Roberto Gerhard

Roberto Gerhard (1896–1970) was a Catalan-British composer whose remarkable career bridged Spain and Britain, tradition and the avant-garde. Born in Valls, Catalonia, he studied first with the great Spanish nationalist Felipe Pedrell and then, crucially, became Arnold Schoenberg’s only Spanish pupil in Vienna and Berlin, absorbing the twelve-tone method while never losing his Spanish roots. After the Spanish Civil War forced him into exile, he settled in Cambridge, England, in 1939, and spent the rest of his life there, becoming a major (if long under-appreciated) figure in British music. His output ranges from colourful, Spanish-flavoured early works (the ballet Don Quixote, the opera The Duenna) to a bold, experimental later style embracing serialism, electronic music and a vivid, exploratory approach to orchestral and electronic sound. A pioneer of electronic and tape music in Britain, he composed four symphonies and much else, and is now recognised as one of the most original voices of his era.