Eugene Goossens

A member of a distinguished musical dynasty, Eugene Goossens studied first at the Bruges Conservatoire in Belgium, then at the Liverpool College of Music, England 1904-6. Later he studied at the Royal College of Music with 'Charles Villiers Stanford' 1907-12. After a brief period as a violinist with the Queen's Hall Orchestra, Goossens turned to conducting. Having conducted both orchestral music and opera while assistant to Sir Thomas Beecham, he went on to conduct the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, the Minneapolis Orchestra, and the St Louis Orchestra among others in the United States. He was conductor with the Cincinatti Symphony Orchestra 1931-46. In 1947 Goossens accepted the positions of Chief Conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in Australia and Director of the New South Wales Conservatorium of Music. Goossens led the campaign for the construction of the Sydney Opera House, and chose the site at Bennelong Point where it now stands. Having been made a Chevalier of the Legion d'Honneur previously, Goossens was knighted in 1955. A scandal involving the importation of banned materials on his return from a tour in 1956, however, destroyed his career in Australia. He was forced to resign from the directorship of the Conservatorium, and he left Australia for Britain soon afterward. In later years it has been suggested that this scandal may have been engineered in some way