I’m not going to strong-arm anyone into liking Armstrong. It’s easy enough to fall in love with the easy charm and seductive melodies of Armstrong Gibbs.
Cecil Armstrong Gibbs (1889-1960) is mostly known for his songs. He studied composition with Ralph Vaughan Williams at the Royal College of Music. Nevertheless, he is often dismissed for gravitating toward musical forms that could easily be described as “slight.”
He did contribute his share of British Light Music, to be sure, but he also wrote symphonies. The second of these, the “Odysseus Symphony,” for soloists, chorus, and orchestra, is clearly cut from the same cloth as Vaughan Williams’ “A Sea Symphony.”
It was Princess Elizabeth – the current Queen Elizabeth II – who requested of Armstrong a piece for her eighteenth birthday. The result was this gorgeous miniature, called “Dusk,” which became one of Gibb’s best-known works.
Happy birthday, Armstrong Gibbs!