The year 2024 marks the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the birth of the British composer Gustav Holst, as well as the ninetieth anniversary of his death. Although his music remains an enduring fixture of the orchestral (The Planets) and wind band (Suites, Hammersmith) canons, scholarship about the composer is rare. One factor contributing to this situation is the outsized influence Imogen Holst’s scholarship plays on our understanding of her father and his music. Her biographical and analytical works remain in print nearly forty years after her death, and despite the works of subsequent biographers such as Michael Short, Alan Gibbs, and Jon Mitchell, the narratives she established remain largely unquestioned. While important work over the last thirty years from Raymond Head, Nalini Ghuman, and others begins to rethink both the historiographical and epistemological frames with which we understand the composer, further work remains to be done to address the complexities and contradictions inherent in Holst and his music.
We propose to explore the music and life of Holst in a scholarly symposium to be held on 19 October 2024 at Utah State University. We invite contributions which reconsider or reframe the composer in the context of contemporary scholarship practices. These could include, but are not limited to, disability studies, post-colonialism, esotericism, as well as general reconsiderations of established historiography. We view Holst as a seminal figure not only in British music studies but in the larger context of twentieth-century European music, and hope not only to advance scholarship on the composer, but also help transform how audiences and listeners understand his life and music.
The symposium will be structured around a keynote by Dr. Nalini Ghuman (Mills College at Northeastern University) and papers interspersed with guided discussions, culminating in an all-Holst concert presented by the American Festival Chorus and Orchestra. Though some participants will be invited, any scholars interested in presenting at the symposium are invited to submit abstracts for of no more than 300 words for 15–20 minute position papers to gustavholst2024@gmail.com by 8 April 2024. Those interested in participating but not presenting may send an expression of interest to the same address by the same date. We hope to include a hybrid element, but this is dependent on funding. The organizers, Christopher M Scheer (Utah State University) and Rachel Gain (Yale University) plan to publish an edited collection of participants’ contributions after the symposium.