Peter Evans Archive

The collection mostly comprises Evans's academic output, principally lectures on the history of music of all periods given for courses at Durham and then Southampton Universities, and especially initially the baroque period such as the viol music of John Jenkins, and then the twentieth century and British music. There are also quantities of articles, papers, talks and lectures given to academic and other audiences, in person or broadcast, and also reviews, sleeve notes and especially programme notes for concerts, along with programmes of concerts for the societies and orchestras which he conducted or was otherwise involved in as a director, or trustee, or might even just have attended. He has retained his lecture notes from his own time as a music student at Durham University. A little personal correspondence survives concerning various possible academic appointments, and also commenting on others' academic work. There are some scores of his own music, and also that of others, especially Benjamin Britten. There is very little material about wider administrative duties at either Durham or Southampton Universities, minimal photographic material, and no recordings.

The musicologist Peter Angus Evans was born on 7 November 1929, the youngest of 8 children of the Baptist minister Rev James Mackie Evans and Elizabeth Mary Fraser. He was educated at West Hartlepool Grammar School and then St Cuthbert's Society, Durham University, from Michaelmas 1947, where he gained a 1st class BA (Hons) in Music in 1950, studying with Arthur Hutchings and A.E.F. Dickinson. He was then briefly a music master at Bishop Wordsworth's School, Salisbury, from September 1951 to December 1952, becoming FRCO in 1952, before returning to Durham University as a lecturer in Music in January 1953. Whilst there, he gained his BMus in 1953, his MA in the same year with a dissertation on 17th-century chamber music manuscripts in Durham Cathedral Library, and his DMus in 1958. At Durham, his other roles included being conductor of both the Durham Colleges Orchestral Society 1953-1960 and the Palatine Opera Group 1956-1961. He was also opera conductor of the Hovingham Festival in 1959. From Durham, he moved to a new chair in Music at Southampton University in October 1961, becoming also dean of the Faculty of Arts there in October 1968. At Southampton, he conducted the University Orchestra 1961-1968, the University Opera from 1964, and also the Philharmonic Society and University Choral Society from 1965, as well as being on the board of management of and occasionally conducting the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. His achievements at Southampton included creating a music honours degree course, and developing the Turner Sims Concert Hall as a purpose-built performance venue on the university's campus in 1974, in collaboration with the Southampton Institute of Sound and Vibration Research, and where a plaque celebrates him as 'the founder of the department of music'. He retired from Southampton in 1990 and moved to near Ledbury in Herefordshire. but remained active, undertaking a visiting fellowship at Trevelyan College Durham in 1991, and continuing to develop his British music interests, such as Jonathan Harvey, Alan Rawsthorne and especially Benjamin Britten, and also Elgar. He was also very active in the Malvern Concert Club, being its chair 1996-2005. As a performer, he was an accomplished organist, pianist and violist. He married the musician June Vickery in 1953 who predeceased him. Evans died on 1 January 2018.

• EVN A Undergraduate Notes
• EVN B Academic Career
• EVN C University Lectures
• EVN D Other Lectures and Academic Output
• EVN E Porfessional Associations
• EVN F Music Scores
• EVN G Personal and Family

Open for consultation.

Donated by the solicitior dealing with his estate, 3 December 2018, Acc No Misc.2018/19:51.

Online catalogue

Permission to make any published use of material from the collection must be sought in advance from the Sub-Librarian, Special Collections (e-mail PG.Library@durham.ac.uk) and, where appropriate, from the copyright owner. The Library will assist where possible with identifying copyright owners, but responsibility for ensuring copyright clearance rests with the user of the material.