Concerts & Tickets
Zadok the Priest
- Purcell
Programme note
Henry Purcell (1659–1695)
Suite from The Fairy QueenSecond Music
Air
Rondeau
Symphony from Act IV
[Prelude]
Canzona
Largo
Allegro – Adagio – Allegro
Prelude to Act III (If love’s a sweet passion)
Symphony from Act V
Chaconne (Dance for the Chinese Man and Woman) from Act VTowards the end of his short life, Purcell became as celebrated a composer for the London theatre as he was for the court and the church. He achieved one of his biggest theatrical successes with The Fairy Queen, produced at the Theatre Royal, Dorset Gardens (which stood between Fleet Street and the Thames) in May 1692, and revived the following year. The Fairy Queen was an anonymous adaptation of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream as a semi-opera: that is, with the cast of actors supplemented by a separate team of singers, performing self-contained masque scenes within each act. Instrumental music was used to preface the acts, to introduce the masques, and for dances within the masques. It also had the specific function of accompanying – and covering the noise of – the “machines” which were used for lavish scenic effects. The Fairy Queen was especially rich in these: which may be one reason why a member of the company later recalled that “the Court and Town were wonderfully satisfy’d with it; but the Expences in setting it out being so great, the Company got very little by it.”
Purcell’s orchestra for The Fairy Queen was, by modern standards, a small one. It is founded on strings, playing in four parts, with a 'continuo' harpsichord (and possibly other instruments) filling out the harmonies. Some numbers have parts for two trumpets and timpani, relatively recent additions to Purcell’s orchestra. A few also have parts for two oboes; in the absence of the original performing material, it is reasonable to assume that the oboes also joined in on the first and second violin parts in many other places. It also seems likely that at least one bassoon was added to the bass line.
This selection of instrumental music from The Fairy Queen begins with two of the pieces played as the members of the audience were taking their seats before the Prologue: they are an Air and a smooth triple-time Rondeau for strings and continuo. These are followed by the grand Symphony (or overture) in D major which introduces the musical segment of Act IV, a masque of the four seasons, set in a garden of gilded fountains, which is performed for the birthday of King Oberon. The Symphony was played to accompany a sunrise: in the words of the play-book printed at the time, “the Sun rises, it appears red through the Mist, as it ascends it dissipates the Vapours, and is seen in its full Lustre”. Scored with trumpets and drums, it is in four movements: an imposing introduction; an intricately contrapuntal Canzona; a minor-key Largo for the strings alone, in Purcell’s most expressive vein of chromatic harmony; and a fanfaring finale, with a contrasting slow middle section again containing some expressive string writing.
The Act III Prelude begins a masque of fairies and rustics with the introduction to the song “If love’s a sweet passion”, setting out its memorable melody in full. And the last two pieces, in C major, are from the masque which concludes the fifth and last Act, a scene of general rejoicing at the forthcoming double wedding of Shakespeare’s lovers. The Symphony, another triple-time piece in rondo form, with trumpets and oboes, accompanied the sudden revelation of an exotic Chinese garden, with a fountain and flying birds. The Chaconne was danced by “a Chinese man and woman" towards the end of the masque; it is in the triple-time rhythm associated with the dance, and also in its traditional form of variations over a repeated (and itself varied) sixteen-bar “ground bass”.
Hear my prayer, O Lord
Purcell grew up in the English church, as a boy chorister in the Chapel Royal and, once his voice had broken, as organ tuner and copyist at Westminster Abbey. In 1679, he succeeded his teacher John Blow as organist of the Abbey, and in 1682 he became one of the organists of the Chapel Royal. Both these posts, and indeed his involvement with the court’s musical establishment before 1682, required him to composed sacred music, chiefly anthems. The anthem Hear my prayer, O Lord, which dates from the early 1680s, is a setting for eight-part choir, supported by organ, of the first verse of the penitential Psalm 102. It is no more than a fragment: for some unknown, and unfathomable, reason, the composer’s manuscript breaks off at the first double bar, with a blank space after it. This is so tantalising that it is hardly surprising contemporary composers such as Sven-David Sandström and Bob Chilcott have used the torso as the starting-point for more extended works; but it is also frequently performed on its own. The piece is based virtually throughout on just two phrases, which are used, both ways up, to create a single span of music gradually increasing in tension towards a powerful climax.
Hear my prayer, O Lord, and let my crying come unto thee.
Psalm 102: 1
Praise the Lord, O JerusalemPurcell’s two church positions, at Westminster Abbey and the Chapel Royal, intersected for royal occasions in the Abbey such as the coronation of James II in 1685 and the coronation of William and Mary in April 1689. It was almost certainly for the latter occasion that he composed Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem, which has a specially compiled Biblical text including verses traditionally associated with coronation services. The piece is a fine example of the verse anthem, a form of Tudor origin in which “verses” for one or more soloists with instrumental accompaniment alternate with passages for the full choir doubled by the instruments. By Purcell’s time, in part thanks to the influence of the French grand motet, the instruments consisted of a string orchestra together with organ, and their contribution included an opening Symphony, or overture, and short “ritornellos” or interludes. As it happens, Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem was the last of Purcell’s “symphony anthems” of this kind, because strings were allowed in anthems only on royal occasions, and after his coronation William discontinued their use.
The anthem is scored for five solo voices – used mostly together, and in one brief passage in a trio of the lower voices, but never in solos or duets – with five-part choir, sparingly used. The Symphony, in a solemn minor key, consists of a slow introduction leading to an extended triple-time fugue. The first verse for the soloists is in a mixture of chordal writing and intricate counterpoint, with occasional interjections by the upper strings as well as the support of the continuo bass. The triple-time trio “As we have heard” is answered and extended by the full choir, with the orchestra, before all five soloists conclude the section. The strings lead a turn to the major for the contrapuntal verse “Be thou exalted”, before the full forces end the anthem with an extended, exuberant triple-time “Alleluia”.
Symphony
Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem: praise thy God, O Sion.
For kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and queens thy nursing mothers.
As we have heard, so have we seen: In the city of our God.
God upholdeth the same for ever.Be thou exalted, Lord, in thine own strength:
So will we sing and praise Thy power.
Alleluia.after Psalm 147: 12; Isaiah 49: 23; Psalm 48: 8; Psalm 21: 13
© Anthony Burton
- Bach
Programme note
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
Contrapunctus XIV (Fuga a tre soggetti) from The Art of FugueDie Kunst der Fuge (The Art of Fugue) was one of Bach’s last major projects. He composed a preliminary version at the beginning of the 1740s, and then returned to the work in the last months of his life to prepare it for publication – which eventually took place in the year after his death. It was conceived as a comprehensive demonstration of the possibilities of counterpoint in the 'old style', in a series of fugues or 'Contrapuncti' in three and four parts (two of them also playable upside down), all based on or including variants of the same theme, together with four two-part canons on further variants of the theme. Most scholars now believe that the work was intended to be played on the harpsichord, with a second player in a couple of pieces. But because it is set out in 'open score', with a separate line for each contrapuntal part, and because it contains no obviously idiomatic keyboard writing, it has always seemed to invite scoring for various families of instruments (as well as more tendentious wholesale orchestration). Tonight the final four-part Contrapunctus will be played by strings, with keyboard support.
This last Contrapunctus, also called 'Fugue on three subjects', remained incomplete at Bach’s death. It does not actually include the recurring main theme of The Art of Fugue, which would presumably have been incorporated into its final section: various completions, notably one published in 1932 by the Edinburgh-based scholar Sir Donald Tovey, have shown how this could have been done. But, as it stands, the piece consists of a continuous sequence of three fugues, each introducing a new 'subject', or theme. The first fugue has a serious, slow-moving subject, which in traditional fashion is later heard in 'inversion' (upside-down) and 'stretto' (overlapping rather than spread-out entries). The second fugue has a more active subject, and later also reintroduces the subject of the first fugue. The third fugue is on a subject beginning with Bach’s musical signature B–A–C–H, the German note-names corresponding to our B flat, A, C, B natural. At the very end of Bach’s manuscript, this is combined with the previous two subjects for a few bars before the lines peter out one by one. The first printed edition ends a few bars earlier at a cadence, not on to a chord of the home key, D minor, but on to its dominant, A major: a 'half-close', as it is called, symbolising the unfinished state of this magisterial torso.
© Anthony Burton
- Handel
Programme note
George Frideric Handel (1685-1759)
Coronation Anthem: My heart is inditingThe German-born Handel had grown comfortable in London where he had lived more or less permanently since 1711. By 1723 his Italian operas had flourished so well that he could afford to buy a new town house at 25 Brook Street – which is now the Handel Museum. Then in 1727 he applied to Parliament to become a naturalized British citizen. His request was granted. So Georg Friedrich Händel became George Frideric Handel. This made Handel eligible for court appointments. So, when King George I, the first of the Hanoverian monarchs, died on June 11th, 1727 on his way to visit Hanover, his successor, King George II, wasted no time in inviting Handel to write four anthems to be part of the Coronation ceremonies. King George II and Queen Caroline were well acquainted with Handel. They had appointed him music master (while they were still Prince and Princess of Wales) for their two daughters, Princesses Anne and Louisa. As it happened there was an interregnum in the position of the Music Director of the Chapel Royal – the holder of the position would have been expected to write the music for so grand an occasion as a Coronation. However, Maurice Greene was only appointed to this position on September 4th, 1727 (he would become Master of the King’s Musick in 1735, staying in that post until his death in 1755) but by then Handel had already been commissioned to write the anthems. Handel had about a month in which to complete the task, though, in the event, the Coronation had to be postponed by a week due to an impending high tide and possibility of flooding in the vicinity of Westminster Abbey. Even so, October 11th turned out to be a very rainy day! Apart from the King’s insistence on the text for Zadok the Priest, Handel was able to choose his own biblical texts for the three remaining anthems and was quite miffed when some bishops attempted to offer unsolicited advice on what would be appropriate. Handel wrote back sharply: “I have read my Bible very well, and I shall chuse (sic) for myself”.
Handel allowed himself the luxury of a very large orchestra (apparently about 160 musicians!) and a choir of nearly 50 made up mainly from the choristers of the Chapel Royal plus soloists. The notes in the margins of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Order of Service suggest some confusion between the segments of the choirs in their different galleries as to the order in which they were supposed to sing the works chosen. “The Anthems in Confusion; all irregular in the Music.”
The four anthems were expected to be performed at particular moments during the Coronation Service. The intended sequence appears to have been as follows: the first was The King shall rejoice (based on Psalm 21) which was attached to the Recognition and the Crowning Ceremony. The second was the glorious Zadok the Priest to accompany the Anointing of the King. Next was Let thy hand be strengthened (for the Enthronement of the newly crowned monarch) and finally came My heart is inditing which was performed during the crowning of Queen Caroline.
My heart is inditing is a four verse anthem, with each verse treated differently. The text is based on Psalm 45 and Isaiah Chapter 49 and proclaims the virtues and status of royal ladies. The opening section is graceful and elegant. Handel added four soloists to his choristers and judiciously included the timpani to add a sense of public occasion. The second verse is led by the boys’ voices. Overall it is rich with canonic entries. The third verse is a stately dance where the women’s voices now hold sway with obbligato violins. The final section is more vigorous – now Handel adds the timpani and trumpets in full puff to glorious effect.
© David Gardner
Coronation Anthem: Zadok the Priest
When King George II invited Handel to write the Coronation Anthems for his imminent coronation in October 1727 one wonders whether he realised just how lasting the result would be. After all, Zadok the Priest has featured in every coronation service since. It contains some six and a half minutes of unashamed splendour, for Handel had quickly absorbed the English taste in ceremonial music – big, simple and grand. Zadok is exactly that – a happy conjunction of appropriate and inspiring text (telling of the anointing of King Solomon in the Old Testament Book of Kings I) and music of powerful directness firmly rooted in the brilliance of D major (thus allowing the use of Baroque valve-less trumpets). The anthem is in three parts. The opening orchestral introduction is a masterpiece of dramatic build up so that the eventual entrance of the choir is positively explosive. Our attention thus riveted, the rest of the anthem strikes the heroic/patriotic mode so suitable for the occasion with trumpets and drums triumphant. Handel keeps the counterpoint to a minimum – he wants the text to be clear and powerful. How he succeeded! No wonder Handel was fêted by the British during his lifetime and is so still to the present day.
© David Gardner
- Bach
Programme note
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
Suite No 3 in D major, BWV 1068Ouverture: Lentement – Vite – Lentement
Air
Gavottes I and II
Bourrées I and II
GigueThis is an orchestral suite in the French style – though we should really call it the Franco-German style, since the form of the suite consisting of an overture and a set of dances, originally an imitation of the suites drawn from the operas of Lully and his successors, was one which was taken up enthusiastically by a whole string of composers at the German courts. Bach’s prolific friend Georg Philipp Telemann composed well over two hundred of them; Bach himself, as far as we know from the surviving copies, wrote only four. This one was probably composed for the Leipzig Collegium Musicum, the student musical society (founded by Telemann) which met at Zimmerman’s coffee house, and which Bach directed (with one short break) from 1729 to about 1741. In the form in which it has come down to us it must have been intended for some special occasion, since it is scored for, by Bach’s standards, a large orchestra: two oboes, three trumpets, timpani, strings and keyboard continuo. But the musicologist Joshua Rifkin has pointed out that the wind section is never given any essential material on its own, and suggested that the work may originally have been conceived for strings alone.
Baroque suites were often called Ouvertures, after the first and longest movement. This one is in the standard form of a slow introduction in crisply dotted (long-short) rhythms, an extended quick section which begins like a fugue and continues in a contrapuntal vein (though with episodes in which the first violin line seems to turn temporarily into a concerto-like solo part), and a slow conclusion in the same style as the opening. A huge repeat is marked which would take the players back through the whole of the quick section and this conclusion: but very few performances these days include this repeat, and it is hard to imagine that Bach’s players would have had the stamina for it either! After the Overture comes the famous Air for strings alone (though not on the violins’ G strings), and three dance movements for the full orchestra: a pair of Gavottes, with the second acting as a trio for the first; a similar pair of Bourrées; and a Gigue. All these movements are in the standard format of two sections, the second equal to or longer than the first, and each repeated; and this layout, together with the regular phrasing imposed by the dances, channels Bach’s music into very different patterns from those found in his more open-ended concerto movements or cantata arias. All the same, his musical personality is never obscured: it shows through, for example, in the ornate top line of the Air (not so different from those in the slow movements of his harpsichord concertos); and, throughout the Suite, in the little touches of contrapuntal interest in the inner parts which always keep Bach’s textures so full and rich and alive.
© Anthony Burton
- conductor/organ/harpsichord
- -
Handel – ever the master dramatist – created one of the iconic moments in all music when he allowed a long slow build-up of chords to grow and grow over a pulsing bass line until it bursts into the radiant shout of Zadok the Priest. That’s the climax of this sumptuous concert of Baroque masters bringing together some of the greatest musical minds of the age into a rich sequence of delights.
Zadok the Priest
- Purcell
Programme note
Henry Purcell (1659–1695)
Suite from The Fairy QueenSecond Music
Air
Rondeau
Symphony from Act IV
[Prelude]
Canzona
Largo
Allegro – Adagio – Allegro
Prelude to Act III (If love’s a sweet passion)
Symphony from Act V
Chaconne (Dance for the Chinese Man and Woman) from Act VTowards the end of his short life, Purcell became as celebrated a composer for the London theatre as he was for the court and the church. He achieved one of his biggest theatrical successes with The Fairy Queen, produced at the Theatre Royal, Dorset Gardens (which stood between Fleet Street and the Thames) in May 1692, and revived the following year. The Fairy Queen was an anonymous adaptation of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream as a semi-opera: that is, with the cast of actors supplemented by a separate team of singers, performing self-contained masque scenes within each act. Instrumental music was used to preface the acts, to introduce the masques, and for dances within the masques. It also had the specific function of accompanying – and covering the noise of – the “machines” which were used for lavish scenic effects. The Fairy Queen was especially rich in these: which may be one reason why a member of the company later recalled that “the Court and Town were wonderfully satisfy’d with it; but the Expences in setting it out being so great, the Company got very little by it.”
Purcell’s orchestra for The Fairy Queen was, by modern standards, a small one. It is founded on strings, playing in four parts, with a 'continuo' harpsichord (and possibly other instruments) filling out the harmonies. Some numbers have parts for two trumpets and timpani, relatively recent additions to Purcell’s orchestra. A few also have parts for two oboes; in the absence of the original performing material, it is reasonable to assume that the oboes also joined in on the first and second violin parts in many other places. It also seems likely that at least one bassoon was added to the bass line.
This selection of instrumental music from The Fairy Queen begins with two of the pieces played as the members of the audience were taking their seats before the Prologue: they are an Air and a smooth triple-time Rondeau for strings and continuo. These are followed by the grand Symphony (or overture) in D major which introduces the musical segment of Act IV, a masque of the four seasons, set in a garden of gilded fountains, which is performed for the birthday of King Oberon. The Symphony was played to accompany a sunrise: in the words of the play-book printed at the time, “the Sun rises, it appears red through the Mist, as it ascends it dissipates the Vapours, and is seen in its full Lustre”. Scored with trumpets and drums, it is in four movements: an imposing introduction; an intricately contrapuntal Canzona; a minor-key Largo for the strings alone, in Purcell’s most expressive vein of chromatic harmony; and a fanfaring finale, with a contrasting slow middle section again containing some expressive string writing.
The Act III Prelude begins a masque of fairies and rustics with the introduction to the song “If love’s a sweet passion”, setting out its memorable melody in full. And the last two pieces, in C major, are from the masque which concludes the fifth and last Act, a scene of general rejoicing at the forthcoming double wedding of Shakespeare’s lovers. The Symphony, another triple-time piece in rondo form, with trumpets and oboes, accompanied the sudden revelation of an exotic Chinese garden, with a fountain and flying birds. The Chaconne was danced by “a Chinese man and woman" towards the end of the masque; it is in the triple-time rhythm associated with the dance, and also in its traditional form of variations over a repeated (and itself varied) sixteen-bar “ground bass”.
Hear my prayer, O Lord
Purcell grew up in the English church, as a boy chorister in the Chapel Royal and, once his voice had broken, as organ tuner and copyist at Westminster Abbey. In 1679, he succeeded his teacher John Blow as organist of the Abbey, and in 1682 he became one of the organists of the Chapel Royal. Both these posts, and indeed his involvement with the court’s musical establishment before 1682, required him to composed sacred music, chiefly anthems. The anthem Hear my prayer, O Lord, which dates from the early 1680s, is a setting for eight-part choir, supported by organ, of the first verse of the penitential Psalm 102. It is no more than a fragment: for some unknown, and unfathomable, reason, the composer’s manuscript breaks off at the first double bar, with a blank space after it. This is so tantalising that it is hardly surprising contemporary composers such as Sven-David Sandström and Bob Chilcott have used the torso as the starting-point for more extended works; but it is also frequently performed on its own. The piece is based virtually throughout on just two phrases, which are used, both ways up, to create a single span of music gradually increasing in tension towards a powerful climax.
Hear my prayer, O Lord, and let my crying come unto thee.
Psalm 102: 1
Praise the Lord, O JerusalemPurcell’s two church positions, at Westminster Abbey and the Chapel Royal, intersected for royal occasions in the Abbey such as the coronation of James II in 1685 and the coronation of William and Mary in April 1689. It was almost certainly for the latter occasion that he composed Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem, which has a specially compiled Biblical text including verses traditionally associated with coronation services. The piece is a fine example of the verse anthem, a form of Tudor origin in which “verses” for one or more soloists with instrumental accompaniment alternate with passages for the full choir doubled by the instruments. By Purcell’s time, in part thanks to the influence of the French grand motet, the instruments consisted of a string orchestra together with organ, and their contribution included an opening Symphony, or overture, and short “ritornellos” or interludes. As it happens, Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem was the last of Purcell’s “symphony anthems” of this kind, because strings were allowed in anthems only on royal occasions, and after his coronation William discontinued their use.
The anthem is scored for five solo voices – used mostly together, and in one brief passage in a trio of the lower voices, but never in solos or duets – with five-part choir, sparingly used. The Symphony, in a solemn minor key, consists of a slow introduction leading to an extended triple-time fugue. The first verse for the soloists is in a mixture of chordal writing and intricate counterpoint, with occasional interjections by the upper strings as well as the support of the continuo bass. The triple-time trio “As we have heard” is answered and extended by the full choir, with the orchestra, before all five soloists conclude the section. The strings lead a turn to the major for the contrapuntal verse “Be thou exalted”, before the full forces end the anthem with an extended, exuberant triple-time “Alleluia”.
Symphony
Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem: praise thy God, O Sion.
For kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and queens thy nursing mothers.
As we have heard, so have we seen: In the city of our God.
God upholdeth the same for ever.Be thou exalted, Lord, in thine own strength:
So will we sing and praise Thy power.
Alleluia.after Psalm 147: 12; Isaiah 49: 23; Psalm 48: 8; Psalm 21: 13
© Anthony Burton
- Bach
Programme note
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
Contrapunctus XIV (Fuga a tre soggetti) from The Art of FugueDie Kunst der Fuge (The Art of Fugue) was one of Bach’s last major projects. He composed a preliminary version at the beginning of the 1740s, and then returned to the work in the last months of his life to prepare it for publication – which eventually took place in the year after his death. It was conceived as a comprehensive demonstration of the possibilities of counterpoint in the 'old style', in a series of fugues or 'Contrapuncti' in three and four parts (two of them also playable upside down), all based on or including variants of the same theme, together with four two-part canons on further variants of the theme. Most scholars now believe that the work was intended to be played on the harpsichord, with a second player in a couple of pieces. But because it is set out in 'open score', with a separate line for each contrapuntal part, and because it contains no obviously idiomatic keyboard writing, it has always seemed to invite scoring for various families of instruments (as well as more tendentious wholesale orchestration). Tonight the final four-part Contrapunctus will be played by strings, with keyboard support.
This last Contrapunctus, also called 'Fugue on three subjects', remained incomplete at Bach’s death. It does not actually include the recurring main theme of The Art of Fugue, which would presumably have been incorporated into its final section: various completions, notably one published in 1932 by the Edinburgh-based scholar Sir Donald Tovey, have shown how this could have been done. But, as it stands, the piece consists of a continuous sequence of three fugues, each introducing a new 'subject', or theme. The first fugue has a serious, slow-moving subject, which in traditional fashion is later heard in 'inversion' (upside-down) and 'stretto' (overlapping rather than spread-out entries). The second fugue has a more active subject, and later also reintroduces the subject of the first fugue. The third fugue is on a subject beginning with Bach’s musical signature B–A–C–H, the German note-names corresponding to our B flat, A, C, B natural. At the very end of Bach’s manuscript, this is combined with the previous two subjects for a few bars before the lines peter out one by one. The first printed edition ends a few bars earlier at a cadence, not on to a chord of the home key, D minor, but on to its dominant, A major: a 'half-close', as it is called, symbolising the unfinished state of this magisterial torso.
© Anthony Burton
- Handel
Programme note
George Frideric Handel (1685-1759)
Coronation Anthem: My heart is inditingThe German-born Handel had grown comfortable in London where he had lived more or less permanently since 1711. By 1723 his Italian operas had flourished so well that he could afford to buy a new town house at 25 Brook Street – which is now the Handel Museum. Then in 1727 he applied to Parliament to become a naturalized British citizen. His request was granted. So Georg Friedrich Händel became George Frideric Handel. This made Handel eligible for court appointments. So, when King George I, the first of the Hanoverian monarchs, died on June 11th, 1727 on his way to visit Hanover, his successor, King George II, wasted no time in inviting Handel to write four anthems to be part of the Coronation ceremonies. King George II and Queen Caroline were well acquainted with Handel. They had appointed him music master (while they were still Prince and Princess of Wales) for their two daughters, Princesses Anne and Louisa. As it happened there was an interregnum in the position of the Music Director of the Chapel Royal – the holder of the position would have been expected to write the music for so grand an occasion as a Coronation. However, Maurice Greene was only appointed to this position on September 4th, 1727 (he would become Master of the King’s Musick in 1735, staying in that post until his death in 1755) but by then Handel had already been commissioned to write the anthems. Handel had about a month in which to complete the task, though, in the event, the Coronation had to be postponed by a week due to an impending high tide and possibility of flooding in the vicinity of Westminster Abbey. Even so, October 11th turned out to be a very rainy day! Apart from the King’s insistence on the text for Zadok the Priest, Handel was able to choose his own biblical texts for the three remaining anthems and was quite miffed when some bishops attempted to offer unsolicited advice on what would be appropriate. Handel wrote back sharply: “I have read my Bible very well, and I shall chuse (sic) for myself”.
Handel allowed himself the luxury of a very large orchestra (apparently about 160 musicians!) and a choir of nearly 50 made up mainly from the choristers of the Chapel Royal plus soloists. The notes in the margins of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Order of Service suggest some confusion between the segments of the choirs in their different galleries as to the order in which they were supposed to sing the works chosen. “The Anthems in Confusion; all irregular in the Music.”
The four anthems were expected to be performed at particular moments during the Coronation Service. The intended sequence appears to have been as follows: the first was The King shall rejoice (based on Psalm 21) which was attached to the Recognition and the Crowning Ceremony. The second was the glorious Zadok the Priest to accompany the Anointing of the King. Next was Let thy hand be strengthened (for the Enthronement of the newly crowned monarch) and finally came My heart is inditing which was performed during the crowning of Queen Caroline.
My heart is inditing is a four verse anthem, with each verse treated differently. The text is based on Psalm 45 and Isaiah Chapter 49 and proclaims the virtues and status of royal ladies. The opening section is graceful and elegant. Handel added four soloists to his choristers and judiciously included the timpani to add a sense of public occasion. The second verse is led by the boys’ voices. Overall it is rich with canonic entries. The third verse is a stately dance where the women’s voices now hold sway with obbligato violins. The final section is more vigorous – now Handel adds the timpani and trumpets in full puff to glorious effect.
© David Gardner
Coronation Anthem: Zadok the Priest
When King George II invited Handel to write the Coronation Anthems for his imminent coronation in October 1727 one wonders whether he realised just how lasting the result would be. After all, Zadok the Priest has featured in every coronation service since. It contains some six and a half minutes of unashamed splendour, for Handel had quickly absorbed the English taste in ceremonial music – big, simple and grand. Zadok is exactly that – a happy conjunction of appropriate and inspiring text (telling of the anointing of King Solomon in the Old Testament Book of Kings I) and music of powerful directness firmly rooted in the brilliance of D major (thus allowing the use of Baroque valve-less trumpets). The anthem is in three parts. The opening orchestral introduction is a masterpiece of dramatic build up so that the eventual entrance of the choir is positively explosive. Our attention thus riveted, the rest of the anthem strikes the heroic/patriotic mode so suitable for the occasion with trumpets and drums triumphant. Handel keeps the counterpoint to a minimum – he wants the text to be clear and powerful. How he succeeded! No wonder Handel was fêted by the British during his lifetime and is so still to the present day.
© David Gardner
- Bach
Programme note
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
Suite No 3 in D major, BWV 1068Ouverture: Lentement – Vite – Lentement
Air
Gavottes I and II
Bourrées I and II
GigueThis is an orchestral suite in the French style – though we should really call it the Franco-German style, since the form of the suite consisting of an overture and a set of dances, originally an imitation of the suites drawn from the operas of Lully and his successors, was one which was taken up enthusiastically by a whole string of composers at the German courts. Bach’s prolific friend Georg Philipp Telemann composed well over two hundred of them; Bach himself, as far as we know from the surviving copies, wrote only four. This one was probably composed for the Leipzig Collegium Musicum, the student musical society (founded by Telemann) which met at Zimmerman’s coffee house, and which Bach directed (with one short break) from 1729 to about 1741. In the form in which it has come down to us it must have been intended for some special occasion, since it is scored for, by Bach’s standards, a large orchestra: two oboes, three trumpets, timpani, strings and keyboard continuo. But the musicologist Joshua Rifkin has pointed out that the wind section is never given any essential material on its own, and suggested that the work may originally have been conceived for strings alone.
Baroque suites were often called Ouvertures, after the first and longest movement. This one is in the standard form of a slow introduction in crisply dotted (long-short) rhythms, an extended quick section which begins like a fugue and continues in a contrapuntal vein (though with episodes in which the first violin line seems to turn temporarily into a concerto-like solo part), and a slow conclusion in the same style as the opening. A huge repeat is marked which would take the players back through the whole of the quick section and this conclusion: but very few performances these days include this repeat, and it is hard to imagine that Bach’s players would have had the stamina for it either! After the Overture comes the famous Air for strings alone (though not on the violins’ G strings), and three dance movements for the full orchestra: a pair of Gavottes, with the second acting as a trio for the first; a similar pair of Bourrées; and a Gigue. All these movements are in the standard format of two sections, the second equal to or longer than the first, and each repeated; and this layout, together with the regular phrasing imposed by the dances, channels Bach’s music into very different patterns from those found in his more open-ended concerto movements or cantata arias. All the same, his musical personality is never obscured: it shows through, for example, in the ornate top line of the Air (not so different from those in the slow movements of his harpsichord concertos); and, throughout the Suite, in the little touches of contrapuntal interest in the inner parts which always keep Bach’s textures so full and rich and alive.
© Anthony Burton
- conductor/organ/harpsichord
- -
Handel – ever the master dramatist – created one of the iconic moments in all music when he allowed a long slow build-up of chords to grow and grow over a pulsing bass line until it bursts into the radiant shout of Zadok the Priest. That’s the climax of this sumptuous concert of Baroque masters bringing together some of the greatest musical minds of the age into a rich sequence of delights.
Orpheus
- Haydn
Programme note
Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
Symphony no 94 in G ‘Surprise’ (1792)Adagio – vivace assai
Andante
Menuet. Allegro molto
Finale. Allegro di moltoHaydn’s two visits to London in 1791 and 1794 were the greatest triumphs of his career so far. Both professionally and socially he was the centre of considerable attention and he lapped up a wealth of new experiences, not least that of seeing his music acclaimed by a large and enthusiastic public. As he wrote to his friend Maria von Genzinger in January 1791, “My arrival caused a great sensation throughout the whole city, and I went the round of all the newspapers for 3 successive days. Everyone wants to know me”. The contrast with years of serving the Esterházy family in relative obscurity must have been overwhelming.
Haydn composed his last twelve symphonies for his two visits, and they have since become known collectively as his ‘London’ Symphonies. No 94, one of the group written for his first visit, was given its premiere in March 1792. Like all but one of the ‘London’ symphonies it opens with a slow introduction, though this one is shorter and quieter than most; the gentle opening for oboes and bassoons was quite a novelty at the time. The main part of the movement then races off with a freshness and sparkle which surely reflect the personal youthful vigour with which the 60-year-old composer astonished his London hosts.
Just how close Haydn’s melodic style was to the traditional peasant music of the region he grew up in is nowhere better demonstrated than by the artless simplicity of the andante’s opening tune (he was even able to re-use it, quite plausibly, in ‘Spring’ from his oratorio The seasons, as the tune whistled by Simon the farmer as he goes ploughing). It is the basis for an extraordinarily inventive set of variations. Contrary to popular legend the sudden fortissimo which gives the symphony its English nickname was not designed to wake the audience up (in any case, it was an afterthought on Haydn’s part). Haydn told his first biographer that it was due to the rivalry with his pupil Ignaz Pleyel, who was also having his work performed in London at the time, and whose presence spurred Haydn to outdo him in brilliant orchestral effects.
The minuet (so-called) is actually one of Haydn’s earthiest peasant dances, with springy, resilient rhythms, robust good humour and, where necessary, moments of elegance. The finale outdoes even the first movement for exuberant vitality, racing along madly through one change of key after another and ending the symphony in that spirit of gracious ebullience of which Haydn alone seemed to know the secret.
© Mike Wheeler
- Szymanowski
Programme note
Karol Szymanowski (1882-1937)
Violin Concerto No 2, Op 61Moderato, molto tranquillo — allegramente, molto energico — andantino, molto tranquillo — tempo I.
Like his First Violin Concerto and the three Mythes for violin and piano, Szymanowski’s Violin Concerto No 2 owes its existence to the composer’s friendship with the violinist Paweł Kochański. Kochański had settled in the USA in the early 1920s but visited Poland in August 1932 and, as Szymanowski put it, in a letter to another friend, he “squeezed out of me, as out of a dessicated tube of toothpaste, believe it or not – a new violin concerto!!”
The two men worked closely together, particularly on the violin part, as they had done back in 1915 on Mythes. Kochánski was the soloist at the first performance, in Warsaw in October 1933, even though he was already suffering from the cancer from which he was to die three months later. When the score was published Szymanowski added a dedication (in French): “To the memory of the Great Musician, my dear and unforgettable Friend, Paul Kochański.”
Like Violin Concerto No 1, the Second is in one continuous movement, but the similarity ends there. Composed in two different periods of the composer’s career, they reflect different expressive priorities. No 1, from 1916, dates from the time when Szymanowski’s absorption in Eastern cultures was at its height, reflected in the atmosphere of heady exoticism that marks so much of his music from that decade. By the time of the Second, he had moved on, through his growing interest in Polish folk music, especially from the southern Tatra Mountain region. This was the main stimulus to his creativity in the last ten years or so of his career, though by the time of the concerto he no longer simply borrowed existing folk music material and instead absorbed its characteristics into his own style.
The work falls into two main sections, linked by the solo cadenza that Kochański composed at Szymanowski’s invitation. It opens with a long, seemingly endlessly inventive theme for the solo violin, containing three distinct melodic ideas that form the basis for the concerto’s first main section. It is in the second half, particularly, that the folk-music influence can be heard, particularly in its incisive rhythmic language, and in which Szymanowski’s musical world comes closest to that of Bartók.
© Mike Wheeler
- Stravinsky
Programme note
Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971)
Orpheus (1947)Down the ages, pagans, Christians and humanists, poets, painters, musicians and filmmakers have all been moved by the story of Orpheus. His journey to the underworld to attempt to retrieve his lover Eurydice has been the paradigm for all manner of symbolic quest narratives, from Dante’s The Divine Comedy and Monteverdi’s Orfeo, to Mozart’s The Magic Flute and Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge! In each case the familiar story is refashioned in the image of its own age, with renewed relevance; each age has reclaimed Orpheus for itself. Across 3000 years of history there is hardly a generation that has been untouched by Orpheus’ songs of loss and lament.
The terrible and unnecessary deaths of the youthful Orpheus and Eurydice took on particular resonance in the violent 20th century. It is telling that Stravinsky chose Orpheus as the subject for his ballet begun within a year of the end of the Second World War. Orpheus (following Apollon musagète and Persephone) is the last of a trio of ballets on Greek myths written over a period of twenty years, and is the most stylized of the three. Exiled for a second time in America, Stravinsky experienced the terrors and privations of the War only at a distance; indeed, it is a sense of distance – from the story’s violence, from overt emotion – that in general characterizes this work. With the close collaboration of choreographer George Balanchine, whose initial idea it was to use Orpheus as the subject, Stravinsky worked out a scenario that starts with Orpheus weeping at Eurydice’s funeral and ends with Orpheus’ apotheosis where Apollo appears, "wrests the lyre from Orpheus and raises his son heavenwards". The music throughout is restrained, distanced. The sense of formality is reinforced by, among other things, the chorale-like frame of prologue and epilogue, and the importance throughout of counterpoint. The designer chosen for the premiere production was Isamu Noguchi, a sculptor whose abstract geometric sets, costumes and masks perfectly matched the distilled purity of Stravinsky’s music and Balanchine’s dances.
The apparent turning away from violence in Orpheus is not a sign of retreat from the horror of the War. In the face of such slaughter, not least in the far-away country of Stravinsky’s birth, another barbaric Rite of Spring would hardly have been possible. The only violent music in Orpheus is the ‘Pas d’action’, where the ‘Bacchantes attack Orpheus, seize him and tear him to pieces’, but even here the music is disciplined. Like other archetypical neoclassical works of the war years, such as the Symphony in C and the Symphony in Three Movements, Orpheus offers "timely reflections on war and death", to appropriate Freud’s phrase of 1915, but with a sense of detachment. Stravinsky’s Orpheus is imbued with a melancholic world-weariness. Alienation, memory and mourning are its defining features. This is captured poignantly in the ballet’s opening. "Orpheus weeps for Eurydice. He stands motionless, with his back to the audience." The falling, lamenting, Phrygian lines of Orpheus’s lyre (harp) are both ancient and modern; they speak directly of loss.
© Jonathan Cross
- conductor
- violin
The Orchestra’s Principal Conductor, Robin Ticciati, gives his first performance in Dumfries. The story of Haydn lulling an unsuspecting audience to sleep with his gentle slow movement then jolting them awake with a loud ‘SURPRISE’ chord is probably too good to be true, but that does not diminish this symphony’s charm or impact. In Orpheus Stravinsky looks back to the earliest days of opera for inspiration in retelling the Greek myth of the hero’s journey to the Underworld, and brilliant French violinist Renaud Capuçon performs Szymanowski’s sumptuous Violin Concerto.
“It reminded the listener just how finely integrated the SCO is… and highlighted the players’ commitment to the music and their sparky new conductor” The Independent
Stravinsky: The Chamber Ballets III
- Haydn
Programme note
Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
Symphony no 94 in G ‘Surprise’ (1792)Adagio – vivace assai
Andante
Menuet. Allegro molto
Finale. Allegro di moltoHaydn’s two visits to London in 1791 and 1794 were the greatest triumphs of his career so far. Both professionally and socially he was the centre of considerable attention and he lapped up a wealth of new experiences, not least that of seeing his music acclaimed by a large and enthusiastic public. As he wrote to his friend Maria von Genzinger in January 1791, “My arrival caused a great sensation throughout the whole city, and I went the round of all the newspapers for 3 successive days. Everyone wants to know me”. The contrast with years of serving the Esterházy family in relative obscurity must have been overwhelming.
Haydn composed his last twelve symphonies for his two visits, and they have since become known collectively as his ‘London’ Symphonies. No 94, one of the group written for his first visit, was given its premiere in March 1792. Like all but one of the ‘London’ symphonies it opens with a slow introduction, though this one is shorter and quieter than most; the gentle opening for oboes and bassoons was quite a novelty at the time. The main part of the movement then races off with a freshness and sparkle which surely reflect the personal youthful vigour with which the 60-year-old composer astonished his London hosts.
Just how close Haydn’s melodic style was to the traditional peasant music of the region he grew up in is nowhere better demonstrated than by the artless simplicity of the andante’s opening tune (he was even able to re-use it, quite plausibly, in ‘Spring’ from his oratorio The seasons, as the tune whistled by Simon the farmer as he goes ploughing). It is the basis for an extraordinarily inventive set of variations. Contrary to popular legend the sudden fortissimo which gives the symphony its English nickname was not designed to wake the audience up (in any case, it was an afterthought on Haydn’s part). Haydn told his first biographer that it was due to the rivalry with his pupil Ignaz Pleyel, who was also having his work performed in London at the time, and whose presence spurred Haydn to outdo him in brilliant orchestral effects.
The minuet (so-called) is actually one of Haydn’s earthiest peasant dances, with springy, resilient rhythms, robust good humour and, where necessary, moments of elegance. The finale outdoes even the first movement for exuberant vitality, racing along madly through one change of key after another and ending the symphony in that spirit of gracious ebullience of which Haydn alone seemed to know the secret.
© Mike Wheeler
- Szymanowski
Programme note
Karol Szymanowski (1882-1937)
Violin Concerto No 2, Op 61Moderato, molto tranquillo — allegramente, molto energico — andantino, molto tranquillo — tempo I.
Like his First Violin Concerto and the three Mythes for violin and piano, Szymanowski’s Violin Concerto No 2 owes its existence to the composer’s friendship with the violinist Paweł Kochański. Kochański had settled in the USA in the early 1920s but visited Poland in August 1932 and, as Szymanowski put it, in a letter to another friend, he “squeezed out of me, as out of a dessicated tube of toothpaste, believe it or not – a new violin concerto!!”
The two men worked closely together, particularly on the violin part, as they had done back in 1915 on Mythes. Kochánski was the soloist at the first performance, in Warsaw in October 1933, even though he was already suffering from the cancer from which he was to die three months later. When the score was published Szymanowski added a dedication (in French): “To the memory of the Great Musician, my dear and unforgettable Friend, Paul Kochański.”
Like Violin Concerto No 1, the Second is in one continuous movement, but the similarity ends there. Composed in two different periods of the composer’s career, they reflect different expressive priorities. No 1, from 1916, dates from the time when Szymanowski’s absorption in Eastern cultures was at its height, reflected in the atmosphere of heady exoticism that marks so much of his music from that decade. By the time of the Second, he had moved on, through his growing interest in Polish folk music, especially from the southern Tatra Mountain region. This was the main stimulus to his creativity in the last ten years or so of his career, though by the time of the concerto he no longer simply borrowed existing folk music material and instead absorbed its characteristics into his own style.
The work falls into two main sections, linked by the solo cadenza that Kochański composed at Szymanowski’s invitation. It opens with a long, seemingly endlessly inventive theme for the solo violin, containing three distinct melodic ideas that form the basis for the concerto’s first main section. It is in the second half, particularly, that the folk-music influence can be heard, particularly in its incisive rhythmic language, and in which Szymanowski’s musical world comes closest to that of Bartók.
© Mike Wheeler
- Stravinsky
Programme note
Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971)
Orpheus (1947)Down the ages, pagans, Christians and humanists, poets, painters, musicians and filmmakers have all been moved by the story of Orpheus. His journey to the underworld to attempt to retrieve his lover Eurydice has been the paradigm for all manner of symbolic quest narratives, from Dante’s The Divine Comedy and Monteverdi’s Orfeo, to Mozart’s The Magic Flute and Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge! In each case the familiar story is refashioned in the image of its own age, with renewed relevance; each age has reclaimed Orpheus for itself. Across 3000 years of history there is hardly a generation that has been untouched by Orpheus’ songs of loss and lament.
The terrible and unnecessary deaths of the youthful Orpheus and Eurydice took on particular resonance in the violent 20th century. It is telling that Stravinsky chose Orpheus as the subject for his ballet begun within a year of the end of the Second World War. Orpheus (following Apollon musagète and Persephone) is the last of a trio of ballets on Greek myths written over a period of twenty years, and is the most stylized of the three. Exiled for a second time in America, Stravinsky experienced the terrors and privations of the War only at a distance; indeed, it is a sense of distance – from the story’s violence, from overt emotion – that in general characterizes this work. With the close collaboration of choreographer George Balanchine, whose initial idea it was to use Orpheus as the subject, Stravinsky worked out a scenario that starts with Orpheus weeping at Eurydice’s funeral and ends with Orpheus’ apotheosis where Apollo appears, "wrests the lyre from Orpheus and raises his son heavenwards". The music throughout is restrained, distanced. The sense of formality is reinforced by, among other things, the chorale-like frame of prologue and epilogue, and the importance throughout of counterpoint. The designer chosen for the premiere production was Isamu Noguchi, a sculptor whose abstract geometric sets, costumes and masks perfectly matched the distilled purity of Stravinsky’s music and Balanchine’s dances.
The apparent turning away from violence in Orpheus is not a sign of retreat from the horror of the War. In the face of such slaughter, not least in the far-away country of Stravinsky’s birth, another barbaric Rite of Spring would hardly have been possible. The only violent music in Orpheus is the ‘Pas d’action’, where the ‘Bacchantes attack Orpheus, seize him and tear him to pieces’, but even here the music is disciplined. Like other archetypical neoclassical works of the war years, such as the Symphony in C and the Symphony in Three Movements, Orpheus offers "timely reflections on war and death", to appropriate Freud’s phrase of 1915, but with a sense of detachment. Stravinsky’s Orpheus is imbued with a melancholic world-weariness. Alienation, memory and mourning are its defining features. This is captured poignantly in the ballet’s opening. "Orpheus weeps for Eurydice. He stands motionless, with his back to the audience." The falling, lamenting, Phrygian lines of Orpheus’s lyre (harp) are both ancient and modern; they speak directly of loss.
© Jonathan Cross
- conductor
- violin
The story of Haydn lulling an unsuspecting audience to sleep with his gentle slow movement then jolting them awake with a loud ‘SURPRISE’ chord is probably too good to be true, but that does not diminish the piece’s charms. In Orpheus Stravinsky looks back to the earliest days of opera for inspiration, and draws on the brilliance of Monteverdi’s world to tell his own version of the myth.
SCO at Perth Concert Hall
- Haydn
Programme note
Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
Symphony no 94 in G ‘Surprise’ (1792)Adagio – vivace assai
Andante
Menuet. Allegro molto
Finale. Allegro di moltoHaydn’s two visits to London in 1791 and 1794 were the greatest triumphs of his career so far. Both professionally and socially he was the centre of considerable attention and he lapped up a wealth of new experiences, not least that of seeing his music acclaimed by a large and enthusiastic public. As he wrote to his friend Maria von Genzinger in January 1791, “My arrival caused a great sensation throughout the whole city, and I went the round of all the newspapers for 3 successive days. Everyone wants to know me”. The contrast with years of serving the Esterházy family in relative obscurity must have been overwhelming.
Haydn composed his last twelve symphonies for his two visits, and they have since become known collectively as his ‘London’ Symphonies. No 94, one of the group written for his first visit, was given its premiere in March 1792. Like all but one of the ‘London’ symphonies it opens with a slow introduction, though this one is shorter and quieter than most; the gentle opening for oboes and bassoons was quite a novelty at the time. The main part of the movement then races off with a freshness and sparkle which surely reflect the personal youthful vigour with which the 60-year-old composer astonished his London hosts.
Just how close Haydn’s melodic style was to the traditional peasant music of the region he grew up in is nowhere better demonstrated than by the artless simplicity of the andante’s opening tune (he was even able to re-use it, quite plausibly, in ‘Spring’ from his oratorio The seasons, as the tune whistled by Simon the farmer as he goes ploughing). It is the basis for an extraordinarily inventive set of variations. Contrary to popular legend the sudden fortissimo which gives the symphony its English nickname was not designed to wake the audience up (in any case, it was an afterthought on Haydn’s part). Haydn told his first biographer that it was due to the rivalry with his pupil Ignaz Pleyel, who was also having his work performed in London at the time, and whose presence spurred Haydn to outdo him in brilliant orchestral effects.
The minuet (so-called) is actually one of Haydn’s earthiest peasant dances, with springy, resilient rhythms, robust good humour and, where necessary, moments of elegance. The finale outdoes even the first movement for exuberant vitality, racing along madly through one change of key after another and ending the symphony in that spirit of gracious ebullience of which Haydn alone seemed to know the secret.
© Mike Wheeler
- Szymanowski
Programme note
Karol Szymanowski (1882-1937)
Violin Concerto No 2, Op 61Moderato, molto tranquillo — allegramente, molto energico — andantino, molto tranquillo — tempo I.
Like his First Violin Concerto and the three Mythes for violin and piano, Szymanowski’s Violin Concerto No 2 owes its existence to the composer’s friendship with the violinist Paweł Kochański. Kochański had settled in the USA in the early 1920s but visited Poland in August 1932 and, as Szymanowski put it, in a letter to another friend, he “squeezed out of me, as out of a dessicated tube of toothpaste, believe it or not – a new violin concerto!!”
The two men worked closely together, particularly on the violin part, as they had done back in 1915 on Mythes. Kochánski was the soloist at the first performance, in Warsaw in October 1933, even though he was already suffering from the cancer from which he was to die three months later. When the score was published Szymanowski added a dedication (in French): “To the memory of the Great Musician, my dear and unforgettable Friend, Paul Kochański.”
Like Violin Concerto No 1, the Second is in one continuous movement, but the similarity ends there. Composed in two different periods of the composer’s career, they reflect different expressive priorities. No 1, from 1916, dates from the time when Szymanowski’s absorption in Eastern cultures was at its height, reflected in the atmosphere of heady exoticism that marks so much of his music from that decade. By the time of the Second, he had moved on, through his growing interest in Polish folk music, especially from the southern Tatra Mountain region. This was the main stimulus to his creativity in the last ten years or so of his career, though by the time of the concerto he no longer simply borrowed existing folk music material and instead absorbed its characteristics into his own style.
The work falls into two main sections, linked by the solo cadenza that Kochański composed at Szymanowski’s invitation. It opens with a long, seemingly endlessly inventive theme for the solo violin, containing three distinct melodic ideas that form the basis for the concerto’s first main section. It is in the second half, particularly, that the folk-music influence can be heard, particularly in its incisive rhythmic language, and in which Szymanowski’s musical world comes closest to that of Bartók.
© Mike Wheeler
- Stravinsky
Programme note
Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971)
Orpheus (1947)Down the ages, pagans, Christians and humanists, poets, painters, musicians and filmmakers have all been moved by the story of Orpheus. His journey to the underworld to attempt to retrieve his lover Eurydice has been the paradigm for all manner of symbolic quest narratives, from Dante’s The Divine Comedy and Monteverdi’s Orfeo, to Mozart’s The Magic Flute and Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge! In each case the familiar story is refashioned in the image of its own age, with renewed relevance; each age has reclaimed Orpheus for itself. Across 3000 years of history there is hardly a generation that has been untouched by Orpheus’ songs of loss and lament.
The terrible and unnecessary deaths of the youthful Orpheus and Eurydice took on particular resonance in the violent 20th century. It is telling that Stravinsky chose Orpheus as the subject for his ballet begun within a year of the end of the Second World War. Orpheus (following Apollon musagète and Persephone) is the last of a trio of ballets on Greek myths written over a period of twenty years, and is the most stylized of the three. Exiled for a second time in America, Stravinsky experienced the terrors and privations of the War only at a distance; indeed, it is a sense of distance – from the story’s violence, from overt emotion – that in general characterizes this work. With the close collaboration of choreographer George Balanchine, whose initial idea it was to use Orpheus as the subject, Stravinsky worked out a scenario that starts with Orpheus weeping at Eurydice’s funeral and ends with Orpheus’ apotheosis where Apollo appears, "wrests the lyre from Orpheus and raises his son heavenwards". The music throughout is restrained, distanced. The sense of formality is reinforced by, among other things, the chorale-like frame of prologue and epilogue, and the importance throughout of counterpoint. The designer chosen for the premiere production was Isamu Noguchi, a sculptor whose abstract geometric sets, costumes and masks perfectly matched the distilled purity of Stravinsky’s music and Balanchine’s dances.
The apparent turning away from violence in Orpheus is not a sign of retreat from the horror of the War. In the face of such slaughter, not least in the far-away country of Stravinsky’s birth, another barbaric Rite of Spring would hardly have been possible. The only violent music in Orpheus is the ‘Pas d’action’, where the ‘Bacchantes attack Orpheus, seize him and tear him to pieces’, but even here the music is disciplined. Like other archetypical neoclassical works of the war years, such as the Symphony in C and the Symphony in Three Movements, Orpheus offers "timely reflections on war and death", to appropriate Freud’s phrase of 1915, but with a sense of detachment. Stravinsky’s Orpheus is imbued with a melancholic world-weariness. Alienation, memory and mourning are its defining features. This is captured poignantly in the ballet’s opening. "Orpheus weeps for Eurydice. He stands motionless, with his back to the audience." The falling, lamenting, Phrygian lines of Orpheus’s lyre (harp) are both ancient and modern; they speak directly of loss.
© Jonathan Cross
- conductor
- violin
Haydn and Stravinsky – both composers who can be described as brilliant, witty and surprising – are paired in this concert which also features the great French violinist Renaud Capuçon performing the Szymanowski concerto – a first for the SCO.
New Romantics IV
- Battistelli
Programme note
EIF commission funded by Donald & Louise MacDonald.
Giorgio Battistelli (b. 1953)
Fair is foul, foul is fair“Fair is foul, and foul is fair,” murmur the three Fateful Sisters (the Weird Sisters of Nordic origin) meeting on the deserted heath. Out of the alliteration rises a sound that infuses the Scottish drama with the sinister sense of an oxymoron in which the ugly and the beautiful become one within the same terror. Terror is destined to be the dominant emotion in the consciousness of the usurper Macbeth – he who will never become king, but merely a regicide and a tyrant.
The same sound flows from the lips of the witches to the lips of Macbeth as soon as he enters the scene. This is the overriding theme of the drama. The alternating voices form an instrument, and run right through the orchestra from the strings to the woodwinds, investing the composition with a dynamism that captures all the echoes of the Shakespearean tragedy – though faster, more compact and more nocturnal. Iniquitous intrigues, conspiratorial obsessions and an imposed violence are transformed into a sound that unveils before the listener an unexplored landscape of symphonic theatre.
- Giorgio Battistelli
- Berio
- Harper
Programme note
SCO commission with funding from the Scottish Government.
Edward Harper (1941-2009)
PastoralEdward Harper's Pastoral is the first movement of what was going to be his Third Symphony - Homage to Robert Burns. The symphony was commissioned by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra as part of the 2009 Homecoming celebrations. This movement is a setting of Robert Burns' The Banks o' Doon, but it begins with the first two words of another Burns poem, Afton Water. The stanzas of The Banks o' Doon are set in reverse order so that the movement finishes with the first stanza sung to the traditional tune Caledonian Hunt's Delight. This is the text as it appears in the work:
Flow gently.
Aft hae I rov'd by bonie Doon,
To see the rose and woodbine twine;
And ilka bird sang o' its luve,
And fondly sae did I o' mine;
Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose,
Fu' sweet upon its thorny tree;
And my fause luver staw my rose,
But, ah! He left the thorn wi' me.Ye banks and braes o' bonie Doon,
How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair!
How can ye chant, ye little birds,
And I sae weary fu' o' care!
Thou'll break my heart, thou warbling bird
That wantons thro' the flowering thorn:
Thou minds me o' departed joys,
Departed, never to return.The movement follows this scheme:
1. Fanfare introduction
2. Rumbling strings and a boding clarinet prepare for a short, florid setting of the words "flowing gently" with notes derived from the tune Caledonian Hunt's Delight and with counterpoint from the two flutes.
3. The longest stretch of the movement is instrumental. It is introduced with a return to the fanfare. This music is expanded and developed with the addition of more snatches from the tune, turning eventually into a short three-part canon for violins and violas, with a prominent 'Scots snap' - preparation for the traditional tune at the end of the movement.
4. The setting of "Aft hae I rov'd….." begins skittishly but darkens a little in the light of rejection.
5. The movement finishes with "Ye banks and braes…" set to the traditional tune with a light accompaniment largely on open strings.
The second movement was to be a setting of a poem specially written for the symphony by Edinburgh's Makar, Ron Butlin. Edward was delighted with this poem and planned to set it as a double fugue. There is the very beginning of a sketch for it, but not nearly enough material for the movement to be completed.
THE BOYS WHO MAKE THE MOST NOISE
Scott: (walks on stage, gazes round, self-important)
The world is still here?
- then so am I,
two centuries more famous!
Burns: (enters from opposite side, gazes round, goes up to Scott)
I ken you, your name is -?
S: Have we met?
B: It’s Walter – no?
S: Sir Walter. Sir Walter Scott, Bart.
And you?
B: Ye kent me then. Ye longed tae meet me, too!
S: Mr Burns?
B: The very same.
And here we are again. Shake hands.
(They shake)
S: Listen -our loyal fans.
(off-stage chorus gets louder as they come on-stage - half stand behind Burns, half behind Scott)
Chorus 1 (half): Robert Burns! Robert Burns!
Chorus 2 (other half): Walter Scott! Walter Scott!
(They get confrontational)
C 1: BURNS!
C 2: SCOTT!
C 1: Tory toe-rag Walter Scott
- all his books, the world’s forgot!
B: My apologies.
C2: Robert Burns - a commie whoor!
The Ploughman Poet shits manure!
S: And mine.
B: They’re enthusiastic, bombastic
S: . . . and iconoclastic.
Let’s blame our literary fame!
B: Two hundred years - and we’re still in the game!
S: For we are the best
B: There’s us - and the rest.
S: The wee scribblers
B: an screivers,
S: Word dribblers
B: playing word peevers.
S: They join up their letters,
think they write like their betters.
B: But we hiv a chorus
that gangs on afore us!
C: Walter Scott! Robert Burns!
Walter Scott! Robert Burns!
S&B: We are the boys
who make the most noise!
Chorus 1 (clapping): Clap hands - here comes Wally!
Chorus 2 (clapping): Clap hands - here comes Rabbie!
Chorus 1 WALTER SCOTT! (clap-clap-clap - like football chant)
Chorus 2 RABBIE BURNS! (clap-clap-clap)
S (to chorus): STOP!
(indicates audience): They’re not clapping? Why are they not clapping?
I gave them:
(very fast?) Rob Roy, Redgauntlet, The Abbot, The Pirate
Ivanhoe and Woodstock, the Fair Maid of Perth,
Kenilworth and Quentin Durward
The Bride of Lammermuir
Waverley, Antiquary, The Lay of the Last Minstrel
Marmion, Guy Mannering
. . .and The Heart of Midlothian
(last sung like ‘5 Golden Rings’ in the 12 days of Xmas?)
B: That’s a football team. Hearts - the Jam Tarts!
I gave them:
Tae a Mouse, Tae a Louse, Tae a Haggis
Ca’ the Yowes an Auld Lang Syne
The Twa Dogs, Holy Willie’s Prayer
Epigrams an Epistles,
Rantin’ Rovin’ Robin
The Jolly Beggars, Tam o’ Shanter
A Red, Red Rose an Comin’ Through the Rye.
For the randy, poems praising houghmagandie
and a Supper that’s not to missed! (like 5 golden etc.)
Chorus: They don’t clap, they don’t care. You’ve both run out of steam.
S (to audience): So I’m nothing but a football team!
B (to audience): An I’m an excuse for getting pissed!
Chorus: That’s progress!
Welcome to the world of hyped-up WOW!
The instant electronic NOW!
- of Ipods, Facebook, politicians,
melting ice-caps, gas emissions!
Logos, no-goes, bombs and terror,
Cyber-sex and crazy weather!
Consumer choice, computer glitch,
mega-poor and mega-rich.
Collapsing banks, the credit crunch,
decaf coffee, the wineless lunch.
24/7, 3 for 2,
in-store, out-source, multi-view.
Big Brother, crack cocaine,
NOW! NOW! and NOW again!
S: and . . . my heroic stories?
Chorus: (abrasive?) Heroism will not save us,
nor will the feudal fantasies you gave us.
Politicians tell us who to hate,
our world is Global Corporate!
We’re sorry, Scott - you’re out of date.
B: And me?
Chorus: (lyrical?) A man is still a man, and he will be
a brother to all men if he
can keep faith with the better part
of what he is - his honest heart.
Your poetry is passionate and true
- we cherish every word and cherish you!
S: And me?
C: Are you still here?
S: (angry) 200 years!
My time will come again.
B: Until then - goodbye, my friend.
(They shake hands and leave together?)
C: Walter Scott and Robert Burns,
inspiring Scotland then and now
- and Scotland still to come?
_______________
It is not entirely clear how many movements he planned for this symphony, but I think he had in mind setting a poem by Robert Garioch - At Robert Fergusson's Grave, October 1962 - for another movement. He was talking of a work lasting thirty-five minutes.
In realising the score of the first movement, Pastoral, I have kept as closely as I could to Edward's intentions. The movement is sketched right through but very often on only one stave. Some things in the sketches are vague and sometimes confused. His intentions for the orchestration are not always clear and I have had to collate fragments found on different pieces of paper. This means that sometimes I have had to take some compositional decisions over small details, but since I had talked with Edward about the piece a little there were some pointers to work from.
Perhaps the most moving thing to see in these sketches is the way in which the handwriting becomes more and more frail as the manuscript progresses. One or two confusions begin to appear. It gives a very graphic picture of the growing of the cancer in him - he completed this movement only five days before he died. All the time I spent working on it I felt his presence very keenly. Realising this score is the very least I could do for such a close friend.
© Lyell Cresswell, 2011
- Britten
Programme note
Benjamin Britten (1913-1975)
Suite on English Folk Tunes: A Time There Was, Op 90Cakes and Ale
The Bitter Withy
Hankin Booby
Hunt the Squirrel
Lord MelbourneBritten composed this suite for chamber orchestra, each of its movements a loving and characteristic elaboration of English folk songs or dances, for the Aldeburgh Festival a year before his untimely death. One movement, the delightful Hankin Booby, had already been heard, seven years earlier, at the opening of the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, with Britten himself as conductor. It was the success of that idiosyncratic little dance – "as pungent and tangy as a Spanish cobla [medieval rhyme]," as one critic remarked at the time – which inspired the composer to give it what he described as four "brothers and sisters.’"
Each movement is a small tribute to the memory of Percy Grainger, Australia's expert in unstable and unpredictable metres. Each is based on a contrasted pair of tunes and named after one of them. The orchestration, though modest, displays all Britten’s brilliance and resourcefulness. Strings, woodwind, and drums are asked to play "fast and rough" in the opening Cakes and Ale. Harp and pizzicato double bass are joined by horns and bells in The Bitter Withy. Wind band, trumpets, and a persistent drum-beat (evocative of a medieval tabor) are required by Hankin Booby. The strains of an American barn dance kindle the start of Hunt the Squirrel and in Lord Melbourne a cor anglais sings the sad melody upon a cushion of string tone. In this long final movement, marked "slow and languid," the sound of a funeral drum is heard, prompting one authority to remark that it was as if Mahler (one of Britten’s favourite composers) had orchestrated an English folk song.
By the time Britten made his arrangement of it, he was mortally ill, still brimming with ideas but finding them a struggle to write down. Every bar, he complained, was "a sweat," adding that it was physically hard to reach to the top of a large page of musical manuscript, "so all the flutes and piccolos tend to get left out." Yet the result is music of touching freshness, shot through with nostalgia, the work’s subtitle a quotation from Thomas Hardy’s poem Before Life and After, which had served as the finale of Britten’s song cycle Winter Words: "A time there was before the birth of consciousness when all went well." Or to put it another way, as Michael Kennedy did in his biography of the composer, "sorrow for what can never be, love for all that has been, is in this music."
© Conrad Wilson
- conductor
- mezzo-soprano
A literary theme links this programme. One of the hits of the 2009 Edinburgh International Festival, Battistelli’s is a corker of a piece vividly evoking the storm and supernatural terror of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Sorrow touches the premiere of Edward Harper’s Pastoral, which is a setting of Burns’ poetry. When he died in 2009, Harper was working on a new symphony for the SCO and his friend Lyell Cresswell has completed this single movement from his manuscript in tribute. Mezzo Karen Cargill, one of Scotland’s brightest stars, also sings traditional folk songs arranged by Berio.
This concert is part of the Fonic Scheme at Glasgow City Halls
New Romantics IV
- Battistelli
Programme note
EIF commission funded by Donald & Louise MacDonald.
Giorgio Battistelli (b. 1953)
Fair is foul, foul is fair“Fair is foul, and foul is fair,” murmur the three Fateful Sisters (the Weird Sisters of Nordic origin) meeting on the deserted heath. Out of the alliteration rises a sound that infuses the Scottish drama with the sinister sense of an oxymoron in which the ugly and the beautiful become one within the same terror. Terror is destined to be the dominant emotion in the consciousness of the usurper Macbeth – he who will never become king, but merely a regicide and a tyrant.
The same sound flows from the lips of the witches to the lips of Macbeth as soon as he enters the scene. This is the overriding theme of the drama. The alternating voices form an instrument, and run right through the orchestra from the strings to the woodwinds, investing the composition with a dynamism that captures all the echoes of the Shakespearean tragedy – though faster, more compact and more nocturnal. Iniquitous intrigues, conspiratorial obsessions and an imposed violence are transformed into a sound that unveils before the listener an unexplored landscape of symphonic theatre.
- Giorgio Battistelli
- Berio
- Harper
Programme note
SCO commission with funding from the Scottish Government.
Edward Harper (1941-2009)
PastoralEdward Harper's Pastoral is the first movement of what was going to be his Third Symphony - Homage to Robert Burns. The symphony was commissioned by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra as part of the 2009 Homecoming celebrations. This movement is a setting of Robert Burns' The Banks o' Doon, but it begins with the first two words of another Burns poem, Afton Water. The stanzas of The Banks o' Doon are set in reverse order so that the movement finishes with the first stanza sung to the traditional tune Caledonian Hunt's Delight. This is the text as it appears in the work:
Flow gently.
Aft hae I rov'd by bonie Doon,
To see the rose and woodbine twine;
And ilka bird sang o' its luve,
And fondly sae did I o' mine;
Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose,
Fu' sweet upon its thorny tree;
And my fause luver staw my rose,
But, ah! He left the thorn wi' me.Ye banks and braes o' bonie Doon,
How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair!
How can ye chant, ye little birds,
And I sae weary fu' o' care!
Thou'll break my heart, thou warbling bird
That wantons thro' the flowering thorn:
Thou minds me o' departed joys,
Departed, never to return.The movement follows this scheme:
1. Fanfare introduction
2. Rumbling strings and a boding clarinet prepare for a short, florid setting of the words "flowing gently" with notes derived from the tune Caledonian Hunt's Delight and with counterpoint from the two flutes.
3. The longest stretch of the movement is instrumental. It is introduced with a return to the fanfare. This music is expanded and developed with the addition of more snatches from the tune, turning eventually into a short three-part canon for violins and violas, with a prominent 'Scots snap' - preparation for the traditional tune at the end of the movement.
4. The setting of "Aft hae I rov'd….." begins skittishly but darkens a little in the light of rejection.
5. The movement finishes with "Ye banks and braes…" set to the traditional tune with a light accompaniment largely on open strings.
The second movement was to be a setting of a poem specially written for the symphony by Edinburgh's Makar, Ron Butlin. Edward was delighted with this poem and planned to set it as a double fugue. There is the very beginning of a sketch for it, but not nearly enough material for the movement to be completed.
THE BOYS WHO MAKE THE MOST NOISE
Scott: (walks on stage, gazes round, self-important)
The world is still here?
- then so am I,
two centuries more famous!
Burns: (enters from opposite side, gazes round, goes up to Scott)
I ken you, your name is -?
S: Have we met?
B: It’s Walter – no?
S: Sir Walter. Sir Walter Scott, Bart.
And you?
B: Ye kent me then. Ye longed tae meet me, too!
S: Mr Burns?
B: The very same.
And here we are again. Shake hands.
(They shake)
S: Listen -our loyal fans.
(off-stage chorus gets louder as they come on-stage - half stand behind Burns, half behind Scott)
Chorus 1 (half): Robert Burns! Robert Burns!
Chorus 2 (other half): Walter Scott! Walter Scott!
(They get confrontational)
C 1: BURNS!
C 2: SCOTT!
C 1: Tory toe-rag Walter Scott
- all his books, the world’s forgot!
B: My apologies.
C2: Robert Burns - a commie whoor!
The Ploughman Poet shits manure!
S: And mine.
B: They’re enthusiastic, bombastic
S: . . . and iconoclastic.
Let’s blame our literary fame!
B: Two hundred years - and we’re still in the game!
S: For we are the best
B: There’s us - and the rest.
S: The wee scribblers
B: an screivers,
S: Word dribblers
B: playing word peevers.
S: They join up their letters,
think they write like their betters.
B: But we hiv a chorus
that gangs on afore us!
C: Walter Scott! Robert Burns!
Walter Scott! Robert Burns!
S&B: We are the boys
who make the most noise!
Chorus 1 (clapping): Clap hands - here comes Wally!
Chorus 2 (clapping): Clap hands - here comes Rabbie!
Chorus 1 WALTER SCOTT! (clap-clap-clap - like football chant)
Chorus 2 RABBIE BURNS! (clap-clap-clap)
S (to chorus): STOP!
(indicates audience): They’re not clapping? Why are they not clapping?
I gave them:
(very fast?) Rob Roy, Redgauntlet, The Abbot, The Pirate
Ivanhoe and Woodstock, the Fair Maid of Perth,
Kenilworth and Quentin Durward
The Bride of Lammermuir
Waverley, Antiquary, The Lay of the Last Minstrel
Marmion, Guy Mannering
. . .and The Heart of Midlothian
(last sung like ‘5 Golden Rings’ in the 12 days of Xmas?)
B: That’s a football team. Hearts - the Jam Tarts!
I gave them:
Tae a Mouse, Tae a Louse, Tae a Haggis
Ca’ the Yowes an Auld Lang Syne
The Twa Dogs, Holy Willie’s Prayer
Epigrams an Epistles,
Rantin’ Rovin’ Robin
The Jolly Beggars, Tam o’ Shanter
A Red, Red Rose an Comin’ Through the Rye.
For the randy, poems praising houghmagandie
and a Supper that’s not to missed! (like 5 golden etc.)
Chorus: They don’t clap, they don’t care. You’ve both run out of steam.
S (to audience): So I’m nothing but a football team!
B (to audience): An I’m an excuse for getting pissed!
Chorus: That’s progress!
Welcome to the world of hyped-up WOW!
The instant electronic NOW!
- of Ipods, Facebook, politicians,
melting ice-caps, gas emissions!
Logos, no-goes, bombs and terror,
Cyber-sex and crazy weather!
Consumer choice, computer glitch,
mega-poor and mega-rich.
Collapsing banks, the credit crunch,
decaf coffee, the wineless lunch.
24/7, 3 for 2,
in-store, out-source, multi-view.
Big Brother, crack cocaine,
NOW! NOW! and NOW again!
S: and . . . my heroic stories?
Chorus: (abrasive?) Heroism will not save us,
nor will the feudal fantasies you gave us.
Politicians tell us who to hate,
our world is Global Corporate!
We’re sorry, Scott - you’re out of date.
B: And me?
Chorus: (lyrical?) A man is still a man, and he will be
a brother to all men if he
can keep faith with the better part
of what he is - his honest heart.
Your poetry is passionate and true
- we cherish every word and cherish you!
S: And me?
C: Are you still here?
S: (angry) 200 years!
My time will come again.
B: Until then - goodbye, my friend.
(They shake hands and leave together?)
C: Walter Scott and Robert Burns,
inspiring Scotland then and now
- and Scotland still to come?
_______________
It is not entirely clear how many movements he planned for this symphony, but I think he had in mind setting a poem by Robert Garioch - At Robert Fergusson's Grave, October 1962 - for another movement. He was talking of a work lasting thirty-five minutes.
In realising the score of the first movement, Pastoral, I have kept as closely as I could to Edward's intentions. The movement is sketched right through but very often on only one stave. Some things in the sketches are vague and sometimes confused. His intentions for the orchestration are not always clear and I have had to collate fragments found on different pieces of paper. This means that sometimes I have had to take some compositional decisions over small details, but since I had talked with Edward about the piece a little there were some pointers to work from.
Perhaps the most moving thing to see in these sketches is the way in which the handwriting becomes more and more frail as the manuscript progresses. One or two confusions begin to appear. It gives a very graphic picture of the growing of the cancer in him - he completed this movement only five days before he died. All the time I spent working on it I felt his presence very keenly. Realising this score is the very least I could do for such a close friend.
© Lyell Cresswell, 2011
- Britten
Programme note
Benjamin Britten (1913-1975)
Suite on English Folk Tunes: A Time There Was, Op 90Cakes and Ale
The Bitter Withy
Hankin Booby
Hunt the Squirrel
Lord MelbourneBritten composed this suite for chamber orchestra, each of its movements a loving and characteristic elaboration of English folk songs or dances, for the Aldeburgh Festival a year before his untimely death. One movement, the delightful Hankin Booby, had already been heard, seven years earlier, at the opening of the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, with Britten himself as conductor. It was the success of that idiosyncratic little dance – "as pungent and tangy as a Spanish cobla [medieval rhyme]," as one critic remarked at the time – which inspired the composer to give it what he described as four "brothers and sisters.’"
Each movement is a small tribute to the memory of Percy Grainger, Australia's expert in unstable and unpredictable metres. Each is based on a contrasted pair of tunes and named after one of them. The orchestration, though modest, displays all Britten’s brilliance and resourcefulness. Strings, woodwind, and drums are asked to play "fast and rough" in the opening Cakes and Ale. Harp and pizzicato double bass are joined by horns and bells in The Bitter Withy. Wind band, trumpets, and a persistent drum-beat (evocative of a medieval tabor) are required by Hankin Booby. The strains of an American barn dance kindle the start of Hunt the Squirrel and in Lord Melbourne a cor anglais sings the sad melody upon a cushion of string tone. In this long final movement, marked "slow and languid," the sound of a funeral drum is heard, prompting one authority to remark that it was as if Mahler (one of Britten’s favourite composers) had orchestrated an English folk song.
By the time Britten made his arrangement of it, he was mortally ill, still brimming with ideas but finding them a struggle to write down. Every bar, he complained, was "a sweat," adding that it was physically hard to reach to the top of a large page of musical manuscript, "so all the flutes and piccolos tend to get left out." Yet the result is music of touching freshness, shot through with nostalgia, the work’s subtitle a quotation from Thomas Hardy’s poem Before Life and After, which had served as the finale of Britten’s song cycle Winter Words: "A time there was before the birth of consciousness when all went well." Or to put it another way, as Michael Kennedy did in his biography of the composer, "sorrow for what can never be, love for all that has been, is in this music."
© Conrad Wilson
- conductor
- mezzo-soprano
A literary theme links this programme. One of the hits of the 2009 Edinburgh International Festival, Battistelli’s is a corker of a piece vividly evoking the storm and supernatural terror of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Sorrow touches the premiere of Edward Harper’s Pastoral, which is a setting of Burns’ poetry. When he died in 2009, Harper was working on a new symphony for the SCO and his friend Lyell Cresswell has completed this single movement from his manuscript in tribute. Mezzo Karen Cargill, one of Scotland’s brightest stars, also sings traditional folk songs arranged by Berio.
Faure Requiem
- Wagner
Programme note
Richard Wagner 1813-1883
Siegfried Idyll (1870)Has there ever been so beautiful a birthday present? Siegfried Idyll was Wagner’s gift to his wife, Cosima, on her birthday (Christmas Day) in 1870.
Cosima, Liszt’s daughter, married the conductor and virtuoso pianist, Hans von Bülow, in 1857, but then fell in love with Richard Wagner in 1864. She left her husband in 1866, having already borne Wagner’s first daughter, Isolde, in 1865. Eva followed in 1868, and then came the longed-for son, Siegfried, in 1869. Cosima’s divorce was finalized in July 1870, and she married Wagner the next month. Siegfried Idyll (which uses themes from the opera Siegfried, as well as many private musical allusions) was Wagner’s thankyou offering, both for her love and for the gift of a son.
The circumstances of the first performance couldn’t have been more romantic. Wagner had secretly rehearsed thirteen musicians from nearby Lucerne. They assembled quietly that Christmas morning on the staircase of the Wagner’s home, Tribschen, on the shore of Lake Lucerne, Switzerland.
Cosima awoke to the sounds of music. Her diary entry for that day reads: “As I awoke, my ear caught a sound, which swelled fuller and fuller; no longer could I imagine myself to be dreaming: music was sounding, and such music! When it died away, Richard came into my room with the children and offered me the score of the symphonic birthday poem. I was in tears, but so was all the rest of the household.”
Obviously, Richard and Cosima were as deeply in love as it is possible to be. This very private composition was the tender expression of that love.
Siegfried Idyll is now often played in a version for orchestra rather than for the chamber ensemble that had originally assembled on Tribschen’s staircase. If anything, the richer tone of the larger string forces enhances the work’s radiant beauty.
© David Gardner
- Schreker
Programme note
Franz Schreker (1878-1934)
Kammersymphonie (Chamber Symphony) (1916)After many years left languishing in obscurity, Franz Schreker’s works are once more receiving the attention and adulation that they attracted during his lifetime. During the early years of the Weimar Republic, Schreker’s fame was at its peak and his operas were performed more often than those of any other composer – with only the exception of Richard Strauss. His opera Der ferne Klang was the turning point in his career and remains one of the seminal works of the twentieth century, cited by Arnold Schoenberg in his Harmonielehre for its daring use of harmonic juxtapositions. Schreker’s imaginative and subtle use of timbre, rich orchestral textures and dramatic operatic characterisations would also have a profound influence on the likes of Alban Berg, Ernst Krenek and Karol Szymanowski.
Sadly, the rise of National Socialism during the 1930s brought about the cancellation of many performances of his works, and with it the loss of many of his scores and secondary sources. Schreker was also soon forced to stand down from his position as Director of the Musikhochschule in Berlin and shortly afterwards died of a stroke at the age of just 56. In just a short space of time the reception of his music changed from having been hailed as the future of German opera to being considered little more than a historical quirk, marginalised and overlooked by posterity.
Of the music which has survived and is now being revived in the concert hall, Schreker’s Kammersymphonie has become one of his most popular orchestral works. Written in just one movement, it is emblematic of the richness of his late style and the precision of orchestration which proved so influential for his contemporaries. Alongside single winds, harp, celeste, harmonium, piano and percussion, Schreker subdivides the strings into no less than ten parts to create a dense and intricately-woven orchestral texture. At times, as many as 22 independent lines may be heard amidst the ensemble, though Schreker often employs subtle instrumental doublings, so that one instrument may appear to merge seamlessly into another.
While these lush and detailed orchestrations, coupled with his colourful harmonic palette, demonstrate the influences of Debussy, Mahler, Wagner and Strauss, it is Schreker’s distinctive mixture of romanticism, naturalism, symbolism and expressionism that make his music unique – straddling the boundaries of stylistic change that characterised the first half of the twentieth century. Writing in 1919, three years after completing the Kammersymphonie, Schreker declared: "I am a sound-artist, a sound-dreamer, a sound-aesthete and have no melody whatsoever."
© Jo Kirkbride
- Fauré
Programme note
Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924)
Requiem (1888)I. Introït et Kyrie
II. Offertoire
III. Sanctus
IV. Pie Jesu
V. Agnus Dei et Lux aeterna
VI. Libera me
VII. In ParadisumConsidering that Fauré wrote very few pieces for large instrumental forces and is more widely recognised for his chamber music, it is quite surprising that his Requiem has become one of his most popular and well-known works. Nevertheless, it did begin its life as a considerably smaller undertaking: the first performance of the work in 1888 comprised only five movements, and the minimal orchestration called for only low strings, harp, organ and timpani. A few years later, and under pressure from his publishers, he augmented the instrumentation to include horns, trumpets and trombones, as well as adding two further movements to the score. Yet the details of this enlarged version are somewhat spurious: the amended score is littered with mistakes and many of the instrumental additions simply double lines already present in the score. Some critics have since suggested that this may indicate that one of Fauré’s pupils – and not the master himself – completed the new edition.
In an interview in 1902, Fauré commented on the work and discussed the morbidity of the subject matter: "It has been said that my Requiem does not express the fear of death and someone has called it a lullaby of death. But it is thus that I see death: as a happy deliverance, an aspiration towards happiness above, rather than as a painful experience. The music of Gounod has been criticized for its overinclination towards human tenderness. But his nature predisposed him to feel this way: religious emotion took this form inside him. Is it not necessary to accept the artist's nature? As to my Requiem, perhaps I have also instinctively sought to escape from what is thought right and proper, after all the years of accompanying burial services on the organ! I know it all by heart. I wanted to write something different."
Fauré’s quest to replace a fear of death with a ‘happy deliverance’ is evident from his choice of texts. In addition to adding the motet Pie Jesu and the texts Libera me and In Paradisum from the Order of the Burial, he also omits the Dies Irae, a central part of the Mass that describes the day of judgement and the division of souls between heaven and hell. As such, the work is characterised by peace and serenity, avoiding the dramatic potential of the more melancholic movements and exchanging theatricality for a purity and directness of expression. In the final movement of the work, the darker hues of D minor (the tonic at the opening) are exchanged for the brighter realm of D major and a chorus of heavenly sopranos sing of a vision of Heaven. Finally, Fauré recalls once more that death is not a punishment but a means of release, as the work closes with same word as it began: Requiem (Rest).
© Jo Kirkbride
- conductor
- soprano
- bass baritone
- -
“…A very human feeling of faith in eternal rest”, was what Fauré hoped to capture in his Requiem. He hated the fire and brimstone settings, and in movements such as the famous ‘Pie Jesu’ he communicates a precious air of peace and consolation instead. Ticciati brings it together with Wagner’s touching love token and a beautiful rarity from the time of World War I. Schreker belonged to the world of Mahler, Strauss and Korngold. He mostly wrote opera, and this chamber symphony has a theatrical, lyrical sweep to it. If his name is unfamiliar that could be because, like so many musicians, he was persecuted by the Nazis and fell into obscurity.
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