Myrtle Meggy

Meggy was born to Sarah Myrtle Meggy (née Boone) and Percy Robert Meggy in Sydney, Australia. Meggy was the eldest of six children. She came from a large literary family: her father was prolific writer and helped found the Chicago Daily News,{{cite news |title=Mr. P.R. Meggy |url=https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/178689280 |access-date=29 November 2020 |publisher=North West Champion, Moree, New South Wales |date=18 July 1935}} while her mother was a published poet.{{cite book |last1=Meggy |first1=Mrs. P.R. |title=The barque and other poems |date=c. 1920 |publisher=Epworth Press |location=Sydney, New South Wales}}

Meggy received her first music lessons from her father.{{cite news |title=Singers and Players |url=https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/AS19080725.2.102 |work=Auckland Star |volume=39 |issue=177 |date=July 25, 2008 |page=12}} When she was nine she began studying with Sydney Moss, and gave her first recital at the age of 12.{{cite news |title=Miss Myrtle Meggy's Recital |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-evening-news-myrtle-meggy-recital/130481591/ |work=The Evening News |date=August 3, 1899 |page=8}} In 1902, she went to London in order to study with Mathilde Verne.{{cite news |title=Miss Myrtle Meggy |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/essex-chronicle-miss-myrtle-meggy/130481957/ |work=The Essex County Chronicle |date=October 27, 1916 |page=2}}

Her first public performance was at the Aeolian Hall in 1905. She soon gave recitals there and at Bechstein Hall. Later she participated in the Proms at Queen's Hall under Sir Henry Wood.{{citation needed|date=November 2020}}

Meggy toured the English provinces with Alice Verlet, and gave concerts in Canada (1906){{cite news |title=Don't fail to hear |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/vancouver-daily-world-dont-fail-to-hear/130482220/ |work=Vancouver Daily World |date=February 6, 1906 |location=Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada |page=16}} and Newfoundland. She made an extensive tour (1907) with Emma Albani through Australia, India, New Zealand, Tasmania, and Ceylon. In 1917 she returned to London to give annual recitals, play with the Queen Hall's orchestra under Sir Henry Wood.{{cite news |title=Miss Myrtle Meggy Returns |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-mirror-meggy-returns/130482618/ |work=The Globe |date=April 9, 1917 |location=Sydney, New South Wales Australia |page=16}}

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor dedicated to her his valse-suite for piano Three-fours, Op. 71 (1909).{{citation needed|date=November 2020}}

In 1917, Meggy returned to Sydney as a result of the First World War. Four of her siblings - her three brothers and her sister Margaret Helen{{cite news |title=Nurse Helen Meggy |url=https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/221928727 |access-date=29 November 2020 |publisher=The Sun, Sydney, New South Wales |date=5 September 1915}} - served with the First Australian Imperial Force abroad. Two brothers, Albert Edward Meggy and Douglas Acland Meggy, were killed in action, during the Gallipoli campaign and the battle of Pozières respectively.{{cite news |title=Australian War Memorial registry file: Mrs. P.R. Meggy |number=AWM93 12/11/4710 |date=1931–1932 |publisher=Australian War Memorial |location=Canberra, Australia}}

Upon her return to Australia in 1917, Meggy received an invitation from Henri Verbrugghen to teach at the New South Wales Conservatorium. In June 1918, she gave the first performance of the complete cycle of Beethoven and Mendelssohn cello sonatas in Sydney with James Messeas.{{cite news |title=Miss Meggy and Mr. Messeas |url=https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/15791427 |access-date=29 November 2020 |publisher=The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, New South Wales |date=29 June 1918}}

In May 1920, Meggy participated in the Beethoven Festival organized by the Conservatorium. She was one of four pianists to perform piano concertos (along with Laurence Godfrey Smith, Frank Hutchens and Henry Penn). She performed the Fourth on 12 May (with Saint-Saëns' cadenzas).

Among her pupils was Marie van Hove.{{citation needed|date=November 2020}}

• H. Saxe Wyndham. [https://archive.org/details/whoswhoinmusic017375mbp Who's who in music: A biographical record of contemporary musicians]. Boston: Small, Maynard and Co., 1913.
• H.J. Gibbney, Ann G. Smith. [http://ncb.anu.edu.au/sites/default/files/documents/A%20Biographical%20Register%201788-1939%20Vol%202%20L-Z.pdf A biographical register 1788-1939. Notes from the name index of the Australian Dictionary of Biography. Vol. II: L-Z]

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Category:1887 births

Category:1959 deaths

Category:20th-century Australian pianists

Category:20th-century Australian women pianists