Biography
Dorothy Gertrude Howell (1898-1982) was an English composer and pianist.
Howell was born on 25th February 1898, grew up in the Handsworth area of Birmingham, and received a convent education. At the age of fiteen she went to the Royal Academy of Music, where her teachers included John McEwen and Tobias Matthay.
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Howell achieved fame with her symphonic poem Lamia, whose premiere was given by Henry Wood at the Proms on 10th September 1919, and which he conducted again that same week. He went on to conduct Lamia again at the 1921, 1923, 1924, 1926, 1930, and 1940 Proms, but in subsequent years it was neglected, until its revival in the 2010 season of the Proms. Howell dedicated Lamia on its 1921 publication to Wood. Among other compositions by Howell, Wood conducted Koong Shee in 1921, her Piano Concerto in 1923 and 1927 with the composer herself as pianist on both occasions, and The Rock in 1928. He was scheduled to conduct the first performance of Three Divertissements, Howell's last known orchestral work, in 1940, but the concert was cancelled because of the Blitz, and it didn't receive its premiere until the 1950 Malvern Festival.
Howell won the Cobbett Prize in 1921 for her Phantasy for violin and piano. She received the nickname of the "English Strauss" in her lifetime. Wood attempted to recruit Howell to his conducting class at the Royal Academy of Music in 1923, but she instead became a teacher there in 1924. During World War II, she served with the Women's Land Army. She retired from the Royal Academy of Music in 1970, and after her retirement continued to teach students privately.
Howell tended the grave of Edward Elgar for several years, and when she died - on 12th January 1982 in Malvern - she was buried near Elgar.
Biography text from Last.fm, available under CC BY-SA.