British Prom Premieres Revisited 1970 Part 3

William Boyce: Symphony No.5 in D major

Sebastian Forbes: Essay for clarinet and orchestra (BBC Commission)

Roberto Gerhard: Epithalamion, Leo

William Boyce’s Symphony No.5 in D major is an enchanting work. It may well have been played on Classic FM; such is its approachability. It was composed in 1739 and was originally entitled Overture to St Cecilia and destined to be the overture to ‘Part 1’ of the St. Cecilia Ode ‘See fam’d Apollo and the Nine’ setting a text by John Lockman (1698-1771). Lockman was a renowned writer and Secretary of the British Herring Fishery. The ‘Symphony’ was first heard at the Apollo Academy in London during 1739.

The opening movement is a ‘French overture’ with a majestic formal opening complete with trumpets and drums, leading into the then obligatory fugal passage. It is a successful movement. This is complemented by a delightful Gavotte and a vivacious Minuet. There have been several excellent recordings of this work, made over the years including releases by L'Oiseau Lyre, Naxos, Nimbus and Archiv labels.

It was performed at the Promenade Concert on Saturday 8 August 1970.

I was unable to find any recording of Sebastian Forbes’s (b.1941) Essay for clarinet and orchestra. This is one of those works that appears to have sunk without trace. A BBC Commission, it was premiered at a special concert given by the BBC Training Orchestra, conducted by Meredith Davies and Michael Rose. It was an otherwise straight forward programme including Beethoven’s Egmont Overture No.1, Sergei Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No.1 in D flat major (soloist, John Lill) and concluding with Johannes Brahms’s Symphony No. 2 in D major.  A major review by Dominic Gill of Forbes’s Essay was published in the Musical Times (September 1970). Gill writes that this is a ‘short (14-minute), well-bred, mildly academic and thoroughly sure-footed Essay in atonal instrumental design for clarinet and orchestra by the young British composer Sebastian Forbes. It falls very roughly into three sections: simple melodic  decoration over long-held chords on muted strings and woodwind; a violent brass introduction to a central developmental section of growing rhythmic interest and increasing restlessness (as well as some  nice imitative writing for soloist and wind); a final part, in which the impetus spends itself - and communicates a sense of distance, muted colours, sunset outlines, set off by a brief, liquid spark of a tailpiece. A pleasant but fairly stereotyped studentish essay - and something of a disappointment in the context of some earlier, more vigorous and less predictable chamber and choral works by Forbes.’

I looked at Sebastian Forbes’s ‘personal’ website which seems to be in abeyance but could find no further details.

At the same concert (31 August 1970) as the audience was introduced to Harrison Birtwistle’s Verses for ensemble, they heard Roberto Gerhard’s equally complex Leo.  This was the second of his ‘cosmological’ pieces. In 1968, he had composed Libra based on his own star sign. Leo was that of his wife, Leopoldina 'Poldi' Feichtegger Gerhard. It was to be the composer’s last completed work: he died on 5 January 1970, so did not live to hear the work’s Proms Premiere.  Leo was commissioned by the Hopkins Center to commemorate the bicentennial anniversary of Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, USA. It was premiered there on 23 August 1969. The first London performance was at the Queen Elizabeth Hall on 24 November 1969, with David Atherton conducting the London Sinfonietta.

Peter Stadlen, writing in The Daily Telegraph (1 September 1970) summed up this performance well. He wrote, ‘what a marvellously happy end to his life Roberto Gerhard has created with Leo…the last bars of this work, which was to be his last, must be the most delightful he has achieved. Here the Catalan charm and the Viennese argumentativeness that used to vie one with the other in his personality and in his art are found beatifically reconciled’. This gorgeous final tribute to his wife, and a consummate backward glance at his career was preceded by more than 15 minutes of abstract and virtuosic scoring.  As for the ‘programme’ it can be ignored. There is little reference to the zodiacal characteristics of the lion nor to the disposition of the composer’s wife.

The composer wrote, ‘I have always wanted to pay homage to the unshakeable, natural, completely unpretentious self-reliance of the lion and to its terrific fighting power... Leo shows the way I tried to do it.’ (© The Estate of Roberto Gerhard).

At least three recordings of Leo have been issues including David Atherton and the London Sinfonietta on the Headline label, HEAD 11 (1977). This LP included the other two astrological works, Libra and Gemini.

Epithalamion was another important work by Roberto Gerhard which was given its Proms Premiere on Thursday 23 July 1970. Other music heard that night included Beethoven’s Violin Concerto in D major and Charles Ives’s Symphony No.4. The BBC Symphony Orchestra was conducted by Edward Downes.

The work was written during the winter of 1965/66. It takes its title from the well-known wedding ‘Ode’ written by Edmund Spenser. Yet the tenor of the piece is thoughtfulness and not celebration. The entire work is a ‘showpiece for large orchestra with a prominent role for a large percussion section.’  The progress of the work is predicated on dialogue between instrumental groups rather than massive orchestral ‘tuttis’.

Epithalamion had been premiered at Valdagno, Italy in September 1966. It was revised for the Promenade Concert. The score is prefaced by a quotation from Psalm 19: ‘In them hath he set a tabernacle for the sun, which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber.’

Formally, the work has been described as ‘an expansive rondo’ and a ‘cycle of variations in which material and gesture are completely integrated.’

To be continued…