 According to his pupil Jane Joseph, Holst fostered in performance "a spirit of practical comradeship ... none could know better than he the boredom possible to a professional player, and the music that rendered boredom impossible".Although Holst wrote many works—particularly songs—during his student days and early adulthood, almost everything he wrote before 1904 he later classified as derivative "early horrors".Nevertheless, the composer and critic Colin Matthews recognises even in these apprentice works an "instinctive orchestral flair".