Edwin Lemare

Edwin Henry Lemare^{[N 1]} (9 September 1865 – 24 September 1934)^[1] was an English organist and composer who lived the latter part of his life in the United States. He was one of the most highly regarded and highly paid organists of his generation,^[2] as well as the greatest performer and one of the most important composers of the late Romantic English-American Organ School.^[3]

Biography

Lemare, 6 years old

Aged 12 with parents

Edwin H. Lemare was born in

Marian Broomhead Colton-Fox, with a nephew, 1886

Elsie Francis Reith, 1890

Charlotte Bauersmith, 1900

While organist at Sheffield Parish Church, he eloped with Marian Broomhead Colton-Fox because her father, a well-known lawyer, did not approve of him.^[6]

After eight years of marriage, they were divorced and Lemare married Elsie Francis Reith. They were divorced in 1909.^[7]

Lemare left England for the United States where he married Charlotte Bauersmith, twenty years his junior, shortly after arriving in New York.^[2] She was herself an organist and sometimes substituted for him.^[8]

After apparently treating

• St. Mary's, Brookfield, Highgate
• St. John's, Finsbury Park, 1882
• Park Hall, Cardiff
• Sheffield Parish Church, 1886
• Albert Hall, Sheffield, 1886
• Holy Trinity, Sloane Street, London, 1892–1895
• St. Margaret's, Westminster
  , London, 1897–1902
• Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh, 1902–1905^[9]
• Panama–Pacific International Exposition, San Francisco, 1915
• City Organist, San Francisco, 1917–1920
• Municipal Organist, Kotzschmar Memorial Organ, Portland, Maine, 1921–1923
• Civic Organist, Chattanooga, Tennessee, 1924–1929

Abilities as organist and composer

As a player, he had a very large

The piece uses the technique known as thumbing down; the left hand plays an accompaniment on the choir manual, while the fingers of the right hand play the tune on the solo manual, and the thumb of the right hand simultaneously plays the tune on the great manual, in parallel sixths. The player is thus playing on three manuals at once.^[10]

"Moonlight and Roses" was sung by Roy Rogers in the 1943 film Song of Texas.

The song also became a U.S. Pop (#51) and Easy Listening (#5) hit for Vic Dana in 1965. It was entitled, "Moonlight and Roses (Bring Memories of You)."^[11]

Compositions for organ

Published as The Organ Music of Edwin H. Lemare, edited by Wayne Leupold (Wayne Leupold Editions/E. C. Schirmer). Series I (Original Compositions): Volume I, II, III and IV; Series II (Transcriptions). He also composed church music and an orchestral symphony.

Original

• Allegretto in B minor
• Andante Cantabile in F (Op. 37)
• Andantino in D-flat (also known as Moonlight & Roses)
• Arcadian Idyll (Op. 52) (1: Serenade; 2: Musette; 3: Solitude)
• Barcarolle in A-flat
• Bell Scherzo (Op. 89)
• Bénédiction Nuptiale (Op. 85)
• Berceuse in D
• Cantique d'Amour (Op. 47)
• Caprice Orientale (Op. 46)
• Chanson d'Été in B-flat
• Chant de Boneur (Op. 62)
• Chant sans paroles in D
• Cloches Sonores (Basso Ostinato) – symphonic sketch (Op. 63)
• Communion Peace (Op. 68)
• Concert Fantasia in F
• Concert Fantasy On the tune 'Hanover'
• Concertstück No 1 – In the form of a Polonaise (Op. 80)
• Concertstück No 2 – In form of a Tarantella (Op. 90)
• Contemplation in D minor (Op. 42)
• Elegy in G
• Evening Pastorale The Curfew (Op. 128)
• Fantaisie Fugue in G minor (Op. 48)
• Fantasie Dorienne in the form of variations (Op. 101)
• Gavotte Moderne in A-flat

• Gavotte à la cour (Op. 84)
• Idyll in E-flat
• Impromptu in A
• Intermezzo : Moonlight (Op. 83/2)
• Intermezzo in B-flat (Op. 39)
• Irish Air from County Derry (arr. by)
• Madrigal in D-flat
• Marche Heroïque (Op. 74)
• Marche Solennelle in E-flat
• Meditation in D-flat (Op. 38)
• Minuet Nuptiale (Op. 103)
• Nocturne in B minor (Op. 41)
• Pastorale No 2 in C
• Pastorale Poem (Op. 54)
• Pastorale in E^[12]
• Rêverie in E-flat (Op. 20)
• Rhapsody in C minor (Op. 43)
• Romance in D-flat
• Romance in D-flat (No 2) (Op. 112)
• Salut d'Amour (Op. 127)
• Scherzo
• Second Andantino in D-flat
• Sonata No 1 in F (Op. 95) (1: Maestoso; 2: Largo; 3: Scherzo; 4: Intermezzo; 5: Finale)
• Soutenir (A Study on One Note) ^[13]
• Spring Song – From the South (Op. 56)
• Summer Sketches (1: Dawn; 2: The Bee; 3: The Cuckoo; 4: Twilight; 5: Evening) (Op. 73)
• Sunshine (Op. 83/1)
• Symphony No 1 in G minor (1: Allegro Moderato; 2: Adagio Cantabile; 3: Scherzo; 4: Finale) (Op. 35)
• Symphony No 2 in D minor (1: Maestoso con fuoco; 2: Adagio patetico; 3: Scherzo; 4: Allegro giusto) (Op. 50)
• Tears and Smiles (1: Tears; 2: Smiles) (Op. 133)
• Toccata di concerto
• Twilight Sketches (Op. 138) (1: Sundown; 2: The Glow-Worm; 3: The Fire Fly; 4: Dusk)

Transcriptions

Lemare was a prolific transcriber of orchestral music for the organ for his own performance in concerts. While there was likely an element of pure showmanship to these transcriptions – which allowed Lemare to display his uncanny skill as a transcriber of major symphonic works, as well as his phenomenal technique – Lemare sincerely believed he was also performing a service in letting concert audiences in mid-sized American towns hear important orchestral works from Europe that would otherwise go unknown in locales with no resident symphony orchestra. Many of his transcriptions are still performed today, especially those he did of the works of Richard Wagner.

Johannes Brahms

• Akademische Festouvertüre
  (Op. 80)
• Ungarischer Tanz No. 5

Edward Elgar

• Gavotte in A
• Idylle (Op. 4/1)
• Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1 (Op. 39)
• Salut d'Amour (Op. 12)
• Sursum Corda (Élévation) (Op. 11)
• Triumphal March from Caractacus (Op. 35)

Camille Saint-Saëns

• Danse macabre (Op. 40)

Richard Wagner

• "Entrance of the Gods into Valhalla" from Das Rheingold
• Overture to Der fliegende Holländer
• Overture to Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg
• Overture to Rienzi
• Overture to Tannhäuser
• "Ride of the Valkyries" from Die Walküre
• "Wotan's Farewell and Magic Fire Music" from Die Walküre
• Prelude to act 3 and "Bridal Music" from Lohengrin
• "Vorspiel und Liebestod" From Tristan und Isolde

Further reading

• Edwin H. Lemare: Organs I have Met: the Autobiography of Edwin H. Lemare, 1866–1934, together with Reminiscences by his Wife and Friends (Los Angeles: Schoolcraft, 1956)
• Nelson Barden: "Edwin H. Lemare", in The American Organist
  • Part 1: Becoming the Best (January 1986, Vol. 20, No. 1)
  • Part 2: Pittsburgh and Australia (March 1986, Vol. 20, No. 3)
  • Part 3: The Midlands, Liverpool, Freiburg (June 1986, Vol. 20, No. 6)
  • Part 4: San Francisco, Portland, Chattanooga, Hollywood (August 1986, Vol. 20, No. 8)

Notes

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Edwin Lemare.

• Edwin H. Lemare: The most detailed biography of Lemare on the web by Nelson Barden. English and French version.
• Recordings Archived 2007-06-27 at the Wayback Machine: "In 1913, at the height of his career, Lemare recorded 96 organ rolls for Welte & Söhne in Freiburg, Germany. These selections were re-performed in 1973 on the Welte-Tripp organ in the Church of the Covenant, Boston."
• Welte Restored. Welte Organ at Sir David Salomons house, Royal Academy of Music, 2011
• Letter written by Lemare in which he refers to his wife as his 'other eleven sixteenths'
• Sheet Music by Edwin Lemare
• Edwin H. Lemare at www.edwinlemare.com – website representing a biographical book
• The Citizens' Committee To Preserve The San Francisco Municipal Pipe Organ at SFExpositionOrgan.org - website and video for The Citizen's Committee to Preserve The San Francisco Exposition Organ
• Free scores by Edwin Lemare at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)

Cultural offices
Preceded by Thomas Trimnell	Organist and Master of the Choristers of Sheffield Cathedral 1886–1892	Succeeded by Thomas William Hanforth