In a reflection published in the Percy Grainger Companion, English tenor Peter Pears argued that ‘the most important, most powerful, most absorbing factor’ of Grainger's life was his mother, ‘and no one who talks about him can – or should – avoid talking about her’. Grainger's ‘unusually close’ relationship with his mother is one of his most consistently recognised influences. Rose's taste in literature, art, and music, her liberal views on human relationships, philosophical perspectives, atheism, and even her racist attitudes have been traced to or blamed for Grainger's artistic tri¬umphs and character weaknesses. Rose and Percy's relationship has been characterised as ‘intense, even stifling’. They were rarely apart, and Rose directed almost every aspect of her son's life. Yet, while their relationship and its impact on Grainger is ubiquitously acknowledged, its emotional and social consequences – in particular, how it affected his relationships with others – have rarely been deeply interrogated.
— Sarah Kirby, “Inventing Percy Grainger: The Construction of Biography on Page, Stage and Screen," Boydell & Brewer, 2026, pp. 114–136
The Percy Grainger Society invites you into the afterlife of one of music’s most intriguing figures. The 2026–27 series of members’ meetings Staging Percy Grainger, Reimaging Life and Legacy is a three-part series exploring how playwrights, composers, and performers have brought Grainger to the stage, illuminating the man behind the music through drama, opera, and intimate theatrical portraiture.
There are three programs in this series. Moderated by Dr. Sarah Kirby, each program reveals how archival traces—letters, images, and music—are transformed into performance, offering fresh perspectives on Grainger’s complex identity as interpreted by artists today.
First: Staging Percy Grainger: Rose & Percy
Rob George, creator of Percy and Rose (1982), opens the series with a searching exploration of Grainger’s emotional world and personal relationships. Inspired by archival sources, George traces how private longing and human connection can be shaped into compelling fiction, revealing how the stage can capture both the vulnerability and intensity that defined Grainger’s inner life.
Rob George graduated from Adelaide University with a BA (Hons) Psych and a DipEd, and after a brief time teaching and in education research, departed regular employment and sought his fortune in film, TV and theatre. Rob wrote the feature Fair Game in the mid-1980s, and the film was re-released in the US in 2022. Rob was the co-originating writer, with Peter Goldsworthy, of the feature film Passion, based on his stage play Percy and Rose, and which starred Richard Roxburgh and Barbara Hershey.