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Guildford Borough Council |
Concerts 1978/79
WEST GALLERY A
£2.20
GUILDFORD CATHEDRAL
SATURDAY 3rd MARCH 1979
at 7.30 p.m.
Michael Rippon — Baritone
Michael
Rippon
has
gained
recognition
through the variety and versatility of his vocal
achievements, singing both lyrical and buffo
roles on the operatic stage, and both modern
and classical music in recitals, broadcasts and
GUILDFORD
CATHEDRAL
on the concert platform. Born in Coventry, he
gained a choral scholarship to St. John’s
College, Cambridge, and then studied for three
(By kind permission of the
years at the Royal Academy of Music.
Dean and Chapter)
As
a
concert
Rippon
sings
and
oratorio
singer,
Michael
for
all
major
societies
the
Guildford
throughout
Britain, and he has appeared at
Philharmonic
Aldeburgh, Windsor etc.). He has worked with
most of the leading British Festivals
(Edin-
burgh, Bath, Leeds, City of London, English
Bach
Festival,
Choirs
Festival,
many leading orchestras, both in this country
and on the continent.
Michael
Orchestra
Three
BBC,
Rippon records
singing
in
both
extensively
radio
and
for the
television
operas, recitals, and concerts and he appears
regularly at the BBC Promenade Concerts. He
records for EMI, Decca, Pye, and Music for
Pleasure.
The
Deutsche
Grammophon
recording of Purcell’s “Ode to St. Caecilia”
received particular acclaim. More recently he
PROTEUS CHOIR
has recorded Walton’s ‘“‘Belshazzar’s Feast”,
and
Holst’s
“The
Wandering
Scholar”,
a
programme of music by Kurt Weill, Mozart’s
MICHAEL RIPPON
“Requiem”
and
“Mass
in
C
Minor”
and
Mathias’““Ode to Joy”.
This season he records operas by Kurt Weill for
Hessischer Rundfunk in Frankfurt and also for
BBC
Conductor:
Radio 3.
He will also take part in a
European tour with ““The Fires of LondonTM.
VERNON HANDLEY
Michael Rippon appeared in Guildford Civic
Hall with Vernon Handley and the Guildford
Philharmonic Orchestra in 1971 in a perfor-
mance of Verdi’s ““‘Requiem”.
Vernon Handley
Vernon Handley was born in Enfield, North
London, and he studied at Balliol College, Oxford, and the Guildhall School of Music and
This performance is promoted by Guildford Borough
Council with financial assistance from the South East
Arts Association.
L
R
e N R
I
R
Drama. He is now one of the busiest British
conductors, working regularly with all major
London and regional Orchestras.
e
e
.
Since 1962 he has been Musical Director to the
Municipality of Guildford where he has
developed the Guildford Philharmonic into a
professional body of major importance, and he
conducts the Proteus Choir with singers all
aged under thirty, as well as the larger Philharmonic Choir. He has made several records with
both the Orchestra and Choirs.
In the recording field, he has currently over a
dozen recordings in the catalogue for four major recording companies and with a repertoire
ranging from Finzi, Vaughan Williams and
Tippett to Tchaikovsky, Faure and SaintSaens. Recently released is Dvorak’s ‘New
World’ Symphony with the Philharmonia on
the new Enigma label, various modern pieces
on the Lyrita label, and for Thames TV he
recently recorded Vaughan Williams’s ballet
Job with the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
His future schedule includes concerts with the
LPO, Philharmonia, Royal Philharmonic
Orchestra and with most of the major regional
orchestras. He will be making further recordings for Enigma, Lyrita and Classics for
Pleasure, and will also be working with the
BBC Northern and Welsh Symphony
Orchestras.
In spite of his crowded -schedule, Vernon
Handley still manages to escape to his
Gloucestershire home for a period every year to
work on enlarging his already immense reper-
toire and to follow his keen interest in ornithology.
visited Germany to make a record of English
music for Cologne Radio.
Because of Mr. Handley’s commitments with
the London Orchestras, Provincial Orchestras
and the BBC, a team of chorus trainers and accompanists work with the Choir to produce
each of the concerts. The Musical Director
acknowledges with thanks the help he has
received from Kenneth Lank, accompanist
Patricia Wood and the team who assisted with
sectional rehearsals.
Cantata No.82: Ich Habe Genug
Bach 1685-1750
Bach was largely responsible for the form by
which we now know the Cantata — a work for
chorus, or several solo voices, not unlike a short
oratorio. However, in the 17th century the term
mainly applied to an elaborate vocal solo, complete with recitatives and arias, sometimes with
an obbligato instrument, which was very popular
at that time in cultured Italian circles.
As well as his work at the Thomasschule, Bach
was expected to direct the music of Leipzig’s
two main churches, St. Thomas and St.
Nicholas. These choirs were composed largely
of students from the Thomasschule, and often
the average number of voices available for a 4part chorus was only twelve. With such
material it is not surprising that Bach
sometimes reverted to the older form of solo
cantata. This was even more useful since his
own home was often visited by touring Italian
singers, whose voices were regularly joined with
that of his wife.
Proteus Choir
The Proteus Choir, which numbers 70 young
people between the ages of fifteen and thirty,
was formed in 1963 as an additional choir in
the Guildford music scheme where young peo-
ple could gain experience in choral work. In its
ranks are trained musicians and singers, as well
as young people still at school, or in the
professions. The Proteus Choir gives a number
of unaccompanied concerts each year, both
secular and religious, as well as singing major
choral works with the Guildford Philharmonic
Orchestra. The Choir has appeared on
television, recorded background music for a
production at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre and
During the 1730’s the poor state of the choir led
to a number of these solo cantatas, some of
them making special demands on the interpretative imagination of the singer.
Ich habe genug was composed for the Purification
of Mary, and scored for bass voice with an
elaborate oboe obbligato. It is concerned with
the heavenly home-sickness of the old man,
who is already reaching the nearness of death
in which earthly things are losing significance.
The orchestra seems to look forward with joy to
his release from earth during the first song,
further emphasised by the arabesques of the
solo oboe.
The main aria is in the nature of a death-
lullaby: ‘“‘Schlummert ein, ihr matten Augen;
quely from the Cradle Songs of Tennyson &
fallet sanst und selig zu” (‘‘Slumber now, my
Blake, from Fletcher’s ‘Come Sleep, and with
weary eyes; close softly and contentedly.”). At
thy
the end the singer reaches an ecstasy ofjoyful
awhile:’ more directly from Macbeth ‘Sleep
that knits up the ravell’d sleave of care’ and
anticipation with the aria “Ich freue mich auf
seems
probable
that
this
Cantata
was
originally composed about 1713. Bach wrote
the
“Schlummert
ein”
aria
into
his
deceiving/Lock
me
in
delight
more distantly from the words of committal at
meinen Tod.” (““I rejoice in my deathTM).
It
sweet
wife’s
the Burial Service in her poem ‘Man has not
many
days,
and
here
in
sunlight/Lies
he
sleeping’.
Klavierbuchlein in 1725, even before transcribing
Although
the Cantata for soprano, presumably for her to
reality underlying the poetic symbolism was
sing.
Denby Richards.
difficult
to define, the mysterious
released to me in the search for musical expression.
A variational technique seemed an inevitable
“Take him, earth”’
challenge, but not a formal set of variations for
Howells b.1892
poems so un-formal and diverse. A six note
Herbert Howells was commissioned officially
by Washington to write the Motet ‘“Take him,
earth” on the first anniversary of the tragic
death of President John F. Kennedy for performance in Washington Cathedral. It was given
its first English performance in St. Paul’s
Cathedral, London, immediately after that in
Washington, and then by Sir David Willcocks
in Cambridge University and recorded by him.
Dr. Howells had originally set the poem in its
Latin version (by Prudentius A.D.400) but the
commissioned version is in English.
figure
falling
and
rising
in
short
steps,
suggested by the phrase ‘Forgive the Sleeping
Man’ is heard (altos and sopranos) in the short
choral introduction using the words which conclude the last poem to give symmetrical balance
to the outer movements and the theme used to
generate the music of each movement.
Architecturally the third movement, the apex of
a pyramid reaching to the lines ‘of a
summer/Whose brief, immediate radiance’ is
flanked by 11 and IV pianissimo movements
reflecting on ‘Man has not many days’ and
“The Man who sleeps whose Soul has fled” and
The Motel makes great use of sub-divisions
framed between 1 and V where the Baritone
within the sections of the chorus, though some
parts of it are in straight forward four part har-
sings of the earthly state and suffering of the
Sleeping Man and asks forgiveness for his con-
mony. At times, the alto voices will move in
dition.
thirds through the texture created by the rest of
the choir, at times the basses or tenors. At the
end,
where the basses
set
a funeral march
rhythm, the chorus divides into eight parts.
This deeply felt work is another example of
music which, although commissioned, proceeds
from sincerity of a composer working in his
The whole is enclosed by the wings of the opening introduction and the march-like last section
where forgiveness is vehemently implored —
‘Forgive the Sleepers, Lord! Thou didst so
make them./Receive them . . . .Movements 111
to the end are performed without a break.
Anthony Scott.
most characteristic language.
“Forgive the Sleeping Man’
Variations on a Theme
Anthony Scott b.1911
Vetrate di Chiesa
—
Church
Windows
‘Forgive the Sleeping Man’ is a theme which in-
Orchestra
spired several of Valentine Ackland’s poems.
Respighi 1879-1936
Recurring over the years, they eventually form-
ed a unified sequence entitled, temptingly for a
musician, ‘Variations on a Theme!’
The poems awaken echoes from the past: obli-
or
Impressions
for
As this year is the centenary of Respighi’s
birth, one can expect many performances of the
tone poems which drew on aspects of life in
Rome and which established Respighi world
wide. The Fountains, the Pines and the
Festivals of that city are glorious and colourful
orchestral essays, but touch the deeper side of
Respighi’s character only occasionally. Two
less often played orchestral works — the
Brazilian Impressions and Vetrate di chiesai
show respectively the more delicate and serious
sides of the composer’s personality. Of them
all, Church Windows is the least performed,
perhaps because of its determined use in two
movements of uneven metres (not beloved of
European conductors) perhaps because of its
overall serious nature. Yet in some ways it is
the most symphonic in design of any of the
composer’s larger works, and because of its
sonorities and subject matter particularly
suitable for Cathedral performance. Speaking
symphonically, the lay-out of the movements
gives us two slow movements, one restlessly so,
the beginning, the other full of nobility at the
end. A violent scherzo as the second movement,
and a particularly tender slow movement
between the scherzo and the finale. Still speaking symphonically, each movement has a
version of ‘scotch snap’ (short note followed by
long note) which is the first sound that we hear
on the clarinet in the first movement. All except
the scherzo share repeated note motifs.
All four pictures are religious events depicted in
stained glass windows in various churches in
Italy.
I. La Fuga in Egitto (The Flight in Egypt).
The clarinet, accompanied by dragging
repeated notes in the strings announces a
meandering tune starting with the ‘Scotch
snap’ already mentioned and reintroducing it
at several points in the melody. The cellos take
the tune up and eventually pass it to the violins.
Fragments of the tune always with its dragging
accompaniment are heard in the different
colours of the orchestra and the painful
procession goes on. The mood is shattered by
the second impression.
I1. S.Michele
Arcangelo
(St.
Michael
Archangel).
Swirling triplets as an accompaniment against
a loud motif from the brass, bassoons and oboes
containing a short note followed by a long note
depict the Archangel driving rebellious angels
from heaven. Where the first movement was
meandering, this is purposeful. The triplets
which started the accompaniment are carried
on almost without a break throughout the
Scherzo. They are halted only for three pages of
full score which might formally be called a trio
except that its unearthly accompaniment to the
trumpet solo destroys any idea of form. The
Scherzo resumes at first pianissimo but eventually finishing with an even more towering
rage than it began. The last triple forte note on
the gong being allowed to vibrate lunghissima.
I11. 11 Mattutino di Santa Chiara (The Matin
of St. Clare).
In complete contrast the repeated notes of the
second violins in 5/4 introduce an expressive
melody on the flute containing in the third bar
the little ‘scotch snap’, now upside down. This
is a gentle picture of the 13th Century saint
who is the centre of the legend of mirac ulous
transportation to a small church to join in the
Matin service must undoubtedly be a well loved
figure in Italian church lore. All instruments
are given fragments of the tune and a modest
climax is reached after a part of the tune is put
before us on different woodwind instruments in
quick succession. The whole melody returns on
the flute and the cllos and the ‘scotch snap’
reappears poignantly to close the movement.
IV. S.Gregorio Magno (St.Gregory the Great).
Three very quiet phrases, each moving towards
a pause, establish the seriousness of this
movement. These three phrases are an introduction to the movement proper which then
proceeds on the full orchestra but pianissimo.
The horns are given a noble chorale accompanied by quiet phrases in contrary motion on
the strings and woodwind. This is succeeded by
a more glowing section where the strings have
the tune but a further chorale is given to horns
and woodwind in canon. When the first mighty
climax is reached, this chorale is stated against
the repeated notes of the first movement and
the slowed down triplets of the second. The
masses are present and it remains only for
St.Gregory to bless them. This he does on the
full organ which arrives when the noise of the
full orchestra is at its height. The orchestra
takes up the solemn crotchets of the organ,
carries the tempo forward triumphantly at a
slightly faster rate and eventually comes to rest
on a bar of indeterminate length in
which
violins, violas and cellos mutter the repeated
note rhythm. After this, the opening phrase of
the movement returns and the great lento, one
of the greatest sounds in orchestra literature,
closes the work.
“GUILDFORD PHILHARMONIC
SUNDAY 18 MARCH 1979
ON THE MOVE”’
at 3 p.m.
This week has also seen the Guildford Philhar-
Mass in B.minor — Bach
monic Orchestra performing in the South East
Helen Walker — Soprano
Region with a Concert in the Woodville Hall,
Susan Kessler - Mezzo Soprano
Gravesend. This was the third occasion that the
Adrian Thompson — Tenor
Orchestra
Stephen Varcoe — Baritone
had
appeared
in
Gravesend
and
because of the success of these Concerts it is
hoped that a regular series of Concerts will be
launched next season in which the Guildford
Philharmonic Choir
Vernon Handley
Philharmonic will be a prominent feature.
SATURDAY 7 APRIL
The Concert comprised of music by Mozart,
at 7.45 p.m.
Beethoven, Butterworth and Dvorak with the
Overture ‘Othelto — Dvorak
brilliant young British pianist Andrew Haigh
Fugal Concerto for Flute, Oboe and Strings
as soloist in Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto.
— Holst
The
large
audience
gave
a
warm
and
enthusiastic reception for the Orchestra’s per-
Symphony No.2 in E.minor — Rachmaninov
Henry Messent — Flute
formance and we look forward very much to
James Brown — Oboe
our next visit to Gravesend.
Vernon Handley
Now that the Orchestra is establishing itself as
the regional orchestra of the South East it is
also visiting certain venues on a regular basis,
one of these being Folkestone. Folkestone’s
classical concert series for 1979/80 at the Leas
Cliff Hall consists of eight concerts, with the
Guildford Philharmonic Orchestra appearing
twice. April 12th sees the opening concert of the
season
when
the
Guildford
Orchestra
with
Vernon Handley conducting will be joined by
the distinguished British pianist John Lill who
will perform Rachmaninov’s 3rd Piano Concer-
to. Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man”
and Borodin’s 2nd Symphony will also be included in this concert. May 5th and 6th sees the
Guildford
Philharmonic
bourne
and
appearing in
Ashford,
East-
performing
Rachmaninov’s 2nd Symphony and the soloist
in Beethoven’s first and third Piano Concertos
will
be
Frankl.
the
Hungarian
born
pianist
Peter