British Prom Premieres Revisited 1970 Part 4

Georg Frederic Handel: Messiah

Elisabeth Lutyens: Essence of our Happiness (BBC Commission)

Anthony Milner: Roman Spring

Henry Purcell: Ode on St Cecilia’s Day (1692)

It seems almost unbelievable that Prommers had to wait some 75 years before they heard a performance of the complete Handel’s Messiah. On Sunday 2 August 1970, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Singers were conducted by Colin Davis. Soloists included Sheila Armstrong (soprano), Robert Tear (tenor) and John Shirley-Quirk (baritone). It would subsequently be performed five more times at the Proms. The most recent (I understand) being on 6 September 2009. Over the years there have been countless extracts of this iconic work heard at this Festival. There are many performances of Handel’s Messiah given each year in the United Kingdom. Currently, some 95 recordings of the entire work available. My personal favourite is King’s College, Cambridge and the St Martin-in-the-Field’s Orchestra conducted by David Willcocks and released in 1972. Many listeners still swear by the remarkable, but dated, Huddersfield Choral Society version conducted Sir Malcolm Sargent made in the 1950s.

Equally remarkable was the Proms Premiere of Henry Purcell’s great Ode on St Cecilia’s Day, Z328, ‘Hail Bright Cecilia.’ This was featured in the second half of the Wednesday 5 August 1970 concert. Before the interval Handel’s Music for the Royal Fireworks and Michael Tippett’s Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli was heard. The English Chamber Orchestra was conducted by Raymond Leppard (for Purcell and Handel).  This was the final, and possibly the best of Purcell’s four Odes to St Cecilia. The work was written during 1692 for the Saint’s Feast Day setting a text by the Irish Anglican Divine and poet, Nicholas Brady. The entire work, lasting for nearly an hour, is replete with stately choruses, engaging solos, duets, and trios, as well as well-wrought instrumental interludes. The Archiv CD catalogue lists 14 recordings of this work now available.

Elisabeth Lutyens’s Essence of our Happiness op.69 has hardly fared well. This work was a BBC Commission. Written for tenor, mixed chorus, and orchestra, it is a setting of texts by Abū Yazīd, John Donne and Arthur Rimbaud. It was composed in 1968, two years before its premiere on Tuesday 8 September 1970. Richard Lewis was the tenor soloist, and the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus were conducted by Norman del Mar.

The work’s title is derived from Donne’s ‘Devotion XIV’ which, in abridged form, is set in the cantata’s long central movement. 

It is interesting that Colin Mason (Daily Telegraph, 9 September 1970) has declared that this ‘large scale work [is composed] in what is probably the simplest and most accessible style [Lutyens] has yet attempted.’

Max Harrison (Musical Times, November 1970) writes: ‘…The ejaculatory expressiveness of Elisabeth Lutyens's Essence of our Happiness at first hearing appears fragmented by the strong cumulative inner tensions which shape the music. But sometimes a curiously acid gaiety, severe yet obliquely suggesting optimism, is achieved. The work is a cycle for tenor, chorus, and orchestra of three mystical texts dealing with time, each complemented by a dance-like orchestral movement.  Originality of content is matched by consistently inventive writing for voices and instruments, so that one's ear is delighted by fresh sounds and shapes as well as by new meaning. The performance, by Richard Lewis with the BBC SO and Chorus under Norman Del Mar, was poised and readily communicative; this work seems likely to prove the most durable of this year's Prom commissions.’

This was the one and only Promenade Concert performance of this work. Unfortunately, there is no recording currently available, either on record or download. Max Harrison’s prediction about durability has proved wrong.

Anthony Milner’s Cantata Roman Spring, op.29 is a remarkable ‘sing’ by any account. The work was composed in 1969 and is written for soprano and tenor solo, chorus, and orchestra. It was a setting of words by the great Latin poets Catullus and Horace.  Roman Spring is a celebration of Spring and a call to lovers to make the most of it. The work was premiered at the Queen Elizbeth Hall during October 1969. 

The composer has described this work as ‘pantonal’, in other words ‘shifting freely among many or all keys.’ This is not atonal music as such: Milner has not totally abandoned the sense of ‘key’ and ‘there are many focal points’ such as ‘chords, single notes, motifs, which act as centres or gravity’ but only in one or two places is ‘there anything that momentarily establishes a sense of key.’ All that said, Roman Spring is approachable and straightforward to enjoy.

Fellow composer Lennox Berkeley writing the BBC’s house magazine, The Listener (23 October 1969) reported that this ‘was music of real distinction’ and the reviewer was ‘particularly struck by the subtle and evocative use of the orchestra.’ Berkeley concluded by suggesting that the ‘vocal writing was restrained but telling in the earlier movements, more forthright in the third, matching thereby the uninhibited mood of the poem.’

The Proms Premiere was given on Monday 17 August 1970. Other works included Benjamin Britten’s Les Illuminations, Mozart’s Piano Concerto No.15 in B flat major, K 450, and Beethoven’s Symphony No.5 in C minor. The soloists for the Milner were Rhonda Bruce, contralto and Philip Langridge, tenor. The BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus were conducted by Peter Gellhorn (Roman Spring).  Colin Davis conducted the other works. Anthony Milner’s Roman Spring was released on LP on Decca SXL 6699 in 1975. The singers were Felicity Palmer, soprano and Robert Tear, tenor. The London Sinfonietta was conducted by David Atherton. It has subsequently been re-released on Lyrita SRCD 267.          

To be continued…