521
In 1929 Cameron organized an all-British festival in Harrogate, including the music of Arnold Bax, Delius, Henry Balfour Gardiner, Joseph Holbrooke, William Hurlstone and Peter Warlock. Also in 1929, Cameron auditioned the pianist Moura Lympany, then aged just 12 years old, and immediately organized her concert debut with him at Harrogate, playing Mendelssohn's G minor Piano Concerto.
In 1930 he guest-conducted with the San Francisco Symphony, and was later invited to become its music director, where from 1930 and 1932 he served as joint music director with Issay Dobrowen. In 1932 he
was appointed music director of the Seattle Symphony, where he stayed until February 1938.
Cameron played an essential role in the immediate post World War II period at the Henry Wood Promenade Concerts held in the Royal Albert Hall where, with Malcolm Sargent, he was responsible for the bulk of the programming, including the Bach/Brahms evenings. One notable occasion was on 7 September 1945 when Cameron conducted the first performance in England of Schoenberg's Piano Concerto, with the 23-year-old pianist Kyla Greenbaum as the soloist. BBC Prom, 7 September 1945, Royal Albert Hall"A Schoenberg Novelty", The Times, 8 September 1945 Despite some underlying hostility the work was received by the audience with unexpected enthusiasm, and (according to The Musical Times) Greenbaum played with "immense courage". Musical Times Issue 1232, October 1945, p 315 Other premieres he conducted at the Proms included E. J. Moeran's Serenade in G (on 2 September 1948) and Alan Bush's Violin Concerto (on 25 August 1949).
He was married twice, first to Frances James, and second to Phyllis MacQueen, but died (unmarried) in a Leominster nursing home, aged 91.
Return to England
In 1938, he returned to England where he remained for the rest of his career. In 1940, he joined the conducting staff of the The Proms as an associate conductor to Henry Wood and began conducting for various orchestras, the London Philharmonic Orchestra most frequently. With the LPO, Cameron conducted the first UK performance of Benjamin Britten's Violin Concerto (on 6 April 1941), and the first UK performance of the Sinfonia da Requiem at the Royal Albert Hall on 22 July 1942.
Retirement and death
Cameron was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1957.Obituary for Basil Cameron, The Musical Times, 116 (1590): p. 731. On 31 March 1960, while conducting the London Symphony Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall with Wilhelm Backhaus as soloist, Cameron became ill and could not continue. He retired in 1964, aged 80 years, with a final concert featuring the Symphony No 4 by Brahms and the Symphony of Psalms by Stravinsky.
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Categories: 1884 Births, 1975 Deaths, English Male Conductors, English Classical Violinists, English Male Violinists, English People Of German Descent, British Army Personnel Of World War I, Commanders Of The Order Of The British Empire, 20th-century English Conductors, 20th-century British Violinists, 20th-century English Male Musicians, London Symphony Orchestra Players, Musicians From Reading, Berkshire, Music Directors Of The San Francisco Symphony, Music Directors Of The Seattle Symphony
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