In the early 1960s, when I’d just left school, prospects were bleak for young Australian composers, whose best option was to go overseas to study and probably end up staying there. Things began to pick up when Professor Donald Peart established a branch of the ISCM which operated from the Music Department of Sydney University and John Hopkins was appointed ABC Director of Music. About this time Richard Meale emerged as a bright beacon, a vital force that connected us with exciting developments in Europe, North America and Asia, and provided, through his own outstanding creative work, a source of hope and national pride.

In my late teens, having heard Richard’s early compositions and performances, I plucked up enough courage to ask him to teach me. He agreed, refusing to accept any payment. Informal lessons with Richard were the highlight of my existence. His mercurial personality I found both alarming and invigorating. He was one of the most persuasive and inspiring people I’ve ever met, with wide ranging interests outside music, which was his greatest love. He’d blaze with sudden enthusiasms, some brief but spectacular; others, as for the music of Debussy, enduring throughout his life. As a teacher – he later became my supervisor at The University of Adelaide – he was never less than totally engaged. He could encourage or pour scorn as he  saw fit, but you always felt he cared at a deep level as you came away from lessons with your head buzzing, all fired up to read Lorca, McLuhan or Camus (“if you don’t read this you’re a fool”, he would say). Over several decades his students – many of whom have achieved prominence – have experienced this kind of passionate exhortation, perennial in style but ever-changing in content. And just as his teaching never got into a rut, the same could be said of his eagerly awaited compositions as they emerged, each exploring new ground, often producing both outrage and wild enthusiasm at their first performances. For all his consummate professionalism I think of him as being at heart an amateur composer in the real sense of the word. All his music was produced first and foremost as a labour of love. He had a hit or miss attitude to deadlines which made programming new works a nightmare – none was considered ready for public presentation until Richard was completely satisfied with every detail of its immaculately notated score. Generations of devoted students have stayed up night after night copying parts – by hand in the days before computers – in a sometimes vain effort to get them on the music stands in time for the first rehearsal – an experience they’ll always remember.

Richard cared passionately about people. He was by nature extremely generous and I recall with gratitude many instances of his personal kindness. He had an enormous capacity for friendship. He was also capable of paranoia and misjudging the actions of people well disposed towards him so that friends and colleagues sometimes became estranged. He was utterly hopeless in money and many other practical matters. He worked hard in the interests of fellow composers and was a powerful spokesperson – often behind the scenes – for Australian music. He was extremely fortunate, especially in later life, in receiving the friendship and loving care of Julie Simonds and her family: Pete, Matt and Caitlin; and his niece Amanda Meale. He was a quite extraordinary human being who would have excelled in very many fields. How fortunate are we that music chose him.

Ross Edwards