NORMAN STINCHCOMBE REVIEWS MORE CDs CELEBRATING THE VAUGHAN WILLIAMS ANNIVERSARY

-

 The flood of releases to mark the 150th anniversary of Vaughan Williams’ birth continues unabated – first recordings of obscure and minor works; ingenious transcriptions of familiar ones; and archive recordings of his symphonies. The title work in ‘Pan’s Anniversary’ (Soloists & Britten Sinfonia / Gould / Albion Records) ★★★ is a musical accompaniment for Ben Jonson’s masque of 1621 created to honour James I. The original music was lost and under time pressure for the outdoor premiere at Stratford-upon-Avon in 1905 Gustav Holst chipped in with some dance arrangements. In Jacobean times what mattered about masques were the elaborate costumes, dazzling special effects, stage machinery and the frisson of seeing the nobility and courtiers taking part. In purely musical terms what we have is pleasant but insubstantial fare, nicely delivered by the singers, speakers (the excellent Timothy and Sam West) chorus and orchestra under William Vann. Timothy Burke’s arrangement of the ‘Tallis Fantasia’, for strings and voices, fails to match the original’s sublimity. 

The arrangements on ‘Vaughan Williams on Brass’ (Tredegar Town Band, Brabbins / Porthouse / Albion Records) ★★★★★ are much more successful and entertaining. In Philip Littlemore’s ingenious brass band arrangement of the 1954 Tuba Concerto soloist Ross Knight gives a virtuoso performance with the normally galumphing tuba exquisitely nimble and light on its feet. Littlemore again provides the score for the ‘English Folk Songs Suite’ – best known in Gordon Jacob’s version for orchestra but resplendent here in a revision of RVW’s original brass form. A host of shorter works include the ‘Flourish for Band’, ‘Variations for Brass Band’ and – suitably for the Tredegar Town Band – ‘Prelude on Three Welsh Hymn Tunes’. 

The recordings made in Brangwyn Hall, Swansea are top class. In ‘Vaughan Williams Live Volume 1’ (Somm Recordings) ★★★ audio restorer Lani Spahr has done a fine job on live tapes of the composer’s sparkling ‘Wasps’ overture (1957) plus Symphonies No.6 (1964) and No.9 (1958). The first two recordings were made at the Albert Hall the other at the Royal Festival Hall both of which have tricky acoustics – boomy and cramped respectively. The BBC Symphony Orchestra and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra were conducted by Sir Malcolm Sargent, a conductor better than his ‘Flash Harry’ nickname and trademark carnation-in-the-buttonhole suggests. The ‘Wasps’ crackles with energy and his approach to the symphonies is vigorous in a way the composer appreciated. No rival for the best modern recordings – Andrew Davis and Haitink – but interesting nevertheless.

Norman Stinchcombe

Popular posts from this blog

Jacquie Lawson e-card music

-
THE MUSIC BEHIND THE E-CARDS MIKE HUGHES-CHAMBERLAIN AND JACQUIE LAWSON E-CARDS by Christopher Morley It's always a joy when an e-greetings card plops into your inbox, not least at festive times of the year. It's easy to understand why the sending of these cyber-messages has become so popular, given the huge cost of postage nowadays At the forefront of this trend are the e-cards produced by Jacquie Lawson, and in addition to the attractive artwork, witty and sensitive storylines, and interactive opportunities offered by these little gems, comes the input of music, atmospheric and appropriate. Whether specially composed or arranged from other sources, these sound-pictures are masterminded by Mike Hughes-Chamberlain, who has made the seamless connection between a musical education and Information Technology in order to create scores for these scores of delightful little gems. He was brought up in Hindhead in Surrey, where his mother founded a music school in 1975.
Read more

Some Enchanted Evenings at the Grand Hotel, Eastbourne

-
CHRISTOPHER MORLEY ENJOYED THREE ENCHANTED EVENINGS AT EASTBOURNE'S GRAND HOTEL SOME ENCHANTED EVENINGS Appassionata at the Grand Hotel, Eastbourne ***** Eastbourne's breathtakingly magnificent Grand Hotel, so imposing yet also so welcoming, has an impressive roster of visiting musicians since its opening in 1875. Among the many luminaries who have crossed its portals are Debussy (who completed La Mer here), Kreisler, Caruso, Nellie Melba, Ysaye, Paul Robeson, Myra Hess… the list goes on. Latest to join them is the young vocal quartet Appassionata, who, together with pianist Will Sharma, presented a three-night entertainment "Some Enchanted Evenings" at the end of March. It began with baritone Matthew Siveter, already a much-loved veteran of Gilbert and Sullivan productions, presenting his one-man show "A Source of Innocent Merriment", drawing material from the likes of G&S themselves, Noel Coward, Flanders and Swann, Tom Lehrer, as well as d
Read more
-
  Birmingham Philharmonic Orchestra 80 th   anniversary concert Birmingham Town Hall   5 stars *****   Eighty years is a ripe age for any orchestra, and two years after Covid scuppered the planned anniversary concert, the Birmingham Philharmonic Orchestra didn’t stint on what was actually its 82 nd  birthday celebration. The BPO had assembled a chorus specially for the occasion, and with representatives from (among others) Birmingham Bach Choir, Wolverhampton Chamber Choir, Dudley Choral Society and Walsall Choral Society, what was billed as a birthday party for the West Midlands’ pre-eminent amateur orchestra actually served as a much wider showcase for regional amateur music making at its most buoyant.    You wouldn’t have guessed that this was an  ad hoc  choir: tuning was secure, ensemble was tight and the tone glowed, especially up top. With the entire first half devoted to Elgar’s  The Music Makers –  the last masterpiece thar Egar created specifically to be sung here in Birmingh
Read more