The beginnings and development of a New Zealand music: The life ...

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the sounds of Vaughan Williams and Sibelius, and that in some way
(invariably undefined) it captured the ambience of the New Zealand
environment.
Many of these articles also acknowledge that Lilburn has
been the most influential figure on the course of New Zealand
composition since 1940.
Most of these articles also point to the development of New
Zealand composition as progressing in waves of composers, with each new
decade bringing the work of new composers to attention. The first
'wave' was Douglas Lilburn in the 1940s.
The second 'wave' comprised
Lilburn's students from the first Cambridge Music School and included
David Farquhar, Edwin Carr, Larry Pruden and Ronald Tremain, all of
whom came to public attention in the 1950s.
the composers who came to attention in the 1960s.
The third 'wave' comprised
Frederick Page's
article in Studies in Music on this decade of New Zealand composition
names a dozen such composers:
Jenny McLeod, Anthony Watson, John Rimmer,
Gillian Whitehead, Gillian Bibby, Lyell Cresswell, John Cousins, Ian
McDonald, Jack Body, Anna Lockwood, Jack Spiers 7 and Ross Harris.
Most of the articles suggest that the second 'wave' of New
"
Zealand composers came under the spell of music by Bartok, Britten,
Stravinsky and Copland, whilst the third 'wave' showed cognisance of
the music of the serialists and the textural/timbral world of Darmstadt
in the 1960s.
All of these articles provide useful introductions to the topic
of New Zealand composition.
Naturally enough, with such a breadth of
topic being tackled within the restricted space of an article, few
discuss the subject of New Zealand composition in anything more than
general terms.
None attempt an evaluation or analysis of the music
itself written during this period except in broad descriptive terms, or
in stylistic comparisons with the work of overseas composers.
Jennings's article in Studies in Music provides the most cogent backgrounding
of the topic, whilst Page's article in the same journal
(despite some factual errors) provides the best overview summary of
composition between the years 1950 and 1970.
In a similar vein to these backgrounding and summarising
7 Jack Spiers, born in England and educated in Scotland and Germany,
is the only non-New Zealander by birth on this list.