Talk:Walford Davies

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English, Welsh or British?

I'm not sure we can call him Welsh - he was born in England (just) and the Grove dictionary calls him English. I'm going to play it safe, though (he did spend a lot of time in Wales after all, and did a lot for music there), and change it to British rather than English. --Camembert

He certainly wasn't Welsh by birth — Oswestry is in England and there's no mention of any Welsh parentage in the DNB or Grove. Wilus

In a recent academic book Jürgen Schaarwächter writes "[...]born only a few miles from Wales and often referred to as a Welshman".^[1] Bruce Eder writes "Davies became one of the leading exponents of Welsh music and musicians, serving as the chairman of the Welsh National Council of Music and acquiring the eternal gratitude of all Welsh people of a musical bent (which by and large meant the entire Welsh population)."^[2] The first quote gives a good case for at least dual nationality, and the second suggests that the Welsh people thought of him as one of their own. The existence of a biography in the Dictionary of Welsh Biography implies that he was Welsh. His wife was Welsh.^[3]

Oswestry is a border town with strong links to Wales. The Wikipedia article says "Oswestry was traditionally a Welsh speaking town and the parish church conducted services in Welsh until 1814." Birthplace is not a reliable indication of Welsh identity, for example the Liverpool article says "In 1813, 10 per cent of Liverpool's population was Welsh, leading to the city becoming known as "the capital of North Wales."". Wikipedia:Nationality of people from the United Kingdom is useful for this issue.

I propose we describe him as British and change the categories accordingly. We could mention his strong links to Wales in the lead paragrapgh. I will leave this for a few days to allow discussion, to try to avert an edit war. User:Tim riley last changed the lead paragraph from British to English and may wish to comment. Verbcatcher (talk) 19:04, 12 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

References

^ Schaarwächter, Jürgen (2015). Two Centuries of British Symphonism: From the beginnings to 1945. A preliminary survey. Vol. 1. Georg Olms Verlag. p. 256. ISBN 3487152274.
^ Eder, Bruce. "Henry Walford Davies". Allmusic.
^ McLean, John Charles. "DAVIES, Sir HENRY WALFORD". Dictionary of Welsh Biography. National Library of Wales.

Surname

A goodgle search on

"Walford Davies" OR "Henry Davies"

seems to indicate his surname is "Walford Davies" , tho the article calls him Davies. In the absence of evidence for Davies as surname, the references to him as "Davies" should be changed to "Walford Davies".
--Jerzy•t 23:51, 20 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Grove lists him under D for Davies. It's clear from the article that Walford was never part of his surname, as it was his grandmother's maiden name. His full legal name was Henry Walford Davies, but he preferred to be known as plain Walford Davies. JackofOz 02:58, 8 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Not just sacred music

I think he also wrote a suite of 8 nursery rhymes (including Miller's daughter, four and twenty tailors, and a prayer "Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, bless the bed that I lie on..." which, with the exception of the prayer, are not religious - but are a great sing.

Career

I have corrected year he was appointed first Director of Music RAF from "In that year [1917]" to "In 1918", the Royal Air Force having been formed from amalgamation of Royal Flying Corps and Royal Naval Air Service on 1 April 1918.Cloptonson (talk) 19:13, 31 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Other Walford Davieses

Are Professor Damian Walford Davies of Cardiff University or Professor Jason Walford Davies of Bangor University related to H. Walford Davies, possibly great-grandsons? This seems credible as Walford is an unusual name. Verbcatcher (talk) 18:05, 12 July 2016 (UTC)[reply]

[1] Schaarwächter, Jürgen (2015). Two Centuries of British Symphonism: From the beginnings to 1945. A preliminary survey. Vol. 1. Georg Olms Verlag. p. 256. ISBN 3487152274.

[2] Eder, Bruce. "Henry Walford Davies". Allmusic.

[3] McLean, John Charles. "DAVIES, Sir HENRY WALFORD". Dictionary of Welsh Biography. National Library of Wales.

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