William Mathias was born in Whitland in Carmarthenshire.
He was regarded somewhat as a child prodigy
and started playing the piano at the age of just three years old.
He was composing by the age of five.
He went on to attend Aberystwyth University
where he became a member of the Elizabethan Madrigal Singers which developed
his love of choral music. He composed ‘Gloria in Excelsis Deo’ for them in
1954.
Mathias also studied at the Royal
Academy of Music in London under Lennox Barclay and was elected a Fellow there in
1965.
He was awarded the Bax Society
Prize of the Harriet Cohen International Music Award in 1968.
Between 1970 and 1988 he held the position of
Professor of Music and head of department in the University of Wales, Bangor. His
compositions include large scale works, including an opera, ‘The Servants,’ three
symphonies and three piano concertos. Much of his music was written for the
Anglican choral tradition – most famously the anthem ‘Let them Praise Thee, O
God’ written for the wedding of Prince Charles and Diana in 1981.
Mathias wrote his ‘Sinfonietta’ for the
Leicestershire Schools Symphony Orchestra in late 1966, and it received its
first performance during the Schools Festival in 1967 at the De Montford Hall. William
Mathias founded the North Wales International Music Festival in St Asaph in
1972 and directed it until his death in 1992.
Read a tribute from his daughter Rhiannon
Nodyn am William Mathias gan ei ferch, Dr. Rhiannon Mathias
