Billy Mayerl
Billy Mayerl (born May 31, 1902 in England ; † March 25, 1959 ) was an English pianist and composer , in whose concert career he was best known as a master of light music . His musical style is characterized by novel syncopated piano solos. He composed more than 300 piano pieces, many of which were named after flowers and trees, as was his most famous composition, Marigold (1927).
Life
Mayerl was born into a family of musicians on London's Tottenham Court Road , near the West End theater district. He started taking piano lessons at an early age and studied at Trinity College of Music at the age of 7 . As a teenager, he supplemented his studies by accompanying silent films and playing dance music .
In 1921 he joined a hotel music group in Southampton and studied American popular music . Eventually he became part of the Savoy Havana Band in London, with which he became famous.
In 1926 he left the Savoy Band and founded his school of syncopation , which specialized in teaching modern musical styles such as ragtime and the stride piano . This led to the creation of the correspondence course How to play like Billy Mayerl . During this time he wrote his most famous solo piece, Marigold . In the late 1930s, his correspondence school is said to have had more than 100 employees and 30,000 students. The school closed in 1957.
Mayerl was the solo pianist for the premiere of George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue in London.
In the 1930s Mayerl composed various works for musical theater , for example Sporting Love , which debuted at London's Gaiety Theater in 1934 , or Twenty to One (1935) and Over She Goes (1936).
Mayerl was a prolific pianist in radio broadcasts and vinyl recordings .
He died of a heart attack in 1959 .
literature
- Peter Dickinson : Marigold. The Music of Billy Mayerl. Oxford University Press, Oxford 1999, ISBN 0-19-816213-8 .
Web links
- A Mayerl biography of Bill Edwards with a list of his compositions (English)
- Billy Mayerl Society website (English)
swell
This article is essentially a translation of the article of the same name from the English language Wikipedia.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Mayerl, Billy |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | English pianist and composer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 31, 1902 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | England |
| DATE OF DEATH | March 25, 1959 |