Uncovering a clockwork composer

Paul Phillips' research helps draw attention to music of novelist Anthony Burgess

With more than 50 books to his credit, Anthony Burgess was highly regarded for his contributions to the world of literature. In 1971, his storytelling abilities were heralded around the world when filmmaker Stanley Kubrick adapted Burgess' most famous novel, "A Clockwork Orange," for the movie screen.

Yet as an artist Burgess remained frustrated. He never planned on being a famous writer. He aspired to be great musician and composer. A lover of music from an early age and greatly influenced by his parents - his mother was a music hall singer and his father a pub pianist - Burgess wrote his first symphony at 18 and continued to compose throughout his life.

But at the time of his death on Nov. 22, 1993, he had only heard a few of his compositions performed, "and was unhappy that the music world was ignorant of the fact that Burgess the writer was also Burgess the composer," says Paul Phillips, who is leading a one-man crusade to uncover the novelist's musical talents.

The quest began after Phillips read Burgess' obituary in The New York Times, which detailed his musical accomplishments.

"Before I knew anything about Burgess' music, I had enjoyed his novels for many years," explains Phillips, right, conductor of the Brown University Orchestra. "Like James Joyce and Vladimer Nabokov, whose writings I also love, Burgess is a writer who revels in the richness of language. But like most of his readers, I hadn't realized that he was also a composer."

His curiosity piqued, Phillips wrote to Burgess' literary publisher only to hit a dead end. He learned that most of the music wasn't published. By happenstance in late 1996, a writer preparing a biography of Burgess was in Providence. She came to several of Phillips' rehearsals and put him in touch with Burgess' widow, Liana, who lives in Monaco.

Ultimately, Phillips was able to travel to Monaco in August 1997. "Seeing the cabinet full of musical manuscripts when I arrived at the Burgess apartment was thrilling," says Phillips. "At that moment, I felt a great sense of discovery and knew that my trip had been worth it."

While there, he examined about 50 compositions. From his search, Phillips believes Burgess penned nearly 175 compositions that range from full symphonic works, chamber pieces and operas to jazz, dance tunes and incidental pieces. But nearly everything he wrote before 1970 has been lost or destroyed.

Phillips also discovered that Burgess was an eclectic composer. His music has two distinct sides - Burgess the popular entertainer who wrote tunes in the style of English music halls and vaudeville, and Burgess the classical composer who was influenced by Debussy, Stravinsky and the English school of Walton, Holst, Vaughn Williams and Elgar.

Mostly a self-taught musician - the University of Manchester wouldn't let him study music because he hadn't pass his physics examination - Burgess spent his early career composing for amateur productions, and as an education officer in Malaya and Borneo teaching English literature and speech.

Diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor in 1959 and given only one year to live, Burgess decided to remake himself into a writer. He calculated that if he wrote 2,000 words a day, every day, by the end of the year he could produce 730,000 words or about 7 novels of 100,000 words each whose royalties would provide income for his wife. He nearly succeeded, writing five and a half novels, including "A Clockwork Orange," during that time.

But the diagnosis, it turned out, was wrong. As an established author, Burgess continued producing novels, nonfiction essays and reviews of literature, television and drama. As his fame and reputation as a writer grew, his music production temporarily declined.

In 1971, he wrote the incidental music for the acclaimed Minneapolis production of "Cyrano de Bergerac," for which he had written the translation. Burgess received $500 for the music, the first income he ever earned as a composer. "Burgess was prouder of the money he earned for his original music than from the much greater royalties he earned for his translation," says Phillips. The success of the Minneapolis production led to a Broadway musical starring Christopher Plummer, for which Burgess wrote the book and lyrics. The show opened in May 1973 to mixed reviews and ran for 49 performances.

The Symphony No. 3 in C written in 1974-75 marked a special point in Burgess' musical development. Commissioned by James Dixon for the University of Iowa Symphony Orchestra, the symphony premiered in Iowa on Oct. 22, 1975. It was the first public performance of any of his orchestral works and an overwhelming experience. "I have written over 30 books, but this was the truly great artistic moment," Burgess declared.

The success of the performance fueled his desire to compose more. "The music simply poured out of him," says Phillips. "At one point he was writing a prelude and fugue every day."

For the next 18 years, Burgess composed a large body of music, among them "The Blooms of Dublin," a full-length two-act musical based on Ulysses, which was broadcast in 1982 by the BBC and Radio Telefis Eireann in celebration of the James Joyce centenary. Burgess also wrote numerous works for a variety of instruments, including brass band, guitar, flute, oboe, piano, strings and voice, and was commissioned by the English National Opera and Scottish Opera to write new translations of "Carmen" and "Oberon." In addition, he wrote the incidental music for his own stage adaptation of "A Clockwork Orange."

Since his trip to Monaco, Phillips has focused his attention to introducing concert-goers to Burgess' music. He has conducted several orchestral pieces with the Brown University Orchestra and the Pioneer Valley Orchestra, has performed several solo piano and chamber music compositions and engaged other musicians to perform the works. So far, he has been involved with the performances of nearly 20 compositions, many of them premieres.

Phillips has also written an article for the second edition of the New Groves Dictionary of Music and Musicians and is working on the first comprehensive study of the music. The book, which he will complete while on sabbatical next year, will include a musical biography of Burgess and a harmonic analysis of the music. He is also making arrangements to produce a recording. Through Phillips' efforts, Burgess' dream of being a well-known composer may soon be realized. In the end, Burgess may have the last note as well as the last word.