Angela Morley: Snowfall

One of the most evocative little pieces of Christmas music I know is Angela Morley’s arrangement of the well-known song ‘Snowfall.’ The melody was composed by Claude Thornhill (1909-65) who was an American pianist, composer, arranger and band leader.

Snowfall was originally written as a piano piece in 1941. It was later arranged as a ‘signature tune for Thornhill’s band and it was first recorded at Liederkrantz Hall in New York City. It can be heard in its ‘original form’ on YouTube. ‘Snowfall’ was covered by dozens of artists including Doris Day, Tony Bennett, Henry Mancini and Manhattan Transfer.

In 1959 Warner Bros. asked Angela Morley to rework a selection of Christmas tunes she had released previously on a 10” Philips LP. Several extra numbers were added. As part of this project, Angela Morley’s arrangement of ‘Snowfall’ was released on the album Happy Holiday: Christmas in High Fidelity (Warner Bros.WS 1341) in 1958.

It is a little confusing when considering any piece by Angela Morley as she changed name and sex in the early ‘seventies’ – until that time she was known as Wally Stott. However, although ‘Snowfall’ was arranged in 1958 it is now assigned to the composer’s latter name. Morley is best known for her scores to the films Watership Down and The Slipper and the Rose. She also wrote music for the Goons and for Hancock’s Half Hour as well as many short pieces of light music. She died in January 2009.

The added magic that Angela Morley has brought to her arrangement of ‘Snowfall’ is all to do with the orchestration. She has created her ‘winter wonderland’ by using a thesaurus of instrumental devices. Icicle-like percussion, slippery woodwind effects, shimmering strings and misty horns and saxophones all lend their colour to this wintery tone poem. It is really a chilly piece, with only a few suggestions of warmth. It is the sort of music that evokes memories of a walk in a snowbound wood with one’s lover, with only the thought of a warm inn and a cheery fire some distance down the road. 

Angela Morley’s arrangement of Snowfall is currently included in The Golden Age of Light Music: Christmas Celebration (GLCD 5185) which also features ‘Christmas Sleigh Bells’ (‘Romance’ and ‘Troika’ from Lieutenant Kije) by Sergei Prokofiev and arranged by Morley. 

Angela Morley’s arrangement of Snowfall can be heard in YouTube. 

Angela Morley: Snowride

Last year I posted about ‘four musical winter journeys': Leroy Anderson’s ‘Sleigh Ride’, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky  ‘Troika’,  Sergei Prokifiev ‘Troika’, from Lieutenant Kije and Fred. Delius’ uncharacteristic ‘Sleigh Ride’. To these can be added Angela Morley’s attractive ‘Snowride.’ This work is included as a part of Naxos’ collection of Christmas music entitled ‘Another Night before Christmas.’ 

Angela Morley’s (1923-2009) Snowride began life as a piece of library music for Chappell’s, which would have been used by film and documentary makers as a suitable background to shots of a leisurely winter journey. As I understand it, the score was lost in the Chappell fire of 1964. However according to the Angela Morley webpages the score was cleverly reconstructed from the original recording.

Snowride opens with a musical representation of jingling bells. Soon a catchy tune begins to establish itself on the horns which will be repeated throughout the work by various instruments. A woodwind figure tries to introduce a Christmas carol-like tune but is soon pushed aside by the main theme.  A sweep of strings suggests that this journey has a romantic interest at its heart – perhaps two lovers are taking a late night journey? The piece is really episodic with lots of little melodies being tossed about many of which never seem to reappear. Percussion plays its part with xylophone and sleigh bells supplying a seasonal mood. The work closes quietly with a cheeky little woodwind phrase.  The pace of this music suggests that there is no particular hurry about this journey: the aim seems to be to enjoy the night air.

Finally I could not resist using the cover of Leroy Anderson’s well-known work as an illustration. It perfectly sums up Morley’s music too.

Angela Morley’s Snowride is available on Naxos 8.572744 with the RTE Concert Orchestra conducted by Gavin Sutherland. 

Angela Morley: Starlight - an impresison for orchestra

I guess that a lot of light music portrays pictures of romantic locations – Las Vegas, New York, Paris and the Mediterranean. However, for many people there nowhere more romantic than London by night. One need only think of taking a taxi cab along Piccadilly on a cold winter’s evening, or perhaps taking a late-night stroll by the gaslights in Green Park. Or maybe it is late-night shopping at Harrods in Knightsbridge before popping into the Dorchester for a Cosmopolitan or a Bellini. And all of these moments somehow seem better if there are stars in the sky. Certainly it will be a rare night in London when the Milky Way is clearly visible, but surely there a many times when the stars and the moon peep out and manage to compete with the electric lamps and light pollution.

Angela Morley has captured all this magic in her evocative piece Starlight. It was written around 1956 when the composer was better known as Wally Stott. All the appropriate effects are used here, the sweeping violins that sound so like Mantovani or Henry Mancini, rich parallel string chords in thirds and sixths, pizzicato and harp arpeggios. Later in the piece a definite light touch of percussion gives an effective counterpoint to the main progress of the strings. Yet the work approaches the end all too soon with a passionate reprise of the string theme. The works last few bars conclude with a great splash of colour.
This is a classic example of the genre and certainly manages to create the image intended. It is impossible to listen to this music and remain oblivious to its mood. Naturally, it is only my conceit that sets it in the West End – it would be equally effective to someone imagining a trip across the Lagoon to the Lido or anchored in the bay off the town of Cannes.
Angela Morley’s Starlight can be heard on The Golden Age of Light Music The 1950s Volume 5 Sunny Side Up Guild GLCD 5142

Angela Morley: Rotten Row – A miniature for orchestra.

I was walking across Park Lane into Hyde Park the other day in the summer sunshine (such as we have had this year) and headed towards the Serpentine. As I passed the bandstand I could see a number of horsemen riding along Rotten Row. Unusually, they were not cavalrymen, but seemed to be members of the public. I wondered where they stabled their horses in Central London?
It is not the place to speculate on the name of this bridleway, save to say that I was always told that is was the Route de Roi – but I shall leave that to the local historians and philologists. As a musician my mind thought of the attractive miniature by Angela Morley, Rotten Row. This is surely one of the most attractive pieces of light music in the repertoire. It is strange that only a single recording of this work is currently available.

It is a little confusing when considering any piece by Angela Morley as she changed name and sex in the early ‘seventies – until that time she was known as Wally Stott. However, although Rotten Row was composed in 1960 it is assigned to the composer’s latter name. Morley is best known for her scores to the films Watership Down and The Slipper and the Rose. She also wrote the music for the Goons and for Hancock’s Half Hour. She died in January of this year.
The piece opens with an upward harp glissando before the main theme establishes itself. This is totally untroubled music that makes you feel good. The clip-clop, the harness bells and jogging-along imagery are maintained throughout most of the piece. However the orchestra passes the theme and its variants between sections – with the horns having a marginally reflective moment. The orchestration is typically delicate and is well varied. The piece ends with a little pizzicato figure and a downward glissando from the harp – taking the miniature a full circle.
Rob Barnett on MusicWeb has described this piece as a “frilly and flouncy piece of pink ‘fifties fluff. It is suggestive of debonair horsey folk taking the air- elegant and superficial.” This seems as little harsh on both the horse-riding fraternity and the music – I do not think that Morley was trying to be particularly profound, pink is not the colour that suggests itself to me and horsey folk are not always superficial!
The reviewer in Gramophone “enjoyed [this piece] clip-clopping along like Leroy Anderson.
I like this piece: it is in same mould as Benjamin Frankel’s Horse and Pair. However, what impressed me most was the subtle orchestration, which is really rather good. And finally, it is a fine impression of an era that has all but disappeared. It is only with a little imagination that I could feel my way back to 1960, far less an earlier period, with the roar of traffic on Park Lane and the mass of the Hilton Hotel behind me and roller-bladers in backward- baseball caps swerving to avoid me on the path.

Angela Morley’s Rotten Row is recorded on White Line CD WHL 2138