It was as a teenager—or even earlier—that I first encountered Frank Merrick. From the age of ten, I studied at the rather grandly entitled International Cello Centre, occupying in fact just a tiny apartment in Ladbroke Grove, London, and presided over my by charismatic teacher Jane Cowan. I ended up going there six days a week for lessons, classes and the occasional evening event—a concert or lecture. A regular at these events was an old man with a distinguished crown of white hair who used to settle himself comfortably in a large armchair, fall fast asleep as the event began, and wake up at the end. This, I discovered, was Frank Merrick, pianist and composer, who had taught Jane’s husband Christopher at the Royal College of Music in (I presume) the 1920s. After some time, I got to know him a bit, gradually falling under his gentle spell; later, I started visiting him in his home—not far away from the Cello Centre—where we played sonatas together. Eventually, he invited me to record his own sonata for cello and piano with him; as I remember, he was 90, I was 17. The sonata was lovely; Frank was justifiably proud that a well-known cellist of his day had told him that the slow movement was as beautiful as Faure’s Élégie. I kept nagging the poor man, asking him incessantly whether he’d written anything else for the cello; no, was the reply, he didn’t think so. (He was the most absent-minded person I’ve ever met, which was why I kept asking; I remember calling once to arrange a time to visit him. We agreed on the following Tuesday, at 4pm. ‘Good’, he said slowly. ‘See you Friday at five’, and put down the phone, leaving me all atwitter. I thought it was because of his age; but Christopher Cowan said he’d been just the same when he’d studied with him. Mind on higher things, I suppose.) Then one day I arrived, and he was holding a piece of music on his lap. ‘Here’, he said, sounding surprised. ‘I just found this suite for solo cello in a box. I’ve no memory at all of having written it.’ I was thrilled, and started learning it forthwith.

Those visits to his house were also particularly enjoyable because he would regale me with stories about his fascinating life. Born in Bristol, he had shown early talent as both pianist and composer, and at the age of eleven had been taken to play to the legendary Paderewski, who suggested that the young Frank go to Vienna to play to the most famous piano teacher of the day, Leschetizky. Frank followed his advice and, amazingly, was accepted as a pupil by the master. In addition, he was taken to see the great Johann Strauss II, who was shown a waltz that the young boy had composed. ‘I see I have a rival’, remarked the composer of ‘The Blue Danube’. Not long thereafter, Frank recalled, he visited Brahms’s apartment, which, for legal reasons, had been kept exactly as it had been when Brahms had died there just two years earlier. (Later, he was to play Brahms’s D minor concerto under the baton of Theodor Müller-Reuter, who had conducted it for Brahms.) Returning to England after more than seventy lessons with Leschetizky—a rare honour, many pianists having been satisfied with just two or three—he made his debut with the Hallé under Hans Richter in 1902, and his Wigmore (then Bechstein) Hall recital debut a year later. (In 1953 and then 1973, he was to give recitals there to mark the anniversaries of that debut; I remember the latter occasion very well.) In 1908/09, Frank toured Australia with Dame Clara Butt. I don’t think he told me much about her—but I do recollect him saying that when he left for that tour, a few volumes of Scarlatti sonatas had been published, and that by the time he returned, several more volumes were available, much to his excitement. In 1910, he entered the Anton Rubinstein competition in St Petersburg as both pianist and composer; other competitors included Arthur Rubinstein (no relation) and my grandfather, Julius Isserlis. Frank was awarded a diploma for composition—a coveted distinction. Back in England, he married Hope Squire, a fellow pianist and composer, and radical suffragette, as well as a vegetarian (rare in those times); she proved to be a major influence on him. During World War I, he registered as a conscientious objector, and in 1917 was jailed for pacifism, with hard labour. (He liked to recall, pride mixed with sorrow, that in his absence his cat died of a broken heart.) Happily, on his release, he resumed his career with surprising speed. He had also become something of a musical radical by this time, introducing to Britain works by many contemporary British composers—including Bax, who dedicated his Paean to Frank—and others, including Debussy, Reger and Prokofiev, championing the sonatas of the latter. On one occasion, one of these sonatas had been poorly received; at the following recital, featuring the next sonata in the cycle, he silently declared to the audience: ‘I don’t care whether or not you like this!’ According to an amused Frank, an artist friend of his saw that thought on his face as he came onto the stage. His composing continued alongside his concert life and by now considerable teaching load. (He had learned, in prison, the international language of Esperanto—another radical cause—and wrote many songs in that language, as did Taneyev.) In preparation for the 1928 centenary of Schubert’s death, the Columbia Record Company enterprisingly announced a competition for the best completion of his ‘Unfinished’ Symphony; Frank produced two delicious movements, which won first prize and were duly recorded (twice, the second time in 1965). In 1937, he took up yet another cause: the music of John Field. In that year he also got married for the second time, to his student Sybil Case, Hope Squire having died after a long illness. In his later years, a Frank Merrick Society was set up by his friends and admirers in order to facilitate the recording of his compositions and performances; indeed, Frank continued playing almost until the end, one of his last projects being the recording of the cello sonata with me, to which I added the present suite (both tapes now lost—probably mercifully). That at least gave me the chance to play it for him, which was good—even though (as I recall) he slept soundly through the whole play-through, waking up only briefly to tell me not to use double dots in the sicilienne.

Since Frank had no memory of its composition, it’s impossible to date the suite exactly; but the title page announces that it was fingered and edited by the cellist W E Whitehouse, and since he died in 1935, we know at least that it was written before then. It is, I feel, an enchanting work, full of charm and invention. On seeing its title, Suite in the eighteenth-century style, one would immediately assume that it is a tribute to the Bach suites—and perhaps it is; but it’s worth remembering that the first complete recording of the suites, Casals’s immortal set, had not yet been made, so it’s quite possible that Frank didn’t know them particularly well. Certainly the opening ritornelle brings to mind Handelian grandeur rather than Bach; and if some of the other movements carry a suggestion of Bach’s seventh suite, it’s by no means a pale imitation. Each movement possesses its own strong character, ranging from the cheeky to the poignant; I am delighted to present the first (surviving!) recording of this long-hidden work.

from notes by Steven Isserlis © 2021