Sam Hartley Braithwaite was born at West Croft, Main Street, Egremont, Cumberland (now Cumbria), on 20 July 1883, the fourth of six children of the surgeon, Samuel Braithwaite, and his wife, Eleanor Elizabeth (née Hartley).
By 1901, Braithwaite had moved to London, and was living at 8 Rossiter Road, Streatham. At this stage in his development, he trained not as an artist but as a musician. He attended the Royal Academy of Music, studying clarinet, organ and piano (the last under Cuthbert Whitemore), and composition (under Frederick Corder). As a clarinettist, he was awarded an Ada Lewis Scholarship in 1902, and performed in concerts that included the Bohemian Concert of the Cumberland and Westmorland Association of London at the Holborn Restaurant in 1905, and another at the Town Hall, Egremont, in 1906.
While at the RAM, he became a close friend of his fellow student, the composer, Arnold Bax, and he would later receive the dedication of Bax’s piano piece, Apple Blossom Time (1915).
Braithwaite remained at the Royal Academy of Music as a teacher of harmony and piano, numbering among his pupils the composer, Eric Coates, who was only three years his junior. From 1910 to 1913, he also worked as the musical director of the Passmore Edwards Settlement in Tavistock Place, an educational institution for the working classes in Bloomsbury (succeeding Gustav Holst in the position). During this period, he was living close by at 37 Tavistock Place, and attempting to establish himself as a composer.
In 1914, Braithwaite was appointed to the staff of Bournemouth School of Music. However, he may not have taken up the position until 1919, following the end of the First World War. In that year, he settled in Southbourne, Bournemouth (then in Hampshire), joining his parents, who had retired there, and his brother, Henry. From that time, he began to divide his energies between music and art, and developed as an accomplished visual artist. As an indication of his shift of focus, he published an article on ‘The Ethical Dominant in John Ruskin’ in Current Opinion in 1919, and began to lecture to local institutions of adult education on ‘Some aspects of the Art Teaching of John Ruskin’.
Braithwaite’s career as a composer blossomed, and some of his resulting works – including the scherzo, A Night by Dalegarth Bridge (1920) – were performed by the Bournemouth Municipal Orchestra (now the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra). His Snow Picture for orchestra (1924) and Elegy for orchestra (1927) both won Carnegie Trust awards and were published as part of the Carnegie Collection of British Music. In January 1927, his article, ‘Modern Music’, appeared in Music Quarterly; attempting a balanced critique of new music, it included ambivalent comments on the music of his friend, Arnold Bax.
Braithwaite took some classes at Bournemouth School of Art, and worked increasingly as a painter and printmaker, specialising in landscapes. He joined, and exhibited with, a number of local art societies, including Eric Hesketh Hubbard’s The Print Society (founded in 1919) and the New Forest Group (founded in 1923). Many of his subjects were of Hampshire and Dorset, though, in 1926, he also painted in Florence. Other of his paintings were more abstract, with titles that alluded to music, such as Foxtrot and Pavan, both of which were exhibited at the Arlington Gallery, Old Bond Street, London, in 1927. By 1931, he was exhibiting regularly with both the Bournemouth Arts Club and the Bournemouth Literature and Art Association. Exhibits at the latter included the transparent oil painting, Marigolds (1932), an indication of a further broadening of subject and approach.
By 1933 – when he was teaching at Bournemouth Conservatoire of Music – Braithwaite had moved to ‘Hillingdon’, Brunstead Road, Poole. He would live there with his mother, his brother, Henry, and his sister, Jessie. During the decade, he exhibited in London at the Fine Art Society (1932-37) and the Royal Academy of Arts (1933 & 1937). His second exhibit at the RA – a watercolour of Chepstow Castle – was reproduced in The Sphere on 18 December 1937.
During the Second World War, Braithwaite remained in Bournemouth and had some involvement with the Wessex Philharmonic Orchestra, as both a composer and a performer. However, he then returned to the Lake District and settled at Primrose Cottage, Carr Bank, Beetham, Westmoreland. He joined the Lake Artists Society, but died soon after on 13 January 1947.
His work is represented in the collections of the Royal Academy of Music; and Aberystwyth university School of Art.
