Everything was going swimmingly for Sir Eugene Goossens – until they found the rubber masks and incense in his luggage at Sydney Airport.
Goossens was the third generation in a dynasty of conductors, all of whom bore the same name. However, the family being of Belgian origin, his forebears employed an accent grave (i.e. Eugène). Eugene III was born in London, and studied in Bruges, Liverpool, and at the Royal Academy of Music under Sir Charles Villiers Stanford.
He was a violinist, and later assistant conductor, under Sir Thomas Beecham. Ultimately, he would carry out Beecham’s notorious arrangement of Handel’s “Messiah.”
Even so, he was a considerably talented composer. He wrote symphonies, operas, concertos and chamber music. He was also the guiding force behind a collection of patriotic fanfares, of which Aaron Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man” was destined to become the most famous.
Goossens accepted several conducting positions in the United States, including at the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra (while he taught at the Eastman School) and the Cincinnati Symphony (where he succeeded Fritz Reiner).
He then spent the better portion of a decade in Australia, where he conducted the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and directed the NSW State Conservatorium of Music.
While “Down Under,” he entered into a passionate affair with Rosaleen Norton, also known as Thorn, later referred to as the Witch of Kings Cross. Norton was an artist and occultist, whose paintings of demons and phalluses were decidedly out-of-step with the spirit of the time.
In 1955, a scandal involving a mentally ill woman who claimed she had participated in a Satanic Black Mass at Norton’s flat had a domino effect. (Sure, Norton had her own coven, but she denied being a Satanist; she did however stand by her charms and hexes.) Her paintings were removed from public exhibitions and photographs were confiscated from her home. Arrests on obscenity and blasphemy charges came fast and furious. The tabloids had a field day.
Unfortunately, Goossens became collateral damage. Incriminating letters, which he had asked Norton to destroy after reading, were found stashed beneath her sofa. Though he was in England when the storm broke, wholly ignorant of the antipodean moral panic, the authorities lay in wait upon his return. Among his luggage were found 800 “pornographic” photos, some film, and the aforementioned masks and incense. As a high profile musical figure, for all intents and purposes, the conductor’s Goossens was cooked. He resigned from his posts in disgrace.
Later he was engaged by the BBC, and especially by Everest Records, for which he made some very fine recordings late in his career. But by all accounts, by that time he was a broken man. You wouldn’t know it from his discography. The conductor continued to turn in powerful performances to the very end.
Happy birthday, Sir Eugene Goossens (1893-1962).
Here is Ottorino Respighi’s “Feste Romane” (Goossen’s final recording, released posthumously):
Circuses https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45GaSoDpbg0
The Jubilee https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKnQyRXFmd4
The October Festival https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-xWO2Lmf9g
The Epiphany https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bwk3EyrsMZ0
There are many other examples of his artistry on YouTube, but unfortunately, as above, most of them seem to be saved in segments.
Here is some of Goossens’ own music, a Baxian tone poem, “The Eternal Rhythm,” composed at the age of 19:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djZQsdCqj5U
PHOTOS: Eugene Goossens (left), bewitched, bothered and bewildered; the charming Rosaleen Norton
