The Suite is in four movements: Introduction (Lento) and Fugue (Allegro); Air (Andantino); Scherzo and Epilogue (Lento sostenuto). It had a duration for about 11 minutes.
The manuscript is dated
“Nov:1973-Jan:1974.” It was published in 1974 by J.& W. Chester Ltd. Other music
written around this time included the Guitar Concerto, op.88
The Daily Telegraph (3 June 1974, p.12) gave an excellent complimentary review of the Suite: “The new piece…proved delightfully ingratiating to listen to, if no doubt tricky to play.” The critic considered that “the most immediately memorable movement, Scherzo, contained a trio melody of heartwarming luminosity, and the work opened and closed in a quiet serenity which, together with the flowing spun-out Air stamp the work with the composer’s typically reticent poetry.”
And then the Suite disappears. There is no recording listed on the Lennox Berkeley Website. I was unable to find an assessment of the score. Furthermore, there is no discussion of it in Peter Dickinson’s The Music of Lennox Berkeley (Woodbridge, Boydell Press, 2003) nor in Tony Scotland’s Lennox and Freda (Norwich, Michael Russell, 2010). I was unable to locate any subsequent concert performances or BBC radio broadcasts.
This is clearly a major work by
one of Britain’s senior composers that has simply disappeared. Perhaps it is
time for a revival?
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