Performed by the Dunedin Symphony Orchestra conducted by Simon Over, Dunedin Town Hall, 6 October 2020.
Frederick Septimus Kelly Photo: Public Domain
Frederick Septimus Kelly was born in Sydney in 1881. Educated first at Sydney Grammar School, he was later sent to England where he attended Eton College and Oxford University. As well as being a gifted musician, he was a natural athlete and took up rowing – he won a gold medal for England at the 1908 Olympics.
During the war, he served at Gallipoli along with his friend, the poet Rupert Brooke. Following Brooke’s death there at Gallipoli, Kelly began writing what would become perhaps his best known work.
He wrote in his diary on 21 May 1915: “I have ever since the day of Rupert Brooke’s death been composing an elegy for string orchestra, the ideas of which are coloured by the surroundings of his grave and circumstances of his death. The modal character of the music seems to be suggested by Greek surroundings as well as Rupert’s character, some passagework by the rustling of the olive tree which bends over his grave.”
After Gallipoli, Kelly went to the Somme where he was killed on 13 September 1916.
Recorded by RNZ Concert
Producer: Tim Dodd; Engineer: Darryl Stack
