Author: EMR2015

Categories
Book

Charles Gannon: John S. Beckett: The Man and the Music

Modern floral

The Lilliput Press, Dublin
xx + 547pp, £30.00

[dropcap]J[/dropcap]ohn was an interesting man. Born and bred in Ireland but from a protestant background, for most of his life he had no interest in religion. He was primarily a musician, but in ways that were unusual. For instance, he scorned Handel and other late baroque composers. He and his colleague Michael Morrow provided certain elements in his style, but John was for many years involved in his Musica Reservata from 1956 until 1973. Many young early musicians were involved. The repertoire covered a wide range, but chiefly in the earlier stages revolving on music from the around the 13th century till the 17th. Strange that I didn’t hear him until their first concert at the South Bank on 1 July 1967, with 35 players: do read Anthony Rooley’s remarks from BBC Radio 3 in 1998 (p. 178). I was involved in a wide variety of concerts and meetings with small choirs. John coached a viol ensemble in Chiswick in the mid-1960s: it was much later that John learnt how to play the instrument. He had a rigorous beat – his value was ideal for some music, but there was little additional information. It took some time for him to use his left hand to clarify anything that might aid the performers.

John subsequently spent much of his time in Ireland, particularly for concerts of Bach cantatas – 39 between 1973 and 1983, though the religious aspects were of little interest: it was the music that mattered. In earlier days, John produced a harpsichord for the Passions – the idea that the organ is the appropriate was unknown and the size of the forces are still unauthentic! John presented a broadcast on Radio 3 called “Early Birds” on 23 September 1988 on the revival of early music, starting with Dolmetsch, including a clavichord. Violet Gordon Woodhouse was claimed as “the first person ever to record harpsichord music”. Wanda Landowska played a Scarlatti Sonata in G (how can it be identified?) on a Pleyel harpsichord. I’m puzzled that Nadia Boulanger was reluctant to play Monteverdi, though some was recorded; the item performed was Chiome d’oro  with two tenors and a piano, Thomas Brinkley (?) led the Studio for Early Music in Munich and August Wenzinger the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis – this sentence is far more plausible than the earlier ones. Michael Tippett was primarily a composer, though he did work at Morley College in the 1940s. Alfred Deller was the first distinguished counter-tenor, not then going above top C but they now sing higher. I was at the Dartington course one year, but I couldn’t stand Walter Bergman telling me how to play continuo! As far as I can remember, Thurston Dart was fine. In fact, this list needs to be updated – early music has improved enormously, though some of it may be excessive!

John’s partner bought a small house in Azof Rd, Greenwich, which often was let out, but eventually it became John’s home when he moved back to London and joined the BBC Music Department in Egton House – mostly providing introductions for programmes like Composer of the Week. John had given up composing, but earlier on, he provided music for radio, often in a contemporary style, including music for his cousin Samuel, who lived in Paris but visited England as well. He travelled widely: to perform, to visit friends, to take holidays, which he enjoyed. As he retired, he tended to enjoy music that he had originally avoided. He died suddenly on 5th February 2007 and was cremated at Lewisham Crematorium on 16 February 2007.

As far as I can tell, the book is accurate. It is readable, though I often needed to find the year of the date. The Appendices run through A (Compositions), B (Discography), C (RTE), D (BBC), E (Musica Reservata concerts), F (Bach Cantata Series at St Ann’s Church. Dublin). There are 25 pictures on 12 pages between p.268 & 269. Finally, there is a bibliography and an index. This is, however, a book about the man, but without much information on the music. It would be interesting if anyone who knew him as a musician, another book would be worth publishing – or perhaps covered by different writers, for instance between early-music events and contemporary modern bits for radio programmes.

Clifford Bartlett

Categories
Sheet music

Handel: Te Deum for the Victory at the Battle of Dettingen, HWV283

Floral design

Edited by Amanda Babington
Bärenreiter BA10706, 2015
xiii+140pp, £30.50
Vocal score BA 10706-90, 2015
ix+84pp, £12.50
Parts: Wind set £30.50, organ £15, strings £4.50 each

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he edition is essentially based on the composer’s first draft, which in this case needed no second draft; the end is missing but was later replaced by John Christopher Smith Jr. There is no critical commentary, but it is hardly needed.

George II was present at the Battle of Dettingen on 27 June 1743. The music was completed by the end of July (thus overlapping with Semele). Five rehearsal took place from 26 September to 18 November, the last being “rehearsed before a splendid Assembly in Whitehall Chapel” (i. e., The Banqueting House). There is a complex mixture of borrowings from a Te Deum  setting by Francesco Antonio Urio (c. 1630-c1720). Three copies of that work survive, one of them perhaps the one acquired by Handel in 1706; it would be useful if the Urio sections had been listed somewhere, or perhaps indicated in the new edition.

This is an excellent edition, with performance material very reasonably priced. So far the Utrecht Te Deum  (with its matching Jubilate) is the most popular of Handel’s settings, but this new edition will perhaps encourage choirs to think about programming it in their concert schedules.

An alternative is available from King’s Music / The Early Music Company, which was published in 2009: A4 score £25, B4 score £30; vocal score £9; set of parts £50 with extras at £4 each.

Clifford Bartlett

Categories
Sheet music

Rameau: Airs d’opéra: Dessus/Soprano – vol. 2

Floral design

Edition de Sylvie Boissou, Benoît Dratwicki, Julien Dubruque
Coédition Centre de musique baroque de Versailles, Société Jean-Philippe Rameau, Bärenreiter-Verlag
BA9192, 2015.
182pp, £38.50

(Also Airs d’opéra: Tenor – vol. 2; BA9197, 2015. 152pp, £38.50)

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]here are 28 items in the soprano selection and 21 for the tenors; this is good value for study and learning the vocal parts, and the print is quite clear enough for practical use. I suspect the piano will be used more than the harpsichord. However, the publisher should make scores and parts available for each aria as required; serious learners of this repertoire and style will want to move from keyboard accompaniment to the full orchestral texture. The layout is excellent, and the first page of each item has the title and then introductions and the text in both French and English. It is slightly disppointing that there is no difference in the price of two books, one of which has 30 fewer pages.

BClifford Bartlett

Categories
Sheet music

Geminiani: 6 Concertos Op. 7, H. 115-120

Floral design

Edited by Richard Maunder
Ut Orpheus, 2016
vi+161pp, £31.95

[dropcap]K[/dropcap]ing’s Music / The Early Music Company have sold facsimiles of the opus-numbered works for 20 years or more, including op. 7, so having a clear, modern score is very useful for reference. The preface is laid out in small print, but most of the second page is blank: larger printer filling the space would have be easier to read. There is a table or ornaments. The score is rather small, too: it will not be much use if you are a conductor, though it will be valuable for students. The KM / EMC facsimile parts cost £50. Some think op. 7 is weaker than the earlier sets. Previous volumes in this series were by Christopher Hogwood.

Clifford Bartlett

Categories
Sheet music

Nicola Fiorenza: Konzert in c-Moll für Blockflöte, Streicher und Basso continuo…

Floral design

Herausgegeben von Dario Benigno
Doblinger D20.283
42pp, £15.50

[dropcap]I[/dropcap] wonder if Nicola  (as named above the work) is a mistake, since the Vorwort  and Preface  both give the name as Nicolò. There is a similar difference in the composer’s dates (either 1700 or “after 1700”). He was born in Naples and became cellist in the court orchestra. The layout is treble recorder, three violins, viola and cello, but in fact the original heading was violetta, a five-stringed viola da gamba: I hope that when the parts are available, there will be separate parts for the gamba as it stands and the figured bass line. There are four movements: Largo amoroso, Andante  (particularly long), Largo  (in F minor) and Allegro. It is an interesting piece and I would love to hear it some time.

Clifford Bartlett

Categories
Sheet music

Händel: Organ Works

Floral design

Compiled after the Urtext of the Halle Handel Edition  by Siegbert Rampe
Bärenreiter, BA 11226, 2016
ix+49pp, £20.50

[dropcap]I[/dropcap] am suspicious of the title. The five items in the HWV 400s are primarily for harpsichord, though the fugues HWV 605-12 are for organ or harpsichord. No. 13, “O the pleasure of the plain”, is a reduced version of the first chorus from Acis & Galatea, but it needs two hands and two feet and goes down to the G below the normal pedals (which were very rare at the time), and why is it so short? Finally, Jesu meine Freude  is a straight three-part setting with the melody in the alto, with a two-bar link into a second verse with the melody in the treble. I’m sure the volume would sell better if a more flexible title had been used, offering the repertoire as suitable for harpsichord AND organ.

Clifford Bartlett

Categories
Sheet music

Masses by Ludwig Daser and Matthaeus Le Maistre

Dark green flowers

Parody masses on Josquin’s Motets from the Court of Duke Albrecht V of Bavaria, edited by Stephanie P. Schlagel.
A-R Editions Inc, Recent Researches of the Renaissance, 164, 2016.
xx, 11 plates + 313pp. $275

There is no need to say much about the music, since the 20 page introduction gives a thorough account of the background. The plates are unnecessarily large; by all means print one page full size to give a proper impression of the original, but the remainder could be placed side by side two to a page simply by reducing them slightly.

The volumes contents are:

Daser Missa Ave Maria G2, C1, C3, C3, F3, F3 (i. e., chiavette)
Daser Missa Preter rerum seriem C1, C3, C4, C4, F4, F4
Le Maistre Missa Preter rerum seriem C1, C3, C4, C4, F4, F4
Daser Missa Qui habitat… C1, C3, C4, F4

The models for these are printed at the end of the volume:

Josquin Ave Maria… virgo serena G2, C3, C3, F4
Senfl Ave Maria… virgo serena G2, C1, C3, C4, F4
Josquin Preter rerum seriem C1, C3, C3, C4, F4, F4
Josquin Qui habitat in ajutorio… C2, C4, C4, F4

The scholarship is excellent. I’m not certain of all the accidentals; for instance, on p. 147, bars 111-112 have options for naturals or sharps and on p. 301 bars 123-7 only editorial e-flats. On p. 76-7 there are no e-flats, but the editorial e-flats in bars 56-8 are not obviously required. On p. 300, bar 112 ( |cD#c| ) could well have been sung #cD#c. The layout is spacious, and as a result, buying a set of single copies for performance could cost you $1650!

Clifford Bartlett

Categories
Sheet music

Filippo Sauli: 6 partitas for Mandolin

Floral design

Edited by Davide Rebuffa
Ut Orpheus, 2016.
X + 38pp, €16.95

Sauli was a theorbist in the first decade of the 18th century at the Hapsburg court in Vienna. The six MS partitas were written in French tablature, but the edition is on a single treble clef in two voices. The length varies from three to five dances. It is likely that bass lines were available: no. 5 is printed thus as an appendix.

Clifford Bartlett

Categories
Festival-conference

Early Nights in Orkney : D James Ross

[dropcap]W[/dropcap]hen the late Peter Maxwell Davies founded the St Magnus Festival in Orkney forty years ago, its main raison d’etre was to showcase contemporary music, and the original 1976 Festival, which I attended as a student, was built around a solid spine of Max’s own compositions. The Festival has grown in ways, which its founder could hardly have anticipated, but one very welcome development is the inclusion of a selection of early music.

Organ, Choir and Pipes, St Magnus Cathedral
Orkney’s magnificent Romanesque/Gothic Cathedral plays host to many of the Festival’s events, and Monday 20th June saw us streaming through its red sandstone portal for a concert melding contemporary, early and traditional music. This anniversary year the organisers have ‘updated’ a number of memorable events from 1976, and this concert was an adaptation of a concert for organ, fiddle and pipes. The choir were the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Voices directed by Tim Dean and it was they who gave us the bulk of the programme’s early content. After a pipe tune and an organ Chaconne based upon it, the voices came as a gentle balm, performing a group of English Renaissance polyphonic motets. Singing from the west end of the Cathedral behind the audience, they opened with a declamatory performance of Tallis’ Sancte Deus, followed by Byrd’s busy Laudibus in sanctis  and Sheppard’s ethereal Libera nos. There were lovely passages in all three works, but the positioning of the choir led to some muddiness in the Byrd and after a shaky start, the tuning never fully settled in the Sheppard. Organist Michael Bowtree contributed an impressive performance of Bach’s G-major Prelude and Fugue BWV541, demonstrating just what a fine instrument the Cathedral organ is, and also in my opinion undermining the various other contemporary works he played, making them sound by comparison like rather random ramblings. This was also the case to a certain extent with Max’s O magnum Mysterium, which sounds to me very hard to bring off and not entirely effective, the exact opposite of Victoria’s setting, which we heard later in the programme. A simply stunning anthem by Judith Weir, Ascending into Heaven, saved the honour of contemporary composers, using a range of radical techniques such as tonal clusters and glissandi to remarkable musical effect. A set of pipe tunes, delivered with great virtuosity and overwhelming volume by Pipe Major Laurence Tait softened us up for two motets by Victoria, O magnum mysterium  and Alma Redemptoris mater  before more contemporary organ music rounded off the event. RCS Voices produce a very pleasant sound, a little too fruity for my taste in the early repertoire with some intrusive vibrato in the tenor and soprano voices, but these young singers are an encouraging indication of the growing importance of early music at the Conservatoire. The northerly latitude f this Festival was brought home to us as we filed out of this late-night event into relative daylight, driving home in the legendary ‘simmer dim’ of the shortest night of the year.

Dido and Aeneas
On Tuesday 21st the Cathedral was again the venue for a triumphant collaboration between the vocal ensemble Voces8 and Florilegium under the direction of Ashley Solomon. Heading the cast as the tragic heroine Dido was operatic soprano Anna Dennis, whose portrayal of the Trojan queen was dramatically mesmerizing and musically stunning. She projected Tate’s subtle dramatic creation with enormous intensity, while enriching Purcell’s vocal lines with subtle ornamentation. In her iconic Lament, her enigmatic expression seemed to demand the audience’s remembrance rather than pleading for it. In costume and ‘off the book’, she was ably supported by the eight versatile singers of Voces8, who with strategic doubling occupied all the other roles. The fact that they were all in ‘civvies’ and reading from scores was not really too off-putting, except perhaps in Dido and Aeneas’ final fiery exchange, when Sam Dressel’s vocal score seriously got in the way. Dressel otherwise gave us a passionate and believable Aeneas, while Barnaby Smith’s venomous Sorceress and Oliver Vincent’s spirited Sailor also deserve special mention. Also worthy of mention was the superb playing of Florilegium, one to a part and superbly dramatic, supportive and pathetic by turns. I was personally delighted to hear lutanist David Miller provide two beautiful guitar grounds where Purcell indicates them, but for which no music survives – in addition to restoring these, Ashley Solomon’s realisation of the score also includes strategic repeats, all of which enhanced the normal printed version. Sometimes performances of music with which one is very familiar can be a disappointment – I prepared my own score for and conducted Dido and Aeneas with the Musick Fyne Chorus and Soloists and The Marvel Baroque Orchestra earlier this year (as well as singing Sorceress!) – but I found this performance consummately excellent and a sheer delight.

Voces8 : Eventide
Fresh from their triumphant Dido and Aeneas, Voces8 next appeared in the Wednesday late-night 10pm slot in St Magnus Cathedral with a programme entitled Eventide. This turned out to be a wide-ranging affair incorporating plainchant and Renaissance choral repertoire, through Romantic and modern music to close harmony. As with Monday evening’s concert, the dual themes of juxtaposition and exploitation of the Cathedral’s architecture were paramount, and the singers started in the apse giving a disembodied account of Orlando Gibbons’ Drop, drop slow tears  and Tallis’ O nata Lux, using the O nata lux  plainchant to advance into the choirstalls, whence they sang Britten’s youthful Hymn to the Virgin. It soon emerged that the concert would fall into similar units of contrasting music, the next of which framed a very English account of Bogoroditse Devo  from Rachmaninov’s All-night Vigil  with the two settings by Tallis of Te lucis ante terminum. In honour of the late founder of the Festival, they sang Max’s gentle Lullaby for Lucy, following it with three other secular works, two spirituals and a folksong all in close harmony. The concluding unit presented an arrangement of Fauré’s Pie Jesu  and the ubiquitous Allegri Miserere  framed in items of chant from the Requiem service, perversely sung in canon, and allowing the singers to again range from the West end to the apse for the Allegri. I find it rather curious that the group chose to construct pseudo-liturgical contexts for works, which of course would never have been heard together, and I have to say I found this and the sheer random eclecticism of the programme disconcerting. However the singing was flawlessly polished and expressive, and the group’s encore, Ola Gjeilo’s Ubi caritas, provided a suitably elegiac ending to the event. I did notice more than one audience member suppress a yawn during the ‘makey-uppy’ Allegri and I wondered idly if its days might be numbered? And my surprise that the singers hadn’t used the performance space to set up the usual contrasting solo and tutti ensembles passed when I realised that, being only eight in number, at least one singer had to sing in both choirs!

Florilegium
Thursday (referendum day) dawned in warmth and sunshine, and it was a wrench to abandon the beach for the dark cave of St Magnus Cathedral for a lunchtime concert by Florilegium – and to judge by a few empty seats, a wrench which some had succumbed to. Hardly had we heard the courtly opening of Telemann’s flute concerto in D and any reservations were forgotten. Ashley Solomon’s delicious flute tone floated above an accompaniment of exquisite delicacy, each note placed to perfection. This is a group which listens and watches constantly, and the result is a heady blend of unanimity and musicianship which is hard to beat. Purcell’s G minor Chacony recalled the group’s superlative playing for Dido and Aeneas  two days previously, while the strings burst into a frenzy in an explosive performance of Vivaldi’s Trio Sonata La Folia, which rose to eye-watering peaks of virtuosity. Finally the strings were rejoined by Ashley Solomon for a beautiful rendition of Bach’s 5th Brandenburg Concerto. This work has in effect three soloists, flute, violin and harpsichord, and there is nothing like a live performance to remind one just how radical this solo role for the keyboard is. As Terence Charlston stepped out of the customary continuo shadows with cascades of solistic bravura, we had a glimpse of the sort of swirling improvisation for which Bach was renowned in his lifetime. This was a beautifully poised Brandenburg 5, benefiting from the thorough understanding the group had developed in recently recording the work.

The Hebrides Ensemble & Max
My final concert at the Festival was on a magically still and sunny Thursday evening, when Scotland’s foremost contemporary music ensemble The Hebrides Ensemble reconstructed with one or two variants a concert given forty years previously by The Fires of London. Consisting of modern music, much of it by Max, it only belongs tangentially in this review, but as I attended the original concert in 1976 when it had a major influence on my subsequent career in early music, I thought I would include it. The key works are ‘realisations’ by Max of Scottish Renaissance repertoire at that time recently rediscovered by Dr Kenneth Elliott: Kinloche his Fantasie  and the Renaissance Scottish Dances which topped and tailed the concert. Deeply influenced by chant and early music in his own compositions, Max was quick to spot the potential of this charming repertoire. From a keyboard original, he transforms the Fantasie by William Kinloche into a glittering flight of fancy for modern chamber ensemble comprising harpsichord, violin, cello, flute, clarinet and percussion. The same mix of instruments also played the 7 Renaissance Scottish Dances, drawn from Dr Elliott’s 1957 Musica Britannica volume and a collection of early Scottish Keyboard Music he published shortly afterwards. These beguiling miniatures are processed through Max’s fertile imagination into an engaging set of lively and slow contemplative movements, one of them melding two slow airs in a way only Max could have conceived of. Although it was the rest of the modernist programme, bristling with pungent harmonies and virtuosity, which tested the players most, it is the early Scottish realisations which I remembered most vividly from forty years ago, and which brought my festival to a nostalgic conclusion.

D James Ross

Categories
Recording

Bassani: Giona, Oratorio a 5 voci

Floral design

Ensemble “Les Nations”, Maria Luisa Baldassari
88:48 (2 CDs in a jewel case)
Tactus TC 640290

[dropcap]B[/dropcap]assani’s Oratorio – composed for Lent in Ferrara when operas were forbidden – is a far cry from the both the oratorios of Carissimi and the operas of Cavalli, and closer in feel to Vivaldi or even early Handel. Da capo arias interspersed with recitatives slow what pace there might have been to what in the Parte Prima is a slow-moving, moralising opera substitute rather than a moving, dramatic, Biblically based narrative. A small organ and harpsichord play continuo, with a constant 8’ ‘cello line, and the violone player also plays the lirone (an instrument that reached its heyday in the early years of the seventeenth century – is there evidence for its use in music this late?), though I could not distinguish it. The upper strings in the five-part ensemble of single strings play in a modern style, with minimal regard for any historically informed practice. Their tuning – which may just be a failure to absorb the temperament of the keyboard instruments – feels at considerable variance with what we might expect. The ‘cello player is better: his free-ranging, melodic part in Non si fide di brieve sereno was a delight.

The singers – the male voices are the best – have some good moments, especially the Testo. But the female voices – there is a duet, and fine echo effects – who have the ungracious roles of Hope and Obedience – are less assured, and too wobbly for me. The narrative hots up in the Parte Seconda, where the storm descends and the helmsman (Atrebate) describes the ship about to founder, when Jonah wakes, rubbing sleep from his eyes. But curiously the whole effect seems bloodless and dull. Partly this is because the music isn’t up to much – there is too much Vivaldian tonic/dominant in endless D major: oh for Handel’s melodic inventiveness! – but partly because there is no real drive, no real dramatic climax – Jonah is just commended for his patience and obedience – and the singers don’t seem able to bring the characters they represent to life.

The recording and production doesn’t help either: there is no libretto with the liner notes: you have to go on line for that; but I couldn’t get through, and the Facebook page has comments from those who had the same experience. In the end, Tactus made contact with me, and provided the text (Italian only, for those who need a translation) and the liner notes. But there was nothing about the performance or style, and no information on the scoring or pitch or continuo decisions, so it is short on information that might help you evaluate the serious quality of this performance.

I don’t imagine there is another recording of this oratorio, but I doubt if this production will commend it to you, unless you are an enthusiast for this particular period and style: but I cannot recommend it as a performance.

David Stancliffe

[iframe style=”width:120px;height:240px;” marginwidth=”0″ marginheight=”0″ scrolling=”no” frameborder=”0″ src=”//ws-eu.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdHtml&MarketPlace=GB&source=ss&ref=as_ss_li_til&ad_type=product_link&tracking_id=infocentral-21&marketplace=amazon&region=GB&placement=B01DAKMGLM&asins=B01DAKMGLM&linkId=79511c101959e76931ba657553eaf383&show_border=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true”]

[iframe src=”http://www.jpc-partner.de/link.php?partner=ngr&artnum=2717461&bg=ffffff&tc=000000&lc=008442&s=0&t=1&i=1&b=1″ width=”170″ height=”214″ scrolling=”no” frameborder=”0″]

[iframe style=”width:120px;height:240px;” marginwidth=”0″ marginheight=”0″ scrolling=”no” frameborder=”0″ src=”//ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdHtml&MarketPlace=US&source=ss&ref=as_ss_li_til&ad_type=product_link&tracking_id=earlymusicrev-20&marketplace=amazon&region=US&placement=B01DAKMGLM&asins=B01DAKMGLM&linkId=0ed31490f0ee8342d3e4620aa922ab46&show_border=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true”]