Gustav Holst Rare Orchestral music in Naxos

Gustav Holst (1874-1934) Orchestral Music

Walt Whitman Overture, Op.7, H42 (1899) Symphony in F major, Op.8, H47, ‘The Cotswolds’ (1899-1900) A Winter Idyll, H31 (1897) Japanese Suite, Op.33, H126 (1915)

Indra – Symphonic Poem, Op.13, H66 (1903)

Ulster Orchestra/JoAnn Falleta

NAXOS 8.572914 [65:55]

Many years ago I recall talking to a lady at the Glasgow Promenade Concerts. We had just heard a fine performance of the ubiquitous The Planets.  She suggested to me that it was unfortunate that there was not more music like this in the composer’s catalogue. And I think at that time that she was right. Over the years, many listeners must have approached some of Holst’s more ‘neo-classical’ works such as the Fugal Overture or the Double Concerto or even Egdon Heath and felt a little disappointment that they seemed to be written in a completely different musical language to the best known work. The present CD to a large extent remedies this deficiency. I am not suggesting that these piece are in way ‘better’ than The Planets – however at least some of them provide  the listener with the ‘romance’ and the ‘Wagnerian’ power of the masterpiece that often seem to be missing in the later works.

I have never liked the ‘Walt Whitman’ Overture since first hearing it on the Classico CD (CLASSCD284) with the Munchener Symphoniker conducted by Douglas Bostock. I cannot really put my finger on the problem…

The Overture was composed in 1899: some seven years after the great American poet had died.  Listeners will know that at that time Whitman had been ‘discovered’ by British composers including R.V.W. whose Towards the Unknown Region, and Sea Symphony used texts derived from the poet’s Leaves of Grass. Holst himself would later compose The Mystic Trumpeter and the Dirge to Two Veterans based on Whitman’s poems.

The Overture is fairly and squarely composed in a Germanic style with a huge hat tip to Wagner. It just seems a little overblown for my taste – I think perhaps because it tends to play down the mystical side of the poet’s work.  Yet it is an exciting piece of music that deserves an occasional airing at orchestral concerts.

The ‘Cotswolds’ Symphony was a work that I always wanted to hear. Yet, I fear that I was a little disappointed when I heard it performed on the above-mentioned Classico CD. I think that I felt that it did not quite paint a musical picture of that fair region of England.

Gustav Holst wrote the work on the cusp of the new century – between 1899 and 1900.The work was completed at Skegness in Lincolnshire. At this time the composer was a trombonist in the Carl Rosa Orchestra as well as the Scottish Orchestra. The work was duly performed in 1902 by the ‘enterprising’ Sir Dan Godfrey and the Bournemouth Municipal Orchestra.

The Symphony is written in four stylistically unbalanced movements – and I think that this spoils this work for me.  The opening movement is somewhat rusticated –with lots of allusions (if not direct quotes) to English folk music. It is a ‘march’ that fairly romps along.

The second movement is the deeply moving ‘Elegy’ (In Memoriam William Morris). This is a shadowy, unsmiling work that is funereal in its exposition. It is conceived as a processional march – with a massive climax in the middle section.  I am not a huge fan of Morris’ escapism; however there is nothing of the daydream about this music. I guess that it can be used as a stand-alone piece. Suggestions have been made that this is really the composer’s response to the Boer War, rather than to Morris himself.

The equilibrium of the work is wrenched back to lighter matters with the ‘scherzo’ which balances the ‘will o’ the wisp’ with a little ‘clod-hopping’. It is a good essay in creating all the fun of the ‘fairground’. There are a few moments of a serious nature. Lighter matters this movement may represent, but this is not ‘light music’ in any accepted sense.

The ‘finale’ is a joy to behold. Once again it is a fusion of the world of folk-music and Johannes Brahms. Yet this is a well-written piece of music that Lewis Foreman has suggested has all the trappings of ‘a harvest hymn, a celebration at the end of the country people’s annual cycle.’ All in all it is an interesting work, if somewhat lacking in unity.

A Winter Idyll is a short tone-poem composed in 1897 whilst the composer was studying at the Royal College of Music.  Imogen Holst has noted that her father saw his musical training as running in a trajectory from Mendelssohn, Grieg and Wagner. Certainly there are nods towards ‘Fingal’s Cave’ in this present work. She adds that Stanford’s influence is not too far away from some of the pages in this score.  It is a deliciously romantic work that may or may not suggest the winter scene to the listener. However, it is truly beautiful music that reflects considerable skill and invention on Holst’s behalf. The work was apparently never performed in the composer’s lifetime.

I have always felt that Holst’s Japanese Suite is one of the ‘forgotten gems’ of his opus. In many ways this romantic piece sits well beside The Planets. This work was composed during 1915 when the composer had taken a break from the larger work.

It was composed at the request of a Japanese dancer called Michio Ito who was performing at the Coliseum. He wanted a work based on Japanese melodies.  The story goes that Holst did not know any so, the dancer whistled a selection.

The Japanese Suite has six-movement that consists of four dances preceded by a prelude and an interlude at the suite’s midpoint.  I agree with Michael Kennedy who has suggested that this work does not sound particularly oriental. If I were to characterise the piece I would suggest that it is very definitely a spin-off of The Planets. Both ‘Venus’ and ‘Mercury’ are never too fat away in mood and texture.  Stravinsky is another model – with The Rite of Spring and Petrushka.

It is not known whether the Suite was ever given in its intended form. However, it received its first performance at a Proms Concert on 1 September 1919. 

Holst developed his interest in Indian philosophy at the turn of the twentieth-century. Keith Anderson suggests that is was perhaps through his father’s second wife who was a theosophist. This interest resulted in a number of important works including the well-known songs from the Rig Veda, the operas Savitri and Sita and the present work ‘Indra’, Symphonic Poem, Op 13.

This impressive tone-poem was composed in 1903 and is based on the legend of the Indian god of the heavens, of rain and storm and his conflict with the demon Vritra. Vritra had been brought to life by the Brahman Tvashtri to avenge the death of his son.  The legend relates how the demon was eventually defeated by Indra with the help of Vishnu. The drought that had been caused by Vritra is finally ended –and as the rain falls the people rejoice.

What is most remarkable about this work is the sheer brilliance of the orchestration. Imogen Holst has noted the contrasts between the quieter sections and the more ‘bombastic’ music. It is a score that was certainly ahead of its time – at least in British music. I suggest that it can be listened to without reference to the myth and can be seen as a contrast between cool, impressionistic music and more aggressive passages that are more Wagnerian or perhaps Straussian than the music that Holst would come to write in later years. It is a stunning work that does not deserve its obscurity. On a personal note it is one of my favourite Holst scores.

The sound quality of this disc is excellent- as is expected from Naxos. The Ulster Orchestra under their Principal Conductor JoAnn Falletta give an authoritative account of these scores. I would have liked slightly more detailed liner notes. Lewis Foreman’s for the Classico editions of the ‘Cotswolds’ Symphony are a model of their kind.

All of the works presented here have already been recorded in the past, either on Lyrita under Sir Adrian Boult or David Atherton and on Classico with Douglas Bostock. 

It would be invidious to suggest which recording was ‘better’ than the other. Holst enthusiasts will demand this new CD to sit alongside the earlier releases. It is encouraging that Naxos has chosen to record these relatively rare, but extremely worthy pieces. Furthermore, I can heartily recommend this CD to all those people who long for more of the same of (or at least stylistically analogous to) The Planets.

With thanks to MusicWeb International where this review was first published.

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Gustav Holst: A Research and Information Guide Mary Christison Huismann

To many lovers of classical music Gustav Holst is the composer of just one work- The Planets: to coin a deprecatory phrase used on Classic FM, he is ‘a one hit wonder.’ Alas, even enthusiasts are probably familiar only with a small portion of his massive catalogue of music. In spite of the enormous popularity of his defining masterpiece, the vast majority of music-lovers know comparatively little about his life and work.  Unfortunately, Holst has suffered neglect compared to his peers in both scholarly and ‘popular’ circles.  The preface to Mary Christison Huismann’s Gustav Holst: A Research and Information Guide suggests that this may be because either he did not found a ‘school’ or that he was a poor ‘self-publicist’.  As detailed information about Holst is likely to be well hidden in archives, both paper and digital, a guide is needed to assist with exploration of this material: Huismann’s book is an ideal companion to this search.

This book is not going to be purchased by the average classical music enthusiast: it is written, I believe, for two types of reader: the academic embarking on a major thesis, dissertation or monograph about the composer and his music, and the ‘populariser.’ By this, I mean the critic, the programme note writer or the scribblers of articles for the musical press and web pages. The ‘populariser’ may not have the resources available to someone studying at Harvard or Oxford. Information can be hard to track down: visits to the major libraries can be expensive and are likely to be infrequent. Instant access to Music Index, the RILM Abstracts of Musical Literature or the International Index to Music Periodicals may not be possible. He or she might be working at home or writing their thoughts on a train. What Huismann has achieved is to do much (but not all) of the searching in the archives for the researcher: they can then spend time following the clues rather than finding them. 

The present book is one of a series of ‘Research and Information Guides’ that have been published over the last couple of decades. These include a wide-range of composers and genres. Certainly the British music enthusiast has been well served by the volumes dedicated to Frederick Delius (2009) – also by Huismann, Benjamin Britten (1996), William Byrd (2005), and Edward Elgar (1993). Other publishers have provided similar material – one thinks of the ‘source books’ for John Ireland, Alan Hoddinott and Alan Bush, published by Ashgate Publishing. Then there are the excellent Bio-Bibliography series from Greenwood, which include volumes on Gerald Finzi, Frank Bridge and Alan Rawsthorne. All these volumes feature their own particular formats, which are largely reflected between books in the series. All are essential tools for anyone interested in these particular composers.

While the literature for Gustav Holst is relatively sparse –compared to a Mahler or an Elgar –it is of excellent quality. Anyone wishing to begin serious study of the composer could do worse than start with Michael Short’s Gustav Holst: The Man and His Music OUP 1990. This is currently out of print. In conjunction with this, Imogen Holst’s A Thematic Catalogue of Gustav Holst’s Music, Faber 1974 and Short’s Gustav Holst, 1874-1934: A Centenary Documentation, White Lion Publishers, 1974 are essential. For musical analysis, the reader may turn to Imogen Holst’s The Music of Gustav Holst 1951, revised 1986, or Holst's Music: A Guide by A.E.F Dickinson and Alan Gibbs, 1995. Most of these books have a bibliography and references to material needed for further study. However, the ‘catalogue’ and ‘documentation’ were written more than 35 years ago. In the succeeding years much (but not enough) has been written about Holst in particular and British music in general. This era has seen the advent of the Internet, with all its potential- good and bad. Music is now heard digitally and not on vinyl. Many works by the composer are available to the listener that would have been beyond their wildest dreams more than a third of century ago. The time had come for a major updating of all this information: Huismann’s book has provided wide-ranging bibliographical information about Gustav Holst up to the end of 2009 –with a few later inclusions.

Gustav Holst: A Research and Information Guide is presented in three principal parts. The first section is biographical, the second is the heart of the work and contains the bibliographical material, and the third section is the discography.

The core of the book is preceded by a preface, which sets out the purpose and scope of the book. This is important, as it could be very easy to expect something from the volume that it was not intended to deliver. For example, Huismann states that there are no references to CD or LP liner or sleeve notes, the newspaper reviews are limited to those easily available in ‘reprint or electronic format’ which in practice means The Times, the New York Timesand the Manchester Guardian.

The first section has a mini-biography of Gustav Holst. This is followed by a chronological table marking important events and compositions. Huismann has included a ‘List of Works’ which is based on the above-mentioned Thematic Catalogue. It is presented by genre: - ‘Dramatic works’, ‘Orchestral and band works’ etc. This includes the Opus number where provided, the ‘H’ number, the dates of composition and revision, and finally the reference to the Collected Facsimile Edition where appropriate. I would have rather had a little more discrimination in these lists – for example, ‘Ballets’ and ‘Incidental music’ separated from ‘Operas’ and ‘Concerted works’ from ‘Orchestral’. Included in these entries are the ‘Early Works’ (Horrors), incomplete and fragmentary sketches and finally Holst’s arrangements of other composer’s music.  This is rounded off with an alphabetical listing of works.

The main part of the book, some 168 pages out of 264, is devoted to the bibliographical references. This is ordered in a comprehensive manner and covers virtually every aspect of Holst’s life and works. It is worthwhile noting some of these headings.

Gustav Holst was not a litterateur, but he did write a number of articles for periodicals. Perhaps the most elusive are ‘The Education of a Composer’ published in The Beacon in 1921 and ‘The Mystic, the Philistine and the Artist’ that appeared in The Quest in 1920. Fortunately, this was reprinted in Imogen Holst’s now out-of-print biography of her father. More significantly are the published lectures delivered by the composer to a wide variety of institutions, including Yale University and The Musical Association.  Letters and journals are referenced, although I could not find any location for Holst’s personal diaries. The only allusion is to A Scrap-book for the Holst Birthplace Museum, which contains facsimiles of a number of diary entries.

Other useful source materials noted include listings of archives such the Holst Museum and the Holst Foundation collections. The location of the composer’s holographs is also given. A section on art and photographic images of Holst and his family will be helpful for writers and publishers.

The next major section is devoted to ‘Holst’s Life and Works.’ There is a comprehensive review of biographical sources, including dictionaries and encyclopaedias. This is then followed by the main monographs on the composer’s life. Interestingly, Josef Holbrooke’s chapter in his Contemporary British Composers is not mentioned. Further subdivisions include studies of Holst’s childhood, his death and burial and obituaries.  Family members, friends, colleagues and places associated with the composer all have their sub-sections.

The composer’s career is given considerable coverage, with categories on ‘Holst as Trombonist,’ ‘Holst as Teacher’ ‘Holst as Conductor and finally as a ‘Composer’. An important section is devoted to articles presenting his musical context with citations on ‘Early English Music’, ‘Folk-song’, ‘Literature’, ‘Socialism’ and ‘Orientalism’. There are references to assessments of the composer’s reputation and his music, his compositional style and his working process.

The section of the bibliography devoted to the musical works is divided into two parts.  Firstly, there are ‘Genre Studies’ and ‘Studies of Multiple Works’ which include histories of 20^thcentury music containing sections on Holst, journalism such as Havergal Brian’s and Cobbett’s Cyclopedic Survey of Chamber Music.

The second part presents bibliographical ‘plus’ references for a large number of the composer’s works. For example, the fine First Suite in E flat (H105) has six separate sub-sections – Monographs & Chapters, Articles, Reviews, Dissertations and Thesis, Scores and Videos. The only actual ‘review’ of the Suite cited is found in the September 16 1920 edition of The Times which many people will have on-line’ at their local libraries.  Most of the other articles are contained in dedicated journals such as the Instrumentalist and the Music Educator’s Journal which are probably not on-line but available in University libraries. It was not difficult to find a number of other references to this work in the Musical Times and other magazines and newspapers, but I guess that a subjective decision has to be made somewhere as to what to include, and due to space limitations, omitted. Interestingly both the entries for the ‘scores’ are web-based resources.

However the very next entry in this section is for the relatively minor ‘Part-songs’ (H48): in this instance there are only two references – both in the Musical Times. Therefore, there is a considerable disparity in the citations given for individual pieces.

There is also an imbalance of content for the major works. For example, there is only one reference each for Beni Mora, the Brook Green Suite and the Lyric Movement. The Planets not surprisingly has 66!

I was surprised that there is no bibliographical reference to the delightful Japanese Suite (the Boult recording is noted, however). King Estmere seems to warrant no dedicated citations, apart from the choral score being available on-line at the Petrucci Music Library, even though there were important reviews in The Graphic and the Musical Times.

The bibliography of individual compositions is certainly not as comprehensive as John Dressler’s fine volume on Alan Rawsthorne. When I looked up Rawsthorne’s Concerto for String Orchestra in Dressler’s Bio-bibliography I found some 55 citations. In the present volume, the St Paul’s Suiteearns a mere eight references. To be fair there are another 10 citations to this work in other sections of this book.  

The final part of the book is the discography. It has been ‘designed to pick up from where the comprehensive discography compiled by Eric Hughes leaves off’.  Hughes work was published in Recorded Sound No. 59, July 1975 and is deemed to have listed ‘all known commercial recordings of Holst’s music (plus BBC tapes etc.) from the earliest 78rpm through 1974.  Huismann qualifies her discography by suggesting hers is a ‘selective list’ limited to commercially available discs issued between 1975 and 2009: it does not include performance by school groups, ‘music clinics!’ self-issued recordings and streamed audio. This seems reasonable. However, I do worry about the ‘selective’ bit. Furthermore, it would have been good if it had been possible to include Eric Hughes listings – even as a facsimile. I imagine that it might be quite hard for most people to find a copy. I notice that Google have ‘digitalised’ this publication, but it is only available in ‘snippet view,’ which is worse than useless.  Perhaps the copyright laws prohibited ‘full view’?

The book concludes with a comprehensive index, which is divided into three parts. The first is a listing of all the music, in alphabetical order. The second is a general index of names of authors, editors and subjects. Finally, there is a Keyword Index. I find this extremely helpful as it includes a whole host of relevant entries. Some examples are ‘bitonality’ ‘correspondence’ ‘literary sources’ ‘obituaries’ ‘reminiscences’ and ‘Thaxted.’ It is a good place to begin any study of the composer or his milieu.

The book is expensive: £95 is a lot of money by any standards –although Amazon appears to have knocked a ‘fiver’ off the price. The Kindle edition is just shy of £60.  Yet, the sheer volume of up-to-date information makes this book difficult to ignore if one wishes to engage in any kind of ‘Holst Studies.’ It will become the first point of call for all research in the coming decade or so. However, institutions will retain this as a ‘reference only’ book so barring access to the e-book version, all work will have to be done in the library – unless one invests in a copy of this volume.

The book is well bound, printed with a clear type on ‘environmentally friendly’ paper. It is easy to use with the well-thought-out indices quickly guiding the reader to the relevant citations.  

Finally, (and unfortunately) I was unable to find much in the way of the author’s details, save to say that Mary L. Huismann is the Music Original Cataloger at the University of Minnesota.

I do have one huge concern about this book –and many others like it. More and more references to web-based information are included. I looked up one webpage and it had ‘disappeared’. Fortunately, it was possible to find it on the Internet Archive ‘Wayback Machine’ but not everyone will bother to do this. There seems to be a dichotomy here. As more information – journals, newspapers and scores are digitalised, the source documents are in grave danger of being archived, sold off or even destroyed. Let us hope that in 20 years time most of the excellent webpages mentioned are still accessible. The author does suggest that this element of the book is a ‘snapshot’ in time, however, more and more people will expect the web pages to remain as a permanent record. Academia will eventually have to resolve this issue.

Meanwhile, I will be putting this book to considerable use over the coming years: I guess that other people will find it equally worthwhile. In spite of the price, and the reservations noted above, especially about the citations of reviews, this is an essential tool for all who wish to dig deeper into the life and times and music of Gustav Holst. 

Gustav Holst: A Research and Information Guide Mary Christison Huismann

Routledge Musical Bibliographies

Routledge, hardback 264 pages

IBSN 978-0-415-99525-2

£95.00

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Gustav Holst: The Coming of Christ –another contemporary review

Another review of this superb ‘discovery’ by the English Music Festival and their CD division. This time from the New York Times.  The recording can be bought direct from EM Records. I have given a few notes at the end of the review. 

Canterbury, England May 28. 

The mystery play [1]– that medieval theatrical convention whereby the Church once tried to explain to the unlettered laity the teachings of the Bible and the ritual – was revived today in the nave of Canterbury Cathedral. Three of England’s foremost artists in the fields of poetry, music and stagecraft collaborated to produce a drama which is adaptable to any church which wishes to add colour or beauty to its forms of worship. 

John Masefield wrote the play about the Nativity, and gave it the simple title ‘The Coming of Christ.’ Gustav Holst, composer, whose ‘The Planets’ was played in the last New York musical season [2], wrote the organ, pianoforte and trumpet accompaniments. In his music, combined perhaps with Masefield’s words or others, there is one tune which is a real addition to English hymnology. Charles Ricketts, [3] designer of operatic settings, recently elected member of the Royal Academy, designed the costumes. For the setting there was the cathedral itself, unadorned and impressive

Three thousand persons crowded two performances today and 3,000 more have taken tickets for tomorrow. In today’s audiences were many celebrities of the London theatre and arts worlds, including Bernard Shaw, but most onlookers were humble townsmen and townswomen [4] of Canterbury, many of whose kinfolk collaborated with the authors either in sewing costumes, making properties or helping in the choruses. 

The play, while given without intervals and consuming only and hour and twenty minutes, naturally falls into four episodes. There were only fourteen characters, including one which the British play censors forbids on the London stage. Anima Christi [5], Masefield labels the character, but clad in white robes and wearing a jewelled crown, it appears as that of the living Christ. 

The play opens after the trumpeters’ fanfare, with four angels, The Power, The Sword, The Mercy, The Light, trying to dissuade the Anima Christi from entering man’s form and enduring the suffering they see with prophetic eyes. Anima Christi is resolute. He converses with the spirits of Paul and Peter, coming followers through whom he is confident he can overcome the world. 

‘Pass onward into life, O resolute soul!’ bids one angel then, and a heavenly host appears to sing him on his way. 

Three Kings [Magi], Baltasar, Melchior and Gaspar, appear, escorted by medieval knights:   Baltasar, a warlord, Gaspar, a ruler of commerce and Melchior a leader of science – each conscious of failure unless he can find the King. 

Then there is the scene of three shepherds talking by night on a snowy hillside, and in the lines Masefield gave two of them he and the Dean of Canterbury, the Very Rev. K. A. Bell, [6] encountered outspoken Tory criticism before the play was put on. The two shepherds talked ‘radical propaganda the gospel of discontent’ [7] according to the critics and ought not to be allowed to say such things in a cathedral. ‘What would you have had them talk – foot and mouth disease?’ Masefield snapped back at his critics. The Dean of Canterbury soothed the alarmed conservatives, pointing out that the eldest and wisest of the shepherds rebuked the radicals even to the extent of knocking their heads together in the good old British fashion, and that all three knelt together at last before the manger. 

The final scene is the adoration of the Madonna and Child by the kings and shepherds. 

‘It is the first time a mystery play ever was given in Canterbury Cathedral, though often given in near-by buildings in the middle ages.’ The Dean said. ‘We hope to give others. I look upon mystery plays as a chance to recapture the arts for the service of the church, a chance to offer the gifts of poetry, music, beauty, colour and design, singing and acting, the arts and crafts to worship. Today as well as many centuries ago, mystery plays may present great religious truths to man’s imagination and senses as well as his mind. 

New York Times May 29 1928 [with minor edits]

NOTES

[1] Mystery Plays date from the Middle Ages. They usually represented a biblical subject such as Adam and Eve or Noah and the Ark. The language was the vernacular. The Mystery Plays were originally held in churches, but eventually secular locations were used. The texts were often interpolated with ‘apocryphal and satirical’ elements. The plays were later organised into series or cycles, with the best known being the Chester, the York and the the Wakefield Plays. They had by and large disappeared by the beginning of the seventeenth century. 

[2] The Planets were first performed in the United States on 29 Dec 1921 simultaneously (nearly) in both Chicago and New York.

[3] Charles De Soussy Rickets, R.A. 1866-1931. Ricketts was an illustrator, a book designer, a publisher, a painter, a sculptor, a stage designer, an author, an art critic, an art advisor, and an art collector. He was truly a polymath.

[4] This part of the review does seem a little patronising to the ‘good folk’ of Canterbury. However, I guess that his meaning is clear. It was not just the great and the good and the professional who contributed to the success of the work. 

[5] Anima Christi – literally Soul of Christ. It was forbidden at that time to represent Christ on the stage.

[6] George Kennedy Allen Bell (1883 1958) was an Anglican theologian, Dean of Canterbury, Bishop of Chichester, member of House of Lords and a pioneer of the Ecumenical Movement. He was a man of extraordinary vision, giving his support in 1943 to the pioneering notion of a World Council of Religions that would support the then League of Nations, and unify the world's spiritual traditions around a common set of values. Elected the first moderator of the World Council of Church's Central Committee in 1948, he also served as a President of the WCC from 1954 until his death. During World War II, he placed his own career at risk by condemning the saturation bombing of Germany. He was a strong supporter of the anti-Hitler Confessing Church in Germany, and gave asylum to Jewish and other refugees. Many speculate that he forfeited the Archbishopric of Canterbury for his forthright, but politically unpopular, views on saturation bombing, yet this left him free to walk on the world stage through his leadership within the World Council of Churches. He can properly be considered one of the founders of the ecumenical movement. A man of courage, he did not hesitate to disagree with the prevailing political opinion of his day. (New World Encyclopedia)

[7] It is interesting to see that like today the church had to deal with attacks on its ‘political’ theology and social concerns. One thinks of Gustav Holst’s good friend Conrad Noel, The Red Vicar of Thaxted who flew the Red Flag in his church.

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John Masefield & Gustav Holst: ‘The Coming of Christ’

One of the highlights of British musical endeavour in 2011 has been the recording of Gustav Holst’s incidental music to John Masefield’s play ‘The Coming of Christ’. As the ‘blurb’ for the CD says:-
‘The Coming of Christ, by Gustav Holst, was commissioned in 1927 by the Dean of Canterbury Cathedral, George Bell, as a setting of a text by John Masefield, words and music together forming a Mystery Play reminiscent of medieval religious dramas. Although the work received its première the following year to critical acclaim, it was thereafter abandoned – until its resurrection at The English Music Festival in 2010; and it is here presented in recorded form for the first time’.
I found a review, written by Marion M. Scott, of the first performance at Canterbury Cathedral. The first performance was given on 28 May 1928. As Scott notes the Cathedral choir was supplemented by Holst’s pupils from Morley College and St Paul’s Girls’ School. The work was conducted by the composer. I shall post one or two contemporary reviews of this work over the Christmas Season.

One of the  most important recent artistic events has been the production in Canterbury Cathedral of John Masefield’s new play, ‘The Coming of Christ,’ with music by Gustav Holst.

Holst’s music consists of seven numbers, and has been written with masterly economy of means and maximum effect. For the opening, plainsong is employed. With the coming of the Kings this changes into a folksong idiom. Their procession is accompanied on a grand pianoforte off the scene. As the play is outside time this is not anachronistic, and serves the purpose of differentiating the secular music of the Kings from that of the Heavenly Hosts in which the organ is employed.
With the plainsong and the folksong elements in his score, Holst has interwoven a third, that of the chorale. A very beautiful Mixolydian [1] melody named ‘Hill-Crest’ (from Masefield’s house) [2] appears at intervals, and forms the climax of the whole work in the last scene, when not only the actors but all the audience join in singing the hymn to full instrumental accompaniment – far above- the pealing of the Cathedral bells.  The effect is overwhelming, the more so for the austerity of the earlier numbers. Following it, the Postlude for the solitary trumpeter should be wonderful, but in practice it was an anticlimax.

Yet aesthetically it was only at these points of beginning and end that Holst’s musical design coincided exactly with that of the play. In between the music moved on a steadily ascending plane to the one climax, while the play stood four-square. The difference in design has some advantages, but it induces an ulterior restlessness.
One would like to know the name of the clarion soprano who took the solos in the special choir which Holst brought from London to assist local musicians.
Marion M. Scott The Christian Science Monitor June 23 1928 (with minor edits)
With thanks to Pam Blevins who is currently preparing a volume of Marion Scott’s Musical Criticism

Notes

[1] Mixolydian refers to the modal scale beginning on G of the white notes of the piano. F is not sharpened.
[2] John Masefield at this time lived at Hill-Crest, Boar’s Hill, Oxford.

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Gustav Holst: Festival at Cheltenham 1927

I came across this article whilst browsing in the 1927 Musical Times. It is worth presenting here as a good account of the Holst Festival in Cheltenham in March 1927.

It was a happy thought on the part of Cheltenham music-lovers to arrange a festival performance of the works of its distinguished son, Gustav Holst. Two concerts (with the same programme) were given in Cheltenham Town Hall by the City of Birmingham Orchestra on March 22, and they are entitled to the epithet 'festival,' in that they had received, one cannot say adequate rehearsal, but far more preparation than is usually possible for a single programme in this country.

Mr. Holst, in a short speech during the graceful ceremony which occupied the interval of the afternoon concert, expressed his gratification at this extra rehearsal, and said that what he most appreciated in the honour which his native town was paying him was the blow it dealt at the prevalent fallacies that music was a foreign language and that all composers were dead. A memento of the occasion was presented to him by the Mayor of Cheltenham in the shape of a picture by a local artist, Mr. Harold Cox, of the Cotswold sky showing the planets that were visible on the night when The Planets was first performed. By special dispensation from the Astronomer Royal they were nearly all there together!

Holst's orchestral work divides itself into two quite definite kinds of music which are distinguished by the sources of their inspiration. More than most composers he has gone consciously to other music for a starting-point for his own. Folk-song and Bach are the texts on which he writes his own musical commentary-the early Somerset Rhapsody, the two Songs without Words, and the Fugal Concerto were the examples given of this very personal side of his genius. Of the other class, music that is original in its conception and owes its origin to a wider experience of life than mere music, the ballet music from The Perfect Fool and that great work The Planets were representative. The Oriental influences that may be discovered in his vocal music found no illustrations in this purely orchestral programme.

One-composer concerts are sometimes a weariness. This Holst event was not, and it revealed in a single afternoon more light on the nature of Mr. Holst's musical personality than scores of isolated performances. One aspect has already been noted: Mr. Holst is certainly a composer who throws more light on the baffling problems of inspiration than almost any other. But beside this we could observe his delight in the contrast between a bare unaccompanied tune and a vast web of contrapuntal sound, mark his judgment in the employment of purposeful reiteration and a blunt full stop when enough has been said, and admire his infallible handling now of the simplest essentials, now of the richest detail.

Mr. Holst conducted most of the programme himself, leaving to Dr. Adrian Boult the Ballet Music and the two little Songs without Words. This was perhaps a matter for slight regret, in spite of its obvious appropriateness; for Mr. Holst, though an inspiring choral conductor, rarely sets an orchestra on fire, and at the afternoon concert the performance lacked that touch of electricity which is needed by Holst, perhaps even more than by most composers, to convert brilliant orchestration and peculiar turns of thought and phrase from a comfortable glow into a blazing incandescence of splendour. The evening concert, however, went with greater élan, and showed even more triumphantly the poetry of the smaller works, the greatness of The Planets, and the humanity of them all. F. S. H.

From the 1 May 1927 edition of The Musical Times, with minor edits.

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