Alderley Edge Orchestra – March 2018
Hamish MacCunn (1868 – 1916) – The Land of the Mountain and the Flood (1887)
Greenock-born Hamish MacCunn, one of the greatest of Scottish composers, concealed a naïve romanticism beneath the bristling exterior which saw him view his Royal College of Music teachers, including Hubert Parry, “with infinite and undiluted disgust” and publicly bicker with George Bernard Shaw. He is best known for this short concert overture, an aesthetically attractive Scottish pastiche written from the long shadows of Mendelssohn's Scottish works at the age of just 18. The title is from Walter Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel, Canto VI.
O Caledonia! stern and wild,
Meet nurse for a poetic child!
Land of the heath and shaggy wood,
Land of the mountain and the flood,
Land of my sires! what mortal hand
Can e'er untie the filial band
That knits me to thy rugged strand!
Carl Maria von Weber (1786 – 1826) – Clarinet Concerto No. 1 in F minor, Op. 73 (1811)
Speaking at Weber's memorial service in Dresden, Richard Wagner must have had at least an inkling that he could not have reached anywhere near the success he attained without Weber. German Romantische Oper surely owes as much to Weber as to Wagner, and had the elder composer not succumbed to tuberculosis aged 39, his works may now be staple repertoire.
If Wagner inherited the opera mantle from Weber, his instrumental and choral music never came close to matching Weber's. In addition to the likes of Der Freischutz, Oberon and Euryanthe, Weber wrote for winds at a level only really matched by Mozart, including two concertos, a quintet, the grand duo concertant and a set of variations for clarinet alone. On the back of a technical revolution in clarinet design in the latter 1700s, Weber was especially drawn to the sound of Heinrich Bärmann, noting his “Welcome evenness of tone from top to bottom”. The F minor concerto was composed quickly to a commission from King Maximilian of Bavaria, with the first movement completed in a single day.
The opening Allegro deviates subtly from classical concerto structure in giving orchestra and soloist independent voices in dialogue with one another, and each party independently developing its own themes. The dark hues of the opening cello line set the tone for an essay in shades of darkness, via a virtuosic cadenza of Bärmann's own invention. The Adagio is redemptive in its slow, yearning aria-like theme for soloist, before the mischievous Rondo finale sweeps any hint of darkness aside. Twice the soloist threatens to put the brakes on proceedings, before wheeling away into its highest register in a thrilling display of technical brilliance.
Gustav Holst (1874 – 1934) – The Planets, Op. 32 (1914-16)
Born In Cheltenham to a father of mixed Swedish, Latvian and German extraction, and of excellent musical stock, Holst displayed a precocity for composition from an early age. The Planets is undoubtedly his best known work, if not one of the best known in the repertoire, but its status as such would no doubt send his ashes spinning around Chichester Cathedral. He had once drily opined that “Every artist ought to pray that he may not be a success – if he's a failure he stands a good chance of concentrating on the best work of which he's capable”, and on other occasion “Woe to you when all men speak well of you”. The success of The Planets and The Hymn of Jesus in 1917 saw him beset with requests for performance, interviews and appearances, distracting him from his 'real work' with a pencil and his teaching commitments at St Paul's Girls' School, and possibly even contributing to the duodenal ulcer which was his downfall.
The astronomical credentials of The Planets go no deeper than the suite's name. The music is instead inspired by the astrological characters associated with each planet visible from Earth. When Pluto was discovered four years before Holst's death, he refused to compose a further movement in order to discourage the work's excessive popularity. The Hallé commissioned Colin Matthews to write a finale in the last months of Kent Nagano's tenureas Music Director, but the subsequent downgrading of Pluto has led to that work largely being shelved.
Each of the seven movements has its own unique voice, and owes little to its neighbours. Mars, the Bringer of War is written in an unsettling five-in-a-bar battleground canvas. Its sound is full of all manner of unusual techniques, from euphonium solos to strings playing with the wood of the bow, double timpanists and screaming brass. John Williams' Star Wars music owes much to Holst, not least for this movement.
Venus, the Bringer of Peace, and Mercury, the Winged Messenger, are less brutal. Summoned up by a solo horn, Venus is an attractive reverie with celestial sparkle provided by harp and celeste. Mercury, like Uranus later on, is born of flighty mischief, and flits past in a flurry of virtuosic writing for the orchestra.
The gas giants begin with Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity, which is a tour de force of power and noble spirit. The unusual idea of giving rapid melodies to the double basses and timpani manages to reconcile the discrepancy between Jupiter's monstrous size and its astrological character. The stirring Thaxted hymn tune of its middle section has been appropriated by all sorts of causes since Holst's life, much to his chagrin, from a rugby anthem to alternative national anthem.
Saturn, the Bringer of Old Age, is a slow-moving, monumental march through life's challenges, from unsettled beginnings, through trials and strife to the wisdom of age. Uranus, the Magician, is its antithesis – a raucous dance of the same character as Dukas's Sorcerer's Apprentice or Berlioz's Witches' Sabbath. The spirit of the prankster romps through the orchestra in a thrilling scene which culminates in a full-length glissando up the keyboard of full organ.
The suite ends with the ethereal, wordless, voices of an unseen women's choir in the final pages of Nepture, the Mystic. To give the illusion of disappearing into the distance, the door to the choir's offstage chamber is slowly closed, bringing about the greatest fade-out since Haydn's Farewell symphony.
© Rohan Shotton 2019. Programme notes may not be reproduced or edited without permission. Please contact me if you would like to use these notes.