Sir Frank Callaway CMG AO OBE 1919-2003

Callaway was the dedicatee for Australian composer Peter Sculthorpe’s short orchestral piece
Sun Song (1984), and for Dmitri Kabalevsky’s Fanfare for Brass Ensemble.

Incredibly, in so full a life, Callaway found time to indulge his passions for gardening, and, all too rarely, composing. His Theme and Diversions for Strings, Theme and Variations for Strings and Prelude and Fugue for Violin and Organ won awards and were publicly performed, but in his later years Callaway preferred to forget them.

Callaway retired from the University of Western Australia in 1984. In his honour the university established the Frank Callaway Foundation for Music, with contributions from Callaway’s friends and admirers. The foundation supports musical activities at the university and works to enhance the strong community and professional associations of the School of Music. Its patrons include Lord Menuhin, Sir Charles Court and Janet Holmes a Court.

The foundation organises the annual Callaway Lecture and stimulates music and music education in Australia and internationally through the non-commercial and co-operative Callaway Centre for Research in Music and Music Education. The centre houses a number of significant collections including those of Callaway himself (including a number of autographed letters and scores by composers such as Liszt, Elgar and Delius), ethnomusicologist John Blacking, Percy Grainger (whom Callaway met during his first overseas study tour and whose ideas on music’s universality impressed him deeply), conductor Verdon Williams, pianist Eileen Joyce (a personal friend of Callaway’s), and music historian Peter Burgis. The Burgis Collection includes significant holdings of Dame Nellie Melba and Peter Dawson memorabilia.

Many of Callaway’s former students and colleagues participated in a joyous gala concert in the Perth Concert Hall on 16 May 1999 to celebrate their mentor’s 80th birthday. After a long period of ill health, Sir Frank Adams Callaway died in Perth on 22 February 2003. He was survived by his wife, Kathleen, who had accompanied him to many overseas conferences, and had a notable career of her own: she was an acclaimed pianist and harpsichordist, and a fine accompanist, particularly for lieder. She was active for many years in concerts and radio broadcasts.

Frank Van Straten, 2007