GUIL.DFORD BOROUGH COUNCIL. CONCERTS' 197980
ENTERPRISING CONCERT
GUILDFORD BOROUGH
COUNCIL CONCERTS
1979/80
CIVIC HALL, GUILDFORD
SATURDAY 10 NOVEMBER 1979
at 7.45 p.m.
Ifor James
Ifor James is undoubtedly one of the world’s leading
horn soloists. He studied under Aubrey Brain at the
Royal Academy of Music and, after being principal
horn with several leading orchestras, he has established himself as a player of world stature.
Largely concerned with solo and chamber music he
undertakes
extensive tours both in the United
Kingdom and abroad. His repertoire is extensive,
many leading composers having written especially
for him. He has played as concerto soloist with most
Guildford
Philharmonic
Orchestra
Associate Leaders:
HUGH BEAN and JOHN LUDLOW
of the leading orchestras and many famous conductors; his chamber music commitments including the
Philip Jones Brass Ensemble, the Schiller Trio and a
duo with John McCabe. One of his specialities is his
gift for lecturing and he has already made several
lecture tours in the U.S.A. and Canada as well as
the United Kingdom. He is also a member of the
Oslo Music Group. Outside his playing he is the
guest conductor of the famous brass band ¢‘Besses o’
th’ Barn” with whom he has made several records
and for whom he has persuaded many top composers to write original works. His records include
performances
with Britten and Barenboim, the
Mozart horn quintet, Brahms horn trio and solo
recitals with Wilfrid Parry and John McCabe.
Vernon Handley
Vernon Handley, Musical Director of the Guildford
Philharmonic Orchestra, is now one of Britain’s
Ifor James
busiest conductors working regularly with all the
Vernon Handley
Philharmonic Choir
in Enfield, North London and studied at Balliol
major London and regional orchestras. He was born
College, Oxford and the Guildhall School of Music
and Drama.
Vernon Handley has been Musical
Director of the Guildford Philharmonic Orchestra
since
1962
and
has
developed
it
into
a
fully
professional body of major importance, which is
now firmly establishing itself as “T’he Orchestra of
the South East’ with concerts in many towns
throughout the South East region from Canterbury
to Winchester.
In 1974 the Composers’ Guild of Great Britain named Vernon Handley as “Conductor of the Year” for
his services to British music and, now recognised as
one of the major champions of British music, he is
frequently entrusted with the world premiere of new
works. He is very busy in the recording field and has
an
extensive
list
of
recordings
in
the
current
catalogue including works by Dvorak, Tchaikovsky,
Elgar, Tippett, Debussy, Vaughan Williams and
Faure. Many recordings are planned, including the
possibility of a further recording with the Guildford
This concert is promoted by Guildford Borough Council
with financial support from the South East Arts
Association.
Philharmonic Orchestra.
In spite of his crowded schedule, Vernon Handley
still manages to escape to his Welsh home for a
period every year to work on enlarging his already
immense repertoire and to follow his keen interest in
thing for him to do; he simply puts, “The wide far
distance — the great solitude”.
ornithology.
A very large orchestra, with triple woodwind, six
horns and two sets of timpani begin with an introduction in three-four time. The second piece of
material is given to clarinets and flutes in six-four,
the running quavers of the first section serving as a
binding element in the second. Lazy echoing horns,
flutes and harp, all using material previously put in
front of us, help us to push our heads through the
clouds and we are in the icy cold but clear air of the
hill tops, with widespread string chords pianissimo
making it quite difficult to breathe. This section
reaches the first instrumental climax, then becomes
softer and softer until we reach the ‘“‘great solitude’.
A few voices are just audible, but it is an orchestral
development of one of Delius’s most beautiful songs
that ensues. Eventually, the orchestra gradually
subsides; only a very quiet string chord, three timpani and a horn are left. From this sound emerge the
eight part unaccompanied choir with soprano and
tenor solos in their midst. Delius’s incredibly fine
ear leads the tune through the most moving harmonies, and the orchestra cannot resist the sound.
They are drawn in section by section until the eight
part choir and full instrumental ensemble sing ecstatically this powerful song. Delius, with perfect
recourse to classical method, usually denied him by
the critics, proceeds from this climax to lay out a
perfectly condensed recapitulation of all that has
gone before, the high points of each section now
appearing in much closer disposition than in the
development of the work, but although formally this
is a descent from the climax, emotionally and intellectually we are not allowed to descend, and the
final bars find us still in the crystal clear air of the
Philharmonic Choir
The Musical Director acknowledges with thanks the
help he has received in training the choir from
Kenneth Lank and accompanists Linden Knight
and Patricia Wood. The Choir made its first
recording in 1973 with the Guildford Philharmonic
Orchestra: ‘‘Intimations of Immortality” by Gerald
Finzi, and in 1976 recorded Hadley’s ““The Trees So
High’ with the Philharmonia Orchestra.
A Song of the High Hills
Delius 1862-1934
Sarah Dunstan Solo Soprano
Andrew King Solo Tenor
When Ken Russell’s film of part of Delius’s life was
shown on television it seemed inevitable that
passages from ‘A Song of the High Hills” should be
used in the background, and yet, characteristic
though it is of Delius, this is one of the rarely performed larger works. Written in 1911, it was not
given its first performance until 1920 under Albert
Coates. The date of its composition, therefore,
places it between Brigg Fair and the First Dance
Rhapsody, and the Second Dance Rhapsody, yet
formally it has much more in common with the
earlier Sea Drift in that its structural control is exercised through a careful organisation of phrase
lengths stemming from one or two germinal ideas
laid out at the beginning of the work. It is typical of
Delius that although purely structurally the first
part of the work is introductory, he begins to set the
mood of the whole work with the very first sounds.
This device is even found in his earliest works, for instance, Appalachia, where he actually uses the intervals from the theme of the set of variations in the
introduction of the work, i.e. before the theme itself
is actually stated.
high hills.
Concerto for Horn
Michael Blake Watkins b.1948
This work was written during the Autumn of 1974
and is scored for solo horn, harp and string
In his childhood Delius knew the wild bleakness of
orchestra. Although the piece is in one continuous
the Yorkshire moors, and later, as a young man,
walked extensively in the hills of Europe and the
movement, it does fall into five clearly defined sec-
mountains of Scandinavia. To look upon this work
as merely an impressionistic tone poem is to miss
the point completely. For Delius it was the colossal
power of nature that mattered, and the individual
moods evoked by each different terrain, whether
that terrain meant the rarified air of the mountain
top, or the full luxuriance of a summer garden.
When the unaccompanied choir join the orchestra,
the song that they sing is hardly that of human
beings, and at the section of the work where the
choir’s theme is introduced instrumentally, Delius
writes a caption in the score, incidentally a very rare
tions, of which the first and the last act as a prelude
and
postlude
respectively.
The distant
opening,
marked Adagio, sees the horn tentatively searching
for and discovering its territory. A single ’cello can
be heard vainly imitating the horn’s rising motif, but
despite this and other interruptions from the
orchestra the soloist predominates. The second section, marked Allegro Maestoso, is constructed on
three contrasting ideas. The first a strong fanfare,
the second a cloudy episode with its distinctively
opaque scoring, and thirdly the main theme which
both soloist and orchestra develop freely. These
ideas frame a central cadenza for horn solo. The
third section is a short but lively vivace. A brief
cadenza acts as a bridge to the fourth section marked Moderato, which is cast in a strong 6/8 rhythm
_and characterized by a slow majestic theme used as
the accompaniment to a solo part for the viola, horn
and ’cello in turn. This material gradually
fragments and eventually gives way to the fifth section, a distant reminder of the first, with the work
ending as quietly as it began.
Tuckets for concerts on 25 November and 8 December are on
Guildford Philharmonic Orchestra brochures, price 40p, are
on sale this evening, also key rings at 75p in the foyer.
Symphony No.3
Copland b 1900
Molto Moderato
Andantino quasi allegretto
Molto Deliberato
Copland’s great success with Appalachian Spring,
his ballet for the Martha Graham Company, was
undoubtedly one of the reasons that the commission
for the Third Symphony came his way. The
Koussevitsky Music Foundation asked him to write
it and in 1946 it appeared with Koussevitsky conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra. The full
score was revised in 1966. Some measure of its initial
success can be gauged from the fact that it was
awarded the New York Music Critics Circle Prize as
the best orchestral work by an American composer
played during the 1946/47 season. Yet, as with so
many brilliant and beautiful symphonies, it is still
rarely heard. Audiences accept gladly Appalachian
Spring, El Salon Mexico, but the title Symphony for
a modern composition.still daunts. In the case of
Copland’s Third, this is particularly unfortunate
composer
managed
to
carry
his
‘American sound’ so attractive in those other works,
and Rodeo and Billy the Kid, into the demanding
form ofa Symphony.
Although there are elements of symphonic usage as
Copland
design,
by
adopts
in that
many
a
composers
very
the first
original
before
overall
movement,
him,
formal
although a
satisfactory self-contained unit, is like an emotional
introduction to the other three movements; for it
contains
themes
which
will
be
used
in
other
movements and that only become developed there
rather than at their first appearance. Three distinct
themes
are
happens in the movement to detract from the feeling
of rugged strength. Each of the themes is first stated
and then built up to an impressive full orchestral
climax. The final bars return to the bare intervals
heard at the very beginning of the movement. The
heard
in
octave in its basic fanfare. The Scherzo, however, is
much clearer in shape than the last movement for
which it provides the material. The structure is A B
A, B being a perky derivative of the octave leap but
so different in character as to become distinctive
material. The slow movement is more complicated
in structural procedure, the most contemplative of
the four and the quietest. It is a treatment in
variation technique of the third principal theme of
the first movement. It is full of ingenious contrapuntal passages in which every device is informed by the
original shape of the theme. One of the louder
Allegro Molto
established
are in the vast open spaces of America and nothing
the horns, the outer notes of which are an octave.
This is a very important statement because the last
movement is going to make such great use of a rising
sale in the foyer during the interval.
the
bare intervals on the flutes, clarinets and violins, we
Scherzo begins with an uncompromising upsurge on
INTERVAL
because
currence later would be still fresh. With the first
the
first
movement
with
relatively little development. It is as if the composer
wanted them to be held in the mind so that their oc-
variations is found to have a relationship with the ris-
ing figure of the Scherzo and as if to remind us of
that movernent Copland makes its first appearance
more emphatic by giving it to the brass instruments
who introduced the Scherzo. The movement ends,
however, in the reflective way in which it began. It
joins on, without a break, to the last movement. A
shadowy version of the composer’s Fanfare for the
Common Man, which had been composed in 1942,
appears on the flutes and clarinets, with the two
harps and lower strings and timps providing a one
bar link to a statement of the Fanfare proper. This is
no mere popular gesture on the part of the composer
for the octave leap which was more filled-in in the
Scherzo has been in our minds from the opening of
the
second
movement
and
here
receives
an
emotional rounding off. Immediately after the Fanfare the movement proceeds in the most traditional
Sonata Allegro that we could have hoped for, but
the ‘Rodeo’ like nature of the first real Allegro seems
to be far removed from stuffy symphonic working
out. It hurtles along in a most exhilarating way until
the Fanfare returns again, this time in augmentation
on the trombones, followed by the trumpets, followed by the woodwind. The rest of the orchestra will
not be quelled, however, and finds it perfectly possible to go on playing its staccato semi-quavers
against the slower notes of the Fanfare. The Fanfare
itself is capable of development and a rhythmically
subtle one, for the orchestra takes up the material so
far used, in a restless pattern of 3/8 followed by 2/4
bars. The semi quavers return, the second main
subject invades the development section and the ensuing complication is cleared suddenly by a
reintroduction
of
the
Fanfare,
which
carries
a
triumphant symphony to an immensely satisfying
conclusion.
GUILDFORD PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA
‘ON THE MOVE’
The
Stephen
Piano Concerto No.25 (K503) — Mozart
SUNDAY 25 NOVEMBER at 3.00 p.m.
CIVIC HALL
THE CROSSLEY CLITHEROE CONCERT
Prelude a I’apres-midi d’un faune — Debussy
Variations on a Rococo theme — Tchaikovsky
Symphony No.3 in F - Brahms
Raphael Wallfisch, Cello
Vernon Handley, Conductor
the
American
born
Dvorak’s Eighth Symphony and Schubert’s Overture ‘Rosamunde’. The next concert in Guildford
Civic Hall on 25 November is the Crossley Clitheroe
Concert and the programme to be performed is
Prelude a l’apres-midi d’un faune by Debussy,
Variations on a Rococo theme by Tchaikovsky, and
Brahms’s Symphony No.3 in F. Soloist in the
Rococo Variations is the outstanding young cellist,
Raphael Wallfisch, who will also play this work in
The Woodville Halls, Gravesend on 2 December.
Don’t forget that three celebrated players from the
Guildford Philharmonic Orchestra, Hugh Bean,
Eldon Fox and John Forster, will-be performing a
Musical Soiree in aid of the South East Music Trust
SATURDAY 8 DECEMBER at 7.45 p.m.
Adagio and Fugue — Mozart
on 5 December at 8.00 p.m. in the Civic Hall!
Piano Concerto No.2 in F minor
— Chopin
Tickets £3.00 to include wine. Leave your name in
Requiem - Faure
the foyer today, or apply as soon as possible to 72
Philharmonic Choir
North Street.
Emanuel Ax, Pianoforte
Fiona Dobie, Soprano
Glyn Davenport, Baritone
WEDNESDAY 5 DECEMBER at 8.00 p.m.
SEASONAL MUSICAL SOIREE
(in aid of the South East Music Trust)
HUGH BEAN, Violin
ELDON FOX, "Cello
JOHN FORSTER, Piano
Tickets £3.00 including wine from 72 North
Street, Guildford
SUNDAY 9 DECEMBER at 7.30 p.m.
University Hall
SURREY
MUSIC
DEPARTMENT
CHAMBER ORCHESTRA
Conductor GRAHAM TREACHER
Debussy — Petite Suite
Stravinsky — Dumbarton Oaks
Schoenberg — Chamber Symphony
Lutoslawski — Venetian Games
£1.00
Bishop-Kovacevich,
No.25 (K503). Other works on the programme are
Stephen Bishop-Kovacevich, Pianoforte
Vernon Handley, Conductor
Admission
visits
pianist, will be performing Mozart’s Piano Concerto
Symphony No.8 in G — Dvorak
(students
available at the door.
Orchestra
consist of works by Schubert, Mozart and Dvorak.
Overture ‘Rosamunde’ — Schubert
OF
Philharmonic
by Shepway District Council). The programme will
Leas Cliff Hall, Folkestone
UNIVERSITY
Guildford
Folkestone on 22nd November (a concert promoted
THURSDAY 22 NOVEMBER at 7.30 p.m.
and
OAPs
50p)
GUILDFORD PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA
Director of Music/Conductor
Vernon Handley
First Violins
John Ludlow
John Allan
Christopher Bearman
Sheila Beckensall
Gordon Buchan
Evelyn Chadwick
Kathleen Hamburger
Jonathan Josephs
Robert Lewcock
Timothy Marchmont
Hazel Mulligan
Martin Pring
Brian Underwood
Second Violins
Nicholas Maxted Jones
Rosemary Roberts
Marie Louise Amberg
Constance Ames
Timothy Callaghan
Ruth Dawson
Andrew Laing
Avril MacLennan
David Richmond
Adrienne Sturdy
Derek Waring
Violas
John Meek
Levine Andrade
Jean Burt
William Hallett
John Harries
Alison Hunka
Linda Court
Louisa Koziol
Cellos
Philip Brothers
Geoffrey Thomas
John Stilwell
Pauline Sadgrove
Christina Macrae
John Hursey
Sally Lucy Howard
Basses
Kevin Rundell
Paul Cullington
Randall Shannon
Jeremy Gordon
Michael Fagg
Dugald Lees
Flutes
Henry Messent
Catharine Hill
Susan Lloyd
Piccolo
Celia Chambers
Oboes
Roger Winfield
Gareth Hulse
Cor Anglais
Helen McQueen
Clarinets
Roger Fallows
Victor Slaymark
E flat Clarinet
Wilfred Goddard
Bass Clarinet
Gordon Lewin
Bassoons
Nicholas Hunka
Anna Meadows
Wendy Robinson
Contra Bassoon
Nicholas Reader
Horns
Peter Clack
Dennis Scard
Valerie Smith
Anthony Gray
George Woodcock
Duncan Hollowood
Trumpets
Michael Hinton
Nicholas Bomford
Colin Clague
Barbara Snell
Trombones
Ian White
David Whitson
Bass Trombone
Ronald Bryans
Tuba
Stephen Wick
Timpani
Roger Blair
David Stirling
John Donaldson
Percussion
Piano
David Stirling
John Forster
John Donaldson
Stephen Lees
Boyd Gilmour
Peter Greenham
Harps
Concerts Manager
Kathleen Atkins
Thelma Owen
Helen Tunstall
The audience may be interested to know that the
violin sections are listed in alphabetical order after
the first desk because a system of rotation of desks is
adopted in this orchestra so that all players have the
opportunity of playing in all positions in the section.