DOLMETSCH, Eugene Arnold 1858-1940. Musician. Arnold Dolmetsch was born in France into a musical family, and after finishing his musical studies at the Brussels Conservatoire came to Dulwich College, where he soon won a reputation as a teacher of the violin. However, his chief love became the study of old music and the instruments on which it was played. He discovered manuscripts of forgotten early English composers in the British Library, gave up teaching, and concentrated on giving lectures and recitals on old instruments which he both repaired and learned to make. In 1903 he married, as his second wife, Mabel Johnston of Denmark Hill. In 1925 he founded an annual historical chamber music festival in Haslemere, Surrey, where they had settled. His four children also participated in these festivals, playing on instruments (such as the clavichord and viol) reconstructed from old designs. The Dolmetsch Foundation was started in 1928, and the Dolmetsch collection of musical instruments is now at the Horniman Museum.
Rosemary Warhurst