Iris du Pré

Iris Maud Greep was born on 3 June 1914 in Plymouth, Devon (England), the daughter of William Henry Greep, a joiner, and his wife Maud Victoria, née Mitchell. She showed musical ability from an early age and began piano lessons at the age of five, initially with a local amateur musician. Despite the family's modest financial circumstances, her mother was determined to provide her daughter with opportunities that she herself had never enjoyed, and Iris soon distinguished herself at local music festivals. The pianist Professor Weekes subsequently taught her free of charge and helped her obtain a scholarship to Devonport High School. Her mother, however, later feared losing her only surviving child to a professional career away from Plymouth.


While still officially a schoolgirl in Plymouth, she travelled to London to take the Performers' Licentiate examination (LRAM) at the Royal Academy of Music. There she came to the attention of the pianist and Academy professor Eric Grant. In 1932, at the age of eighteen, Greep received a scholarship to study at the London School of Dalcroze Eurhythmics. Her schoolteacher Lilian Watts, a specialist in Dalcroze Eurhythmics, had encouraged her to apply. The Dalcroze method, combining musical training with rhythm and physical movement, was to have a lasting influence on her later work as a teacher. After completing her Dalcroze training in 1934, she successfully auditioned for a scholarship at the Royal Academy of Music, where she studied from 1934 until 1938, with Eric Grant as her piano professor and Theodore Holland as her professor of composition.
Greep proved successful as a pianist, violist and as a composer. In 1936 she received the Janet Duff Greet Prize, and in 1937 the Challen and Son Pianoforte Prize as well as the Oliveira Prescott Gift. The latter was an Academy award intended for distinguished composition students. During these years several of her compositions were performed at Academy concerts. The first two movements of her Piano Sonata, Allegro ritmico and Andante cantabile, were played by the composer at a Students' Recital on 27 June 1935. On 29 April 1937 a Chamber Concert of Students' Compositions included her Four Pagan Dances for violin, viola, cello and piano, performed by Frederick Grinke, Max Gilbert, Florence Hooton and Greep herself.

At the same time Greep was developing a career as a concert pianist. A surviving programme documents a solo pianoforte recital at the Grotrian Hall in Wigmore Street, London, on 22 February 1938. In the summer of that year she travelled to Zakopane, Poland, to attend a course given by the distinguished pianist Egon Petri. During this visit she met Derek du Pré, who was travelling in the Tatra Mountains. Together they visited local villages and sang with the inhabitants, whose folk songs Greep transcribed onto manuscript paper. The meeting eventually led to their marriage.
Greep's visit to Poland also resulted in an activity quite separate from her work as pianist and composer. Derek du Pré's book When Poland Smiled, published in London by Gee & Co. in 1940, contained a chapter on Ukrainian folk music written by Iris Greep.
The outbreak of the Second World War restricted, but did not end, Greep's activity as a professional pianist. During the first wartime period she also worked on the staff of the evacuated Dalcroze school at Glassenbury in Kent and remained associated with it until her marriage. On 15 April 1940 a British radio listing announced Modern Piano Music: A short recital by Iris Greep, demonstrating that she continued to perform for the BBC during the war.

On 25 July 1940 Iris Greep married Derek du Pré. He worked as an accountant and subsequently became assistant editor and later editor of the professional journal The Accountant. Iris continued to use her maiden name professionally, and both performances and compositions from the years following her marriage are still recorded under the name Iris Greep.

Her activity as a composer was particularly significant during these years. Her Sonata for Viola and Piano, composed in 1940 and dedicated to the violist Winifred Copperwheat, received its first performance at the Royal Academy of Music on 17 June 1941, with David Bellman playing the viola and Greep herself at the piano. The work evidently attracted attention beyond Britain. On 10 February 1942 the American journal Musical America, in a survey of younger British composers, wrote:

"[..] and a much younger composer, Ruth Gipps, who was a pupil of Vaughan Williams has already written a great number of promising works in both a picturesque and a lyrical vein. Ruth Gipps is the pride at the moment of the Royal College of Music and her rival seems to be Iris Greep at the Academy, who has met with decided success with her viola sonata and her pieces for viola and clarinet."
During this period Greep was therefore regarded as considerably more than a composer of educational music. Her surviving output from the 1930s and early 1940s includes a cello sonata, piano sonatas and ballades, a substantial chamber work for piano and strings, music for the ballet Cherry Stones, a viola sonata and the orchestral work Stonehenge. Her ballet music was associated with Lydia Kyasht's Russian Ballet de la Jeunesse Anglaise, while excerpts from Cherry Stones were performed by Manuel Frenkel and Cherry Isherwood at the Royal Academy of Music on 25 November 1940.

Greep also remained active as a pianist after becoming a wife and mother. On 21 April 1944 she appeared in the BBC Home Programme in a broadcast of Polish music. A contemporary Polish newspaper announced her performance of a Mazurka and an Oberek by Karol Rathaus, evidently two movements from his Three Polish Dances, Op. 47. Her daughter Hilary later remembered regularly listening to her mother's broadcasts during the 1940s, including a recital of works by Bach, Schumann and Brahms.
There is also evidence that Greep continued to regard composition as an active part of her professional life in the later war years. In December 1944 Ismena Holland, wife of Greep's former composition teacher Theodore Holland and later godmother and an important benefactor of Jacqueline du Pré, wrote to Iris and affectionately asked after “the composer Iris Greep”. In 1945 the Royal Academy of Music further recognised Greep's professional achievements by electing her an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music (ARAM).

Iris and Derek du Pré's first daughter, Hilary, was born in 1942, followed by Jacqueline in 1945 and their son Piers in 1948. Music occupied a central place in family life. Iris introduced both daughters to music at an early age and applied principles derived from her Dalcroze training. Hilary later became a flautist, while Jacqueline du Pré developed into one of the outstanding cellists of the twentieth century.
Iris du Pré played a particularly important role in Jacqueline's earliest musical development. When Jacqueline became fascinated by the cello at about four years of age, her mother devised short pieces and exercises through which particular musical sounds and technical ideas could be introduced. These were written by hand and supplemented with words and drawings intended to stimulate the child's imagination. Two of Jacqueline's earliest surviving violoncello exercise books are dated March 1950. Material of this kind was later published by J. Curwen & Sons as Songs for My 'Cello and Me. Iris prepared corresponding pedagogical music for other young players as well.

Although she became increasingly occupied with teaching and with the musical education of her family, Iris du Pré continued to work professionally as a pianist and music teacher. Former pupil Fiona Simon later recalled having piano lessons with Greep and described her as a teacher at the Royal Academy of Music. She subsequently taught music in schools and during the later part of her career was associated with Apsley Grammar School at Hemel Hempstead.

Iris du Pré died of cancer on 27 September 1985 at Ashmansworth in Hampshire (England).

Iris du Pré Archive

In my possession is the largest part of the compositional estate of Iris du Pré. That means autograph manuscripts of her own compositions of which nearly all are unpublished so far. In fact only 4 of her compositions were ever published, all of them books for musical beginners: Songs for my 'cello and me; Songs for my violin and me; Hilary's tunes and Miniature suite. But Iris du Pré also composed works for professional musicans, in serious formats and for larger ensembles. My archive contains the following works of her:

1. A sea ballade, for piano (1933)
2. Sonata in D, for piano (1935)
3. Sonata in B minor, for cello and piano (1935)
4. Stonehenge, symphonic poem
5. Four Pagan Dances, for piano, violin, viola and cello (1937)
6. Cherry Stones, ballet music (1939/40)
7. Sonata for viola and piano (1940)
8. Sea Mist, for piano
9. Piano Ballade
10. Untitled composition for piano
11. Cradle Song, for contralto, flute and piano
12. A Little Sonata, for cello and piano
13. I Saw Three Ships, for three-part chorus
14. Lullaby, after Brahms
15. The Reaper’s Song, after Schumann
16. Hymn to Life, for voice and piano
17. The Rain, for voice and piano

In addition to the above mentioned autograph manuscripts I also own printed copies the "Miniature suite for piano" (the personal copy of Hilary du Pre) and "Hilary's tunes" for piano resp. piano duet.

With the kind permission of Hilary Finzi and Piers du Pré, I am able to publish the compositions of Iris du Pré on my website. Below you will find the scores of her works, together with additional information about each composition:

1) A Sea Ballade, for piano (1933)

"A Sea Ballade" is one of Greep’s earliest surviving compositions. A nearly identical version was later used as the first movement of the Piano sonata from 1935.

2) Sonata in D, for piano (1935)

The first two movements, Allegro ritmico and Andante cantabile, were performed by Iris Greep at a Students’ Chamber Concert in Duke’s Hall, Royal Academy of Music, on 27 June 1935. The complete work also contains a third movement Allegro vivace. The first movement was originally called "A Sea Ballade" and existed as an individual piece (see above).

3) Sonata in B minor, for cello and piano (1935)



The earliest performance so far traced took place at the Abbey Hall, Plymouth, on 1 May 1936, with Dennyse Holdaway, a pupil of Ivor James at the Royal College of Music, and Iris Greep at the piano. The Western Morning News described the work as “well-written and vigorously conceived”, praising its energy, decisiveness and “grace of melody”; the performance was said to make “exhilarating hearing”. A further performance took place at the Society of Women Musicians in London in January 1938.

4) Stonehenge, symphonic poem

"Stonehenge" was already complete by April 1936. The Western Morning News described it explicitly as a “symphonic poem” and reported that it was to be “run through” by the Royal Academy of Music orchestra during the following term. In early 1937 an orchestral work by Greep was rehearsed at the Academy under Sir Henry Wood; it is possible, though not yet proven, that this was Stonehenge.

5) Four Pagan Dances, for piano, violin, viola and cello (1937)

The work was performed at a Chamber Concert of Students’ Compositions in Duke’s Hall on 29 April 1937 by Frederick Grinke, Max Gilbert, Florence Hooton and Iris Greep. The four movements were Pan, Earth, Moon and Planet. A surviving autograph in my collection contains only three movements, To Pan, To the Moon and To the Stars. Significantly, To the Stars is written on a pasted slip covering the original title Planets. The manuscript therefore appears to represent a revised version of the work, possibly with the Earth movement removed.

6) Cherry Stones, ballet music (1939/40)

Greep composed the score for Lydia Kyasht’s ballet company. The earliest performance so far traced took place at the Bath Pavilion in March 1940, where the Bath Chronicle described Cherry Stones as “a delightful version of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor, etc.” On 25 November 1940 Manuel Frenkel and Cherry Isherwood performed two-piano excerpts at the Royal Academy of Music, comprising Little Girl, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor, Gentleman, Ploughboy, Apothecary and Thief (Finale). The ballet remained in Kyasht’s repertoire in 1941, including performances at Harrow Coliseum and during the company’s Garrick Theatre season.

7) Sonata for viola and piano (1940)

The Sonata was dedicated to Winifred Copperwheat. Greep already had a personal connection with the viola: in 1932 she had appeared as a viola soloist in Plymouth, and in early 1940 she performed (as the pianist) Vaughan Williams’s Suite for viola and piano with Copperwheat at the Society of Women Musicians. Greep’s own Sonata was first performed at the Royal Academy of Music on 17 June 1941 by David Bellman and the composer, and on 13 December 1941 by Copperwheat and Greep. In February 1942 Edward Lockspeiser wrote in Musical America that Greep had met with “decided success” with the work. The autograph bears the stamp of Hinrichsen Edition Ltd. and the number H.E. 334a, suggesting that publication was seriously considered.

8) Sea Mist, for piano

No contemporary performance, publication or review of Sea Mist has yet been traced. The surviving manuscript appears to be the principal known source for the work.

9) Piano Ballade

No contemporary performance or publication has so far been identified. The manuscript is at present the only known source for the composition.

10) Untitled composition for piano

The surviving autograph lacks a title. No independent reference has yet been found that would allow the work to be identified or dated more precisely.

11) Cradle Song, for contralto, flute and piano

Greep set Padraic Colum’s poem A Cradle Song. No contemporary performance or publication of her setting has so far been traced. Its scoring for contralto, flute and piano is unusual among settings of Colum’s text.

12) A Little Sonata, for cello and piano

The surviving manuscript was edited by the cellist and teacher Alison Dalrymple, who later became Jacqueline du Pré’s first regular cello teacher. This strongly suggests that the work belongs to Greep’s later pedagogical activity and was intended for young cellists. No public performance or printed edition has yet been identified.

13) I Saw Three Ships, for three-part chorus

Greep arranged the traditional English Christmas carol for three-part chorus. There are two identical manuscripts part of the archive, the second one has the different title "As I sat under a Sycamore Tree". No specific contemporary performance or publication has yet been traced. Its scoring suggests an educational or amateur choral context.

14) Lullaby, after Brahms

This arrangement of Brahms’s Wiegenlied was made for three flutes, oboe, clarinet, cello and piano.

15) The Reaper’s Song, after Schumann

Greep arranged Schumann’s Schnitterliedchen, Op. 68 No. 18, for flute, oboe, clarinet, cello and piano.

16) Hymn to Life, for voice and piano

The song sets a text by Helene Williams, whose identity has not yet been established with certainty. No contemporary performance or publication has so far been traced, and the surviving manuscript remains the principal known source.

17) The Rain, for voice and piano

The composition is scored for voice and piano and is a setting of a poem by William Henry Davies.