Priaulx Rainier

Although she spent most of her adult life in Britain, Priaulx Rainier felt that her roots were firmly in South Africa. It was actually the sounds and atmosphere of her childhood years which proved to be a source of reference throughout her life. Ivy Priaulx Rainier was the third of five children. The others were: Peter William, born in 1890, Ellen Florence Dorothy (better known as Nella), born in 1892 and Eveline Howard, born in 1898. A younger sister, Winifred Yolland was born in 1905. Her father, William Gregory, was born on 17 December 18581 in Southampton. Although little is known about him, the family ancestry can be traced as far back as AD 750. The 1903 CA Calvert and JH Rainier publication Genealogy of the Rainier Family, Ancestors in Male Line of the Rainiers according to Ms in Bib R a Paris contains a special section devoted to the British and South African branch of the family. Ellen Howard, his wife, was born on 21 April 18672 at Hemel Hampstead near London. She was the only girl and youngest of a family of seven children. Priaulx’s Cape Town sojourn, where she studied at the newly-founded South African College of Music, was influenced by her violin teachers Winifred Leffler, Ellie Marx and William Henry ('Daddy') Bell. Under his guidance she played string quartets from the age of eleven on a regular basis. Although not a student of Bell, he did exercise a tremendous influence on all the students of the College; his influence upon her was lasting. To her the activities at the College were by far the richest she had had in her training. After winning an Overseas Scholarship from the University of South Africa in 1919, Rainier went to London and continued her studies at the Royal Academy of Music3. Her violin teachers were Hans Wesseley (a former pupil of Kreissler) and Rowsby Woof. She had the great fortune of going to JB McEwen4 for harmony and counterpoint. At the same time, the violist Lionel Tertis was appointed to form string quartets and to take charge of chamber music. Her first visit back to South Africa was in order to to recuperate from a nervous breakdown. In 1922 the names of Priaulx and Walter Swanson5, who settled in South Africa much later, appeared amongst the first violins who performed at a Student’s Concert in Queen’s Hall, London. After having completed her LRAM diploma, Priaulx had to earn a living. In 1925 she was offered a post teaching violin and aural training at Badminton School, Bristol - a school which Indira Ghandi attended. She never wanted to return to South Africa, because she felt that she had too much too absorb and too many opportunities to extend herself. Edith Sitwell once said to her:’You’ve got to be amongst people who keep “shopping up” your brain.’ Priaulx could see that this would not be possible in South Africa, as she was well aware of the cultural environment and development through her regular contact with family and friends. Circumstances demanded that she earn a living as a teacher and violinist, so there was little time for composing. There were opportunities for quartet and quintet playing, especially at society ‘at homes’. She met the violinist Orrea Pernel at the Society of Women Musicians and they eventually formed a quartet with Winnifred Copperwheat (viola) and Gene Milne. They performed for about three years on a regular basis. At about this time her cousin Aubrey Rainier6, who was first enrolled at Walen’s Cello School, London, became a pupil of Professor Ivor James of the Royal College of Music. He gave his first full-scale Wigmore Hall recital accompanied by Gerald Moore on the pianoforte, at the age of eight. When Priaulx was about thirty she was involved in a serious motorcar accident which forced her to stop her private teaching. Strangely, it was always physical accidents in her life that made her change her direction. During this period she wrote a Duo for piano and violin which was performed in the Wigmore Hall on 30 April 1936 by Orrea Pernel an