The Life and Legacy of Caroline Townshend - Part Two

In a previous post, I began an account of the life of Caroline Townshend, a remarkable Anglo-Irish lady and a hugely influential, yet unsung, heroine of contemporary Irish harping history. 

Where, when or how Carrie became interested in the Irish harp we simply do not know. It may possibly have been a natural consequence of her Gaelic League membership. Some part may have been played by one of her closest friends, another remarkable woman, Dr. Annie Patterson, a native of Armagh, who founded the Feis Ceoil music competition in Dublin. 

Dr Annie Patterson

In 1926 the Feis Ceoil syllabus for that year includes The Townshend Cup presented by Miss Carrie Townshend, to be awarded for the singing of two songs in the Irish language, to one’s own harp accompaniment on the Irish harp. 

The archives of the Feis Ceoil contain a three page document (sadly undated), enticingly titled 'For the Adjudicator of the Townshend Cup'. I hope to have an opportunity to inspect it at some point and see whether we can glean anything further of Carrie from it.  When Patterson died in 1934, Carrie endowed the Feis Ceoil with the Dr Annie Patterson Medal in her memory. The medal is still awarded today.

Apart from Annie Patterson, Carrie’s social circle in Cork, included the Fleischmanns a family of highly regarded classical musicians. Aloys Fleischmann Snr was an organist and composer. His wife Tilly Swertz was a concert pianist of renown who had studied under a pupil of Liszt. 

Tilly Swertz

Contemporary newspaper claims during Caroline Townshend's lifetime, that she had studied piano under a pupil of Wagner are probably an error, passed on Chinese whispers fashion from one of Carrie’s former pupils; it is more likely that it was under Tilly Swertz that she did advanced piano studies.  

Fleischmann's son Aloys Jnr went on to become a notable Irish composer with many pieces for harp in his repertoire. As a child he noted in his diary of June 1926 that 'Pappie' spent the evening talking to Miss Townshend about harps. Quite possibly it is through the family’s friendship with Carrie that his interest in the Irish harp originated. Incidentally Papa was apparently in considerable pain that day from a leg problem but clearly that didn’t deter Miss Townshend from pursuing her topic of interest!

In any case once, she ‘put her mind to it’, as Ó’Riada says, Carrie found herself unable to find a playable Irish harp. It seems extraordinary to us nowadays, to imagine that as recently as a hundred years ago, it was well-nigh impossible to buy an Irish harp in Ireland and were it not for Carrie Townshend, that might well still be the case. Eventually she located a suitable instrument in Wales. She would probably have had some instruction there in the technique of playing it and indeed according to Ó Riada, much of her harping style owes a good deal to the Welsh tradition. Or could she have perhaps had instruction from Owen Lloyd? Lloyd was one of the few and most prominent teachers of harp in the early years of twentieth century Ireland and he is said to have studied under the Welsh harper, Thomas Aptommas. 

On returning to Ireland, she prevailed upon Denis McCullough, an Irish Republican activist and musical instrument maker/retailer, to make her a copy of the Trinity College, Brian Boru harp and also to make several other copies for general sale. McCullough would later establish a music shop in Dublin’s Suffolk Street, McCullough Piggott, which continues to sell Irish harps today. 

The Brian Boru harp

Throughout the 1920s and 1930s Carrie was teaching harp in Dublin to a number of advanced students who would go on to international acclaim. Most notable amongst these was Sanchia Pielou who in 1935 became a founding member of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and the Ní Shé sisters Maírín (later Mrs Ferriter) and Róisín (later Ó Tuama), natives of Cork, but living in Dublin. Between them, these two women taught an entire generation of Irish harpists spanning the 1950s to the 1990s. 

Maírín and Róisín Ní Shé 

Mrs Ferriter’s most famous pupil was Mary O’Hara who won the Townshend Cup in 1953 and went on to international fame. Cormac De Barra, grandson of Róisín Ní Shé is a present day harpist of great distinction and international repute. 

Many of Carrie’s arrangements were passed on by the Ní Shé sisters to their pupils, in particular by Maírín Ní Shé, who, in, Sheila Larchet’s book ‘The Irish Harp Book: A Tutor and Companion’, described herself as ‘deeply indebted to harp teacher, Caroline Townshend’.

Carrie died in Dublin May 1951, after suffering a major stroke, which left her paralysed down one side and died within the week at Coolock House, a private nursing home. She was just a few weeks short of her ninety second birthday. Though she never married and left no children, yet Caroline Townshend founded a dynasty, a harping dynasty and left a musical legacy, which endures to this day.

This post was written by Angela Frewen, based on her research into the life of Caroline Townshend. Further information on the Townshend family can be found here,  a site curated by Colonel John Townsend.