Three points. Firstly, for one of the finest of the British émigré
composers, Mátyás Seiber is sadly under-represented on CD. At present there seems to be four (five if we
include the present disc) recordings entirely devoted to his music. This gives
a moderately representative selection of his chamber music including the three
String Quartets, some songs and a number of a cappella pieces. A handful of his orchestral works have been
issued including the Notturno for horn and strings, the Concertino for clarinet
and string orchestra and the Besardo Suite No.2, also for string orchestra as
part of compilations. It leaves a large amount of his catalogue missing from
the recording studio, including ballets, film music and most of the
jazz-inspired music. Secondly, the Mátyás Seiber Trust has produced a fine website
that gives a good biography of the composer, a complete list of his music, a
discography and much more. I do not need to replicate any of this: however a
thumbnail sketch of the composer may be of interest for those who have not come
across Seiber before. Thirdly, any reviewer of this current CD is largely absolved
from any detailed discussion of the Joyce works by the comprehensive essay
on MusicWeb International by Alan Gibbs.
This needs to be read by anyone with more than a passing interest in
these great works.
When Howard Hartog edited his European Music in the Twentieth Century
(Penguin Books, 1957) Hugh Wood was able to state that Seiber’s ‘best known
works’ were the present cantata Ulysses
and the third string quartet ‘Quartetto Lirico’ (1951). Other ‘notable’ pieces
were the Elegy and the ‘powerful’ Concert Piece for violin and piano. If concertgoers were asked about Seiber’s
music nowadays, I guess that the questioner would draw a blank. He seems to
have largely disappeared from view. One possible exception to this is the ever
popular Three Hungarian Folksongs. This is where I was introduced to Seiber’s
music: they featured in a concert of the now defunct Stepps and District Choral
Society under their musical director, the Rev. Fred. Muir. Shortly after this performance, I discovered
the old Decca recording (SXL2232) of the present Elegy and the Three Fragments
which had been released in 1960. The two Seiber pieces were coupled with
Humphrey Searle’s fine Symphony No.1 played by the London Symphony Orchestra
conducted by Sir Adrian Boult. I do not think I was impressed: how times
change!
Mátyás Seiber was born in
Budapest on 4 May 1905. He studied with fellow-Hungarian Zoltan Kodaly at that
city’s Academy between 1919 and 1924.
His musical achievements included playing in the orchestra of a trans-Atlantic
liner and time in Russia as a musical correspondent. In 1928 he taught at the
newly-created jazz class at the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt. During this period he played in the Lenzewski
Quartet and was musical director in various theatres. In 1935 he immigrated to England where he was
engaged in a number of jobs, including working in a publishing house, teaching
at Morley College and founding the Dorian Singers. From the end of the Second World War he
concentrated on composing, teaching and conducting. Seiber was killed in a
motor-car accident near Johannesburg on 25 September 1960.
As a composer, Mátyás Seiber
engaged with a number of musical styles including jazz, Bartok and twelve-tone
techniques. His catalogue of work is wide-ranging and includes an opera, three
string quartets, a variety of concerted works and many songs and folk-song
arrangements.
Hugh Wood, in the liner notes,
explains that James Joyce’s great novel Ulysses
made a huge impact on Seiber in the years before he considered using the text
for a musical setting. The composer had
‘a deep insight into every level of meaning it (Ulysses) possessed.’ He
became aware of the ‘peculiar affinities with music’ that the novel seemed to present.
The cantata Ulysses which
was composed in 1947 is a considerable and impressive work by any account. It
is scored for a large orchestra, tenor solo and chorus. Its duration is more
than three quarters of an hour. In fact, Wood has suggested that it could be
well be categorised as a ‘Choral Symphony’ in five movements rather than a
cantata. It was premiered at the Central Hall Westminster on 27 May 1949.
The sleeve notes give a detailed exposition of Ulysses musical progress; however it is important to note that the
cantata makes use of the ‘Ithaca’ section of Joyce’s book. This is composed of
a ‘catechism’ of 309 questions and answers. It was apparently the author’s
favourite section of the book. Seiber
has chosen metaphysical questions rather that majoring on some of the more
pedestrian issues. The tenor solo (Alexander Young) is charged with raising five interrogations
which are subsequently responded to by the chorus. These are 1. The Heaventree,
2. Meditations of Evolution increasingly vaster, 3. Obverse meditations of
Involution, 4. Nocturne Intermezzo and 5.
Epilogue.
In a 1970 article in the Musical Times, Hugh Wood wrote, ‘the
basic reason for the quality of this score is the successful fusion of
disparate elements: the style is impure, that is, it is diverse and enriched
from many sources.’ Holst, Bartok and Schoenberg are suggested as possible
aesthetic markers. I felt this disparity of styles became largely unnoticed
whilst listening to the cantata and it certainly did not trouble me. I think
that two things can be adduced here. Firstly, Seiber has a perfect
understanding of word-setting which couples text and music together in a
satisfying unity. And, secondly, he has full control of the formal development
of the work – from the opening to the closing low note, the cantata works its
magic. The various elements seem perfectly natural in their setting and never
give the impression of ‘cut and paste.’
The Elegy for viola and small
orchestra was composed in 1953 and had been commissioned by the Donaueschingen
Festival in Germany. It received its premiere there under the auspices of Hans
Rosbaud conducting the Southwest German Radio Orchestra. The viola soloist was
Ulrich Koch.
This is a striking, but often
introverted, work that explores a range of moods in its short compass. Hugh
Wood mentions some of the Elegy’s diversity including fanfares of muted
trumpets, rich string chords and a largely rhapsodic feel to much of the its
progress. The scoring and the structure of the Elegy are much simpler than the two
cantatas, yet the composer has imbued it with depth and considerable
imagination. It is not a serial work, but inhabits a world of typically gentle
dissonance. The Gramophone review of
the 1960 LP noted that the solo viola sounded a little distant, and suggested
it may be that the soloist Cecil Aronowitz may not have had the ‘knack of
seizing the limelight.’ Any problems of balance appear to have been sorted out
on this re-release. Aronowitz gives a fine and thoughtful presentation. Unfortunately,
there is no other recording to compare it to. The London Philharmonic Orchestra
is conducted by the composer.
I was bowled over (42 years
late!) by the Three Fragments from A
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. The work was a commission from the
Swiss section of the International Society of Contemporary Music and was
subsequently premiered in Basel during November 1958. Seiber has used a wordless chorus with the text presented by
speaker rather than a singer: Peter
Pears gives a stunning and often moving performance here. There is an element of ‘sprechgesang’ with
the ‘relative pitches’ of the words notated in the score. The accompaniment is
by small ensemble including flute, clarinet, bass clarinet, violin, viola,
cello, piano and percussion.
The three sections of A Portrait that Seiber chose were when
Stephen Dedalus finds inner-piece watching clouds floating across the sky, the
‘nightmarish’ sermon given by Father Arnall and finally the authors ‘rapturous
sleep on the beach after admiring a young girl bathing her legs in the water.’
Although this is a 12-tone piece,
I believe that Seiber’s serialism lies lightly on the work’s soundscape and
development. There is some pointillism associated with Webern, but nothing that
detracts from the Three Fragments approachability. It is true that Seiber’s ultimately romantic
style and his strong sense of lyricism makes his serialism a pleasure to listen
to.
This CD is a masterpiece from the
first bar to the last. Three of Mátyás Seiber finest works are presented here.
Although the recording of the Elegy and the Three
Fragments was made in 1960 and Ulysses
derives from a 1972 BBC broadcast, the passing of years has not flawed the
recordings. The liner notes by Hugh Wood, Alan Gibbs and Paul Conway are superb
in their detail. The texts of Ulysses
and the Three Fragments are included.
These three works are so
important for the understanding of one particular trajectory of serialism and
post-war music. It is unbelievable that it has taken until 2015 for Ulysses to be generally available on
record or CD. The other two works have been deleted for a generation. It seems to me that they should be taken up
as repertoire pieces as soon as possible. For one thing, there is always a
dearth of concerted works for viola. Finally, it would be ideal if record companies
and concert promoters could feature more music from Mátyás Seiber’s catalogue. Do
we really need yet another recording of The
Lark Ascending or Elgar’s Cello Concerto? Mátyás Seiber has only been
played at the Promenade Concerts twice (Tre Pezzi (1959) and the Notturno
(1955)).
Based on the magnificent quality
of the works on this present CD this is a musical scandal.
Track Lisiting:
Matyas Seiber (1905-60)
Matyas Seiber (1905-60)
Ulysses: Cantata
for Tenor Solo, chorus and orchestra (1947)
Elegy for solo viola and small orchestra (1954)
Three Fragments from A
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1957)
Alexander Young (tenor) London Symphony Orchestra & BBC
Chorus/David Atherton, (Ulysses)
Cecil Aronowitz (viola) London Philharmonic Orchestra/Mátyás
Seiber (Elegy)
Peter Pears (narrator) Dorian Singers & Melos
Ensemble/Mátyás Seiber (Three Fragments)
Rec. BBC Archive Performance, broadcast 21 May 1972
(Ulysses) Elegy & Three Fragments
originally released on Decca SXL2232 (1960)
With thanks to MusicWeb International where this
review was first published.
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