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Today is Remembrance Sunday in the UK, when we remember all those who lost their lives in the struggle for peace and freedom. Remembrance Sunday has many musical connections, ranging from Benjamin Britten through Arvo Pärt, to George Lloyd, who was himself traumatised in action.
Next Saturday I will be at a performance in Norwich Cathedral of Herbert Howell's 1936 Requiem. This is an economic, intense and moving work that lasts for little more than fifteen minutes, and is scored for SSAATTBB and organ. There is an excellent recording of it on Naxos by the Choir of St Johns' College, Cambridge directed by Christopher Robinson. The CD also includes Take him, earth, for cherishing, the motet composed by Howells to mark the assasination of President John F. Kennedy. We will be remembering that sad event just five days after the Norwich Cathedral performance of Howell's Requiem.
My footer photo is a reminder of one of the more obscure musical connections to Remembrance Sunday. It shows the Cenotaph in Whitehall where the nation remembers the war dead today. The stark monument was designed by the architect Sir Edwin Lutyens, whose daughter we caught recently walking with Stravinsky. And that mention of 'Twelve-tone Lizzie' brings me to an important question that lies behind my scepticism about the current media hype surrounding John Foulds' World Requiem. Why does our public music of remembrance have to be 'accessible' and not too challenging? Why does it have to be so 'Classic FM'?
If you must have your Nimrod, but you like to be tonally challenged, why not try Thomas Adès' first string quartet Arcadiana? This was first performed at the Cambridge Elgar Festival in 1994. It is quintessential Adès, and you definitely won't hear it on Classic FM. But the sixth movement is titled O Albion, and for seventeen devotissimo bars in E flat, the key of Nimrod, it movingly pay homage to the time of Elgar and those that died in the trenches of the Somme. But if you come from the World Requiem 'big is beautiful' school why not try Geoffrey Burgon's 1976 Requiem, and give your loudspeakers a real workout? More on Geoffrey Burgon here.
In his peerless War Requiem Benjamin Britten stressed reconciliation as well as remembrance by specifying (but not obtaining) a British, German and Russian soloist for the work's first performance in Coventry Cathedral, the preserved ruins of which are seen below. If, like me, you value reconciliation as well as remembrance, and are uncomfortable with the jingoism associated with the Albert Hall, I give you two personal choices of music for Remembrance Sunday.
Toru Takemitsu's Requiem (for string orchestra) was written in 1957 in memory of the Japanese film composer Fumio Hayasaka. It is a slow, elegiac work lasting a little over ten minutes. The three movements are marked Lento, Modére and Moins lent. Disarmingly the composer later explained "I was never able to write an Allegro ..."
I write this waiting for the start of the BBC broadcast from the Cenotaph. A CD is playing that moves me even more than the Nimrod that will be played in a few minutes. Eleven young choristers from the famous Kreuzchor were among more the 25,000 killed in the British and American bombing of Dresden on February 13th 1945. As well as the terrible loss of its choristers, the famous choir also lost its its neogothic choir school on the Georgplatz, its library of sheet music and archive, and its very raison d'être, the beautiful Kreuzkirche (Church of the Holy Cross) which dated from the 13th century.
The cantor of the Kreuzkirche, Rudolf Mauersberger, completed his Dresden Requiem in 1961. It is a profoundly moving memorial to the victims of the bombing of Dresden. But it was also a living symbol of Dresden's resistance to the repressive political regime in the GDR until Die Wende in 1989. There is an excellent recording of the Dresden Requiem by the Kreuzchor on the German Carus label. My header image is a session photo from the recording in Dresden's Lukaskirche in 1994. This has been the venue for many famous recordings, including Herbert von Karajan's 1970 Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg.
Rudolf Mauersberger's Dresden Requiem was written for the boy's voices of the Kreuzchor. Much of the singing is a capella, but the score also uses a small ensemble of organ, celeste, trombones, double basses and percussion. It is certainly not atonal, but neither is it 'Classic FM'. And it has been performed in Dresden every year since its premiere more than fifty years ago.
You can read the full story of the Dresden Requiem, and listen to samples, here. To my knowledge it has never been performed in London. Let us remember the dead of the bombing of Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki today, as well as all other victims of war. And let us hope for a London performance of Rudolf Mauersberger's Dresden Requiem in the future.
* Update - read here how the World Requiem un-Foulded.
Follow this path to see Dresden restored from the ruins.
Image credits. Header Carus, middle Wikipedia, footer Ministry of Defense 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
This tympanum crowns the restored west front of the Romanesque abbey church of Vézelay in Burgundy, France, which we visited in September. During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries Vézelay was an important monastic and pilgrimage centre, and today it is still one of the four starting points for the Santiago de Compostela pilgrimage route. The Abbey is one of the great architectural achievements of the Romanesqe period, although a major fire in 1120 and other disasters forced extensive renovation in the nineteenth century.
The nave, seen above, dates from the third decade of the twelth century. Although it is Romaneque at its most glorious there are some other interesting influences. See my article on the Rüstem Pasa Camii in Istanbul to understand how the alternating patterns in the stones of the arches echo Islamic architecture, an influence that probably found its way to Burgundy from Muslim Spain to the south-west. The view below is from the apse looking back through the choir to the nave. The apse and choir are Gothic additions dating from the end of the twelth century, and the change of styles is clearly evident at the transept.
The abbey of Vézelay is a wonderful performing space, and you can hear a unique recording made there in my Future Radio programme this Sunday, November 11 at 5.00pm UK time. Takafumi Harada studied in Tokyo and Rome, and was professor of musicology at the University of Kochi in Japan. He has composed for radio, television, the cinema and rock bands. In 1993 he took monastic vows and joined les Fraternités Monastiques de Jérusalem based in Vézelay, and became Brother Damien. He has applied his musical talents to the celebration of the liturgy at Vézelay, and in particular he has worked to rehabilitate the kithara into liturgical music.
The kithara (cithare in French) was an ancient Greek member of the zither family, and in modern Greek a kithara is a guitar. It was used to accompany worship in Biblical times, but subsequently fell out of use. Brother Damien's revival of the instrument is not a dry musicological exercise. He has composed contemporary works for the kithara and monastic choir, and I will be playing some of these on my radio programme from recordings made in the abbey church at Vézelay. His compositions use Japanese and Buddhist themes as well as setting the Psalms, and his work has been supported by L'Association des Amis de la Cithare japonais who have sponsored a CD of his compositions Eveille-toi, cithre! (Arise, kithara!). It can be bought from the website of les Fraternités Monastiques de Jérusalem, where short audio samples are also available.
Takafumi Harada's compositions for the kithara will be coupled with an apposite work, Toru Takemitsu's From me flows what you call Time. This concerto for five piece percussion group and orchestra is built around a five note theme, and its preoccupation with the number five reflects the numbers symbolism in Tibetan Buddhism. This will be a fascinating programme, and I am almost certain that the four pieces for kithara that I am playing are broadcast premieres. Do join me at 5.00pm UK time on Sunday November 11 if you can.
Now read about columns of plainsong soaring upwards.
* Listen via the audio stream on Sunday Nov 11 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. All photographs (c) On An Overgrown Path 2007. Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Aude Gotto writes: 
When the King of Hearts’ Gallery in Norwich first exhibited my personal collection, composed exclusively of works by living artists, I wrote in the introduction: “This is the collection of someone who didn’t like contemporary art.” A reassurance for the public who generally feels wary of anything "contemporary”, with some reason, it has to be said,in the light of the Turner Prize and other such highlights of the “art world.”
The same wariness applies to modern music, because of what has been termed the “squeaky gate” school, which makes a concert more of a headache than a pleasure. However, I have come a long way over the years, discovering that there are many talented artists and musicians who use a contemporary idiom to express themselves in ways that are both beautiful and arresting, and who are worth making the effort of opening one’s mind to new forms and harmonies.
Indeed we have had quite a number of contemporary works performed at the King of Hearts: the memorable Messiaen recitals by Peter Hill were the initial foray into a world of sound very different from baroque; in 2000 we celebrated the millennium by the commissioning new works, among which the most rewarding was David Bedford’s Quartet, bringing together Piers Adams on recorder, Simon Dinnigan on guitar, Gary Cooper on harpsichord and Tatty Theo on baroque cello. This proved eloquently that a modern composer can write for period instruments with charm and imagination. I was encouraged in the adventure by the comment of an older lady who was a regular attender, and who exclaimed at the end of a concert: "I was rather worried about this contemporary piece and not looking forward to it, but, do you know, I really enjoyed it!”
As far back as 1994, the adventurous harpsichordist Jane Chapman gave a recital which brought together baroque and 20th century music for the instrument; this was quite a revelation, and the reason why we are having her again this year! So we arrive after this rather long preamble, at the theme of this article, the Autumn Festival at the King of Hearts, in Norwich.
The title, Journey across Time, conveys the purpose, which is to cross over barriers, and present music written in the last hundred years as well as baroque favourites. There is an emphasis on Bach and Handel played by some of your favourite performers, so you will no be stretched all the time! But in each concert contrasting contemporary or at least 20th century pieces are included.
The most avant-garde work is a piece for flute and pre-recorded tapes by Jeremy Peyton-Jones, a premiere for the King of Hearts. I trust that flautist Rachel Brown, for whom it was written and who was keen for an opportunity to play it, will present it with her usual musical sensitivity so that we will enjoy the novelty. Another feature is the use of period instruments, such as baroque violin and particularly harpsichord, by modern composers. Stephen Dodgson writes lovely accessible music, Ligeti has toe-tapping rhythms in Hungarian Rock and Takemitsu creates dreamy Japanese harmonises on the harpsichord.
Full details of Journey Across Time from the King of Hearts website, On An Overgrown Path will be there. And stay on the 'old and new' path with Bach and modern technologyImage of 'Boaz Wakes up and finds Ruth at his feet' - original lithograph by Marc Chagall from Aude Gotto's personal collection. 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
Aldeburgh Festival's new production of Benjamin Britten's Death in Venice has been hailed as a 'triumph' by the critics. Director Yoshi Oida is singled out for particular praise, and this production is yet another example of Japanese influence on cosmopolitan Aldeburgh. Britten's homage to Noh Theatre, Curlew River, is the best known Eastern connection, but the Festival has some other interesting, and lesser known, Japanese links.
In 1984 Toru Takemitsu visited the Aldeburgh Festival for the first time, and fell in love with that most sublime of all performing spaces, Snape Maltings. The result of his visit was the Festival commission, Archipelago S., which was given its first performance at Snape in 1993. The work is an essay into surround-sound, and uses two mixed ensembles on either side of the main stage, a brass quintet along the back wall (there is no balcony at Snape), and two clarinets play behind the audience to either side of the auditorium.
Archipelago S was commissioned by Oliver Knussen when he was artistic director of the Aldeburgh Festival. Knussen has recorded it on a DG CD which also includes Takemitsu's Dream/Window from 1985. Archipelago S is for large orchestra with integral small ensemble, and the composer described it as follows: The title "Dream/Window" is taken from the Buddhist name of a Zen priest of the Muromachi Period. Muso (mu = dream, so = window) Soseki (1275-1351). Among the many famous gardens designed by Muso Soseki is that of the Saiho-ji Temple (popularly known as the "Moss Temple") in Kyoto. My music has been profoundly influenced by Japanese historic gardens. For example, "Arc" for piano and orchestra (1963-66/76) and "In an Autumn Garden" in the complete version for gagaku orchestra (1979) were based on relatively concrete images of gardens.
I was fortunate to visit Kyoto some years back and visit the famous temples, and this sparked a fascination for Japanese garden design. I bought a copy of Kiyoshi Seike's book on Japanese gardens when working in New York in the early 1980s, and created my first garden using it a few years later. My photo above is another example of Japan meets East Anglia - it is the view from my study here in Norfolk where I write On An Overgrown Path, and shows the small Japanese garden outside the patio doors.
No post tomorrow as we are at Aldeburgh for a full day of music, Nono in the morning followed by a picnic on the beach, and then Death in Venice at Snape in the evening. But continue the thread with going Buddhist with Lou Harrison.
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
Today is Remembrance Sunday in the UK, when we remember all those who lost their lives in the struggle for peace and freedom. Remembrance Sunday has many musical connections, ranging from Benjamin Britten through Arvo Pärt, to George Lloyd, who was himself traumatised in action.
