Freda Swain


Freda Swain was a British composer and music educator.

Biography

Freda Swain was born at Portsmouth, England. She studied composition with Charles Villiers Stanford and piano with Dora Matthay and Arthur Alexander at the Royal College of Music, earning awards including the Sullivan Prize in 1921.
In 1924 Swain began teaching at the Royal College and in 1936 she founded the British Music Movement to help promote the efforts of young composers and artists. Swain married Arthur Alexander in 1921, and before World War II the couple toured South Africa and Australia, lecturing, broadcasting and performing recitals.

Works

Swain's first major success was The Harp of Aengus for violin and orchestra, soloist Achille Rivarde at the Queen’s Hall in January 1925. Her ‘Airmail’ Piano Concerto, mailed in instalments to her husband Arthur Alexander while he was stuck in South Africa during World War II, was performed by Alexander in Cape Town. She composed a one-act opera Second Chance, but never finished a second opera, The Shadowy Waters. Other works include a concertino for piano and strings and other orchestral pieces, songs and song cycles, choral and church music, two string quartets, a Suite for Six Trumpets, and a number of other chamber and instrumental pieces.
Selected works include:
Songs: