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Well not exactly, but I'm away from the keyboard and off to the fine county that was the birthplace of composer George Lloyd, home to Malcolm Arnold who wrote a set of his English Dances there in the 1960s and the location of the castle that inspired Arnold Bax's Tintagel. Back soon, there may be a delay in uploading comments but keep them coming. In the meantime please support other music blogs here and here and don't forget Elliott Carter and Michael Tippett on Future Radio.
Fishing boat on Aldeburgh beach (c) On An Overgrown Path 2008. Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Two contrasting responses from America to my post Third rate music on Naxos' American classics?
Flinging merde - 'Granted some of the stuff that Naxos has packaged in that series has been less than distinguished but operating in a cultural establishment where critics treat every cow patty ever dropped by the likes of Alwyn (above) and Bax and Finzi and Michael Tippitt (sic) as if it were fois gras, Clements is hardly in a position to fling merde' - from Sequenza21, and I'm sure Norman Lebrecht would approve of that misspelling of Tippett.
The true beauty of the effort - 'Personally speaking I expect listener reaction to concert music is heavily dependent on emotional mood and cultural/historical context . The concept of "ratings" and "tiers" for composers is pretty much an over-rated specialization of critics, which serves the purpose of puffery and closed-mindedness.
My father is the American composer George Frederick McKay (photo below), who liked to say that "if the criticism of a composer's music gets to be really sharp, then he knows he is writing some good pieces." He also once got a big laugh from hearing concert goers in seats in front of him commenting in reverent tones that he was dead.
His music is really like a big layer-cake; in other words, in his young life, he composed jazz-infuenced pieces and romantic songs. Later, his music became more socially aware and radical-- "ultra-modern" toward the end of the 1930's at a time when he mentored John Cage in Seattle both encouraging the younger composer musically and inviting him to the family home for dinner and philosophical discussion.
Following this, my father launched into a loving involvement with American folk-music, and completely cast aside the "opus' system, which he considered a rather crazy European artifact. As to making critics of his music "cringe," he probably would have enjoyed this, since he had a mischievous and rugged nature derived from his upbringing in the West. His music is far from simple, and in many cases has deep religious and philosophical meaning. Much is yet to be revealed, since he composed nearly 1000 various works.
It is doubtful that any of us will ever get to hear high-level performances of all his works, since most conductors are still under the threat of being pummeled by Symphony Society grannies if they get too far afield from the standard concert fare. We have a commercial radio station in Seattle that broadcasts a full month of Mozart works, with one Mozart piece every hour, which gives me the urge to say "give me a break, guys!" Also noted is the absolute repetition of Vivaldi's Four Seasons by glamour-puss groups of all stripes.
So with this rather subjective outburst, I have implicated myself forever as an indivdually thinking patriotic, and maybe not so clever commentor. I should add that, although I loved Mozart's music in context to the movie "Amadeus," he never will or would have the chance to equal the magic of George Frederick McKay's interpretation of Native American themes that most likely stretch back 10,000 years in human history.
This is the true beauty of the effort John McLaughlin Williams has made to create wonderful recordings of the legendary music of America, that many have forgotten. My father's initiative in his mature years was to merge his music with the natural music of his homeland and speak of international peace' - comment from Fred McKay on my Naxos American Classics post.
Any American readers who still think Michael Tippett is an English pastoralist should listen to my Future Radio programme on March 2 when I will be playing Tippett conducting his own Second Symphony; while this Tippett post with its world view brings this path full circle.
Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Last Friday's BBC Radio 3 broadcast of Vaughan Williams' Fifth Symphony, played by the Ulster Orchestra conducted by John Lubbock, contained more beauty in one bar than was to be found in the whole of Riccardo Muti's recent London concerts with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Why do we focus so much on a few 'star' conductors and orchestras? And why do we consign to oblivion the forgotten maestros and musicians who work away from the limelight, and who contribute so much?
The Ulster Orchestra was created as a full time professional orchestra in 1966, and its first conductor Maurice Miles (above) is one of those forgotten maestros. He was born in 1908, and was principal conductor of the Yorkshire Symphony from 1947 until 1954. The orchestra played many twentieth century works, including more than thirty by British composers in his first season alone. His repertoire was eclectic, and he gave a rare performance of Arthur Honegger's oratorio King David at the 1950 Leeds Triennial Musical Festival.
But the star system was setting the musical agenda more than fifty years ago, just as it does today. In 1954 Maurice Miles was replaced as conductor in Leeds 1954 by the mucher higher profile Russian Nikolai Malko, who had given the first performances of Shostakovich's First and Second Symphonies.
Maurice Miles' specialities were never likely to become fashionable. Arnold Bax, and Arthur Butterworth were among the composers he championed. He gave the first performance of Gerald Finzi's beautiful Dies Natalis in the Wigmore Hall in 1940, and conducted Geoffrey Bush's Symphony No. 1 at the Proms in 1958. As well as his work in Northern Ireland Maurice Miles was a frequent conductor of the BBC Welsh and Scottish Symphony Orchestras. He spent decades advocating unfashionable composers with unglamorous orchestras, before, finally, turning to teaching conducting at the Royal Academy of Music in London.
In the early 1980s my wife and I bought our first house outside Dorking, in the shadow of Ralph Vaughan Williams' beloved Leith Hill, and we were living there when our first child was born. The house was modest but nice, and it was on the kind of housing development that young people with families lived on. But a charming old gentleman moved into the house opposite, and lived there on his own. He travelled on the train to London several times a week, and kept himself to himself much of the time. But my brief conversations with him told me that he knew a lot more about my musical heroes than I ever would.
Our son was young, and we were preoccupied with those transient things that preoccupy young parents. To my eternal regret I did not spend more time with our neighbour Maurice Miles before he died in 1985, aged 77. Today he is just one of many forgotten maestros. But the wonderful music that the Ulster Orchestra continues to make means I will not forget him.
* This Sunday (Oct 28) I will play Gerald Finzi's forgotten Cello Concerto from 1955 on my Future Radio programme at 5.00pm UK time, together with another forgotten cello concerto from an earlier time by Leonardo Leo.
* He may have hit the spot with Shostakovich, but not all of Nikolai Malko's repertoire became fashionable. He also conducted the first performances of Nikolai Myaskovsky's Symphony No. 5 and Vagn Holmboe's Symphony No. 7 - where are they now? In fact Owain Arwel Hughes, of all people, recorded a cycle of the Vagn Holmboe symphonies for BIS some fifteen years ago, and I have the Symphony No. 2 playing as I write. It was what my late, and lamented, EMI colleague Douglas Pudney would probably have described as 'a justly neglected masterpiece'.* But do listen to the Finzi Cello Concerto via the audio stream here on Sunday Oct 28 at 5.00pm UK time. Convert Overgrown Path radio on-air times to your local time zone using this link. Windows Media Player doesn't like the audio stream very much and takes ages to buffer. WinAmp or iTunes handle it best. Unfortunately the royalty license doesn't permit on-demand replay, so you have to listen in real time. If you are in the Norwich, UK area tune to 96.9FM.
Photo credit Discovering Leeds. Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Photograph above taken at the Carmelite Monastery, Quidenham, Norfolk on November 18th 2006 by Pliable.
Now playing - November Woods (1917) by Arnold Bax, performed by the Ulster Orchestra conducted by Bryden Thomson (Chandos LP ABRD066). Bax described himself as a 'brazen romantic', so you won't find him on Sequenza21. His life and music were informed by literature and nature, and he drew on Celtic and Nordic mythology for inspiration. November Woods is a close companion to two other Bax tone poems, The Garden of Fand and Tintagel.
The legends of King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table are linked to the Cornish castle of Tintagel, and Bax's eponymous tone poem is available on one of my nomination for the greatest records of the 20th century. This EMI recording was made in No 1 Studio, Abbey Road with Robert Kinloch Anderson producing in 1967. The coupling is one of the great 20th century symphonies, Vaughan Williams 5th, the score of which was completed in 1943, and is dedicated to Jean Sibelius 'without permission'. Both works are conducted by one of the great 20th century conductors, Sir John Barbirolli. As you may have guessed I recommend it. Also recommended is Bax's autobiography Farewell My Youth. Sadly it is now out of print, my copy is of a 1949 edition and expect to pay quite a high price if you find a copy.
The words on the crucifix at Quidenham in my header photo are: Wanderers stay and think of me here a while, how I hung on the cross so that thou could come to me. This message is reflected in Vaughan Williams' magnificent 5th Symphony which draws on material from his 1951 opera The Pilgrim's Progress which in turn was based on John Bunyan's 17th century allegorical novel. There is a classic EMI recording of the opera with Sir Adrian Boult conducting, and John Noble singing The Pilgrim. It was made in London's Kingsway Hall in 1972 with exemplary sound from the legendary producer and engineering team of the two Christophers - Bishop and Parker. My webname, Pliable, comes from one of the characters in Bunyan's novel. I have been married for 30 years today, and my wife thinks it significant that Pliable was one of the two residents of The City of Destruction in Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. The other was Obstinate.
That mention of The City of Destruction brings this Overgrown Path through more November Woods to its final destination. The two photographs above were taken yesterday as we walked through the campus of the University of East Anglia to the Sainsbury Center for Visual Arts to view their magnificent Francis Bacon exhibition. Bacon shared Celtic connections with Bax, and was born in Dublin in 1909, although he spent much of his creative life in London. The exhibition focuses on Bacon's work from the 1950s, and quite stunning it is. Just as even the very best audio system cannot realistically reproduce an orchestral fortissimo from a recording, so Bacon's paintings cannot be done justice on the printed page. They must be seen in the flesh. Some are massive, black statements from the City of Destruction, but others, by contrast, celebrate with colour Bacon's love of van Gogh and travel. And those contrasts brings me the end of this Path. It has travelled from the enlightenment, through romanticism to the modern, and is a reminder, if we neeed one, of how fortunate we are to live in a society of contrasts that can embrace equally Bunyan, and Bax, and Bacon, and beyond.* Listen to a 43 minute BBC audio programme on Vaughan William's Fifth Symphony - 
* For more recordings of Bax, Vaughan Williams and their contemporaries take An Overgrown Path to Treasure trove of 20th century composers
Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
