Dennis Brain: A Life in Music

Chapter 2: The RAF Years (1939–1946)

15 The RAF Years (1939–1946) C H A P T E R 2 Brain was in the Royal Air Force (RAF) during World War II and a year afterwards. He continued studies at the Royal Academy of Music during the war and augmented playing in the RAF Symphony Orchestra with musical engagements in London and the provinces. RAF duties took Brain to RAF bases at home and abroad and to some extent restricted outside engagements. Sometimes he had to turn down offers of work owing to schedule conflicts and to his increasing demand as a soloist . His concerts as well as broadcasts in solo repertoire increased from 1941 onwards on home and overseas transmissions. This was in addition to many chamber music recitals and broadcasts with strings and other combinations. He was not restricted to classical music but ventured into the sphere of dance bands, light music, and music for the film industry. With so many musicians away in the services abroad, he was much in demand for film soundtracks as well as in the many ensembles and orchestras being established in and around London during the war years. It was a short train journey from Uxbridge, Middlesex, and he was usually free of duties from mid-day onwards. Joining Up The outbreak of war in September 1939 temporarily interrupted studies. On September 26, the Brain brothers enlisted in the RAF (Pls. 1–2). They signed up for seven years and were not discharged until September 26, 1946. Gareth Morris, their flutist friend from the Academy, returned from a holiday and found the brothers in uniform. Soon he joined them. After basic training, they became members of the RAF Central Band at Uxbridge, where their 16 Dennis Brain: A Life in Music commanding officer, Wing Commander O’Donnell, was busy planning the formation of a large symphony orchestra, with Air Ministry approval.1 Morris recalled the warm welcome they received at Uxbridge: “The regular bandsmen there (it was their profession and their life) gave us the warmest of welcomes. Of course, they adored Dennis. There were horn players there, regular bandsmen and here comes the greatest virtuoso in the world. They absolutely loved him and he loved them too. They all welcomed us with delightful open arms.”2 Meanwhile, the Royal Academy experienced a shortage of musicians. The Brain brothers were invited to return for the spring and summer terms in 1940. Their father was in Bristol with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, which had been evacuated in September 1939, so Brain continued his studies with the organ and carried on his horn playing unsupervised.3 Norman Del Mar, a horn student of Frank Probyn at the Royal College of Music, joined the RAF Symphony Orchestra as second horn. Del Mar remembered those days: “Probyn got me into the RAF Band (Probyn was my horn teacher at the College, a very distinguished gentleman) and he got me of his own initiative into the RAF Band because he said it would be very good for me to ‘be with the Brain boys’ as he put it. Leonard, of course, was with Dennis in the RAF Band. I met Dennis first actually in barracks.”4 Brain and Del Mar soon became firm friends, embellishing and improvising on the standard repertoire, all made more enjoyable because their conductors rarely noticed. Del Mar remembered Brain at this time: If he was game for anything, this was his motto—anything that turned up, we’d have a go at. That would be the fun of it and when we used to sit in the RAF, the whole point of everything was to try and catch the conductors out, as much as one could, by exaggerating every musical point to its utmost. Every phrase had to be precisely so and you’d look out of the corner of your eye to see if they noticed. If they did, it was one up to them, if they didn’t, it was one up to us. Dennis always—and between us we concocted all kinds of horn obbligatos for the most ridiculous pieces!5 Sir Henry Walford Davies’s RAF March Past became a horn cadenza for Brain, “much to the fury of the regular first horn,” as Del Mar recalled, and he and Brain used to “add scales and flourishes.”6 John Burden, who had been a student with Brain at the Academy, joined the RAF Orchestra at Uxbridge briefly. He recalled: I had applied to the...