 Exhausted from his wartime concerts routine , Grainger spent much of 1946 on holiday in Europe . He was experiencing a sense of career failure ; in 1947 , when refusing the Chair of Music at Adelaide University , he wrote : " If I were 40 years younger , and not so crushed by defeat in every branch of music I have essayed , I am sure I would have welcomed such a chance " . In January 1948 he conducted the premiere of his wind band setting of " The Power of Rome and the Christian Heart " , written for the Goldman Band to celebrate the 70th birthday of its founder . Afterwards , Grainger denigrated his own music as " commonplace " while praising Darius Milhaud 's Suite Française , with which it had shared the programme . 
