bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Sonata Structures in Early Britten
Authors: Evans Peter
Published: February 2010

Until Britten returned from America in 1942 it would have seemed reasonable, despite the sensitivity he had revealed in setting texts as unexpected and heterogeneous as those of Auden, Rimbaud and Michelangelo, to assume that instrumental composition was to form the core of his work. He had first made his mark in the chamber media, though his Opus 1 perhaps also represented as close an approach to the orchestra as was judicious at a time when opportunities of performance did not easily come the way of an unknown young composer. Structurally these first two works, the Sinfonietta and the Phantasy for oboe quartet, demonstrated notably original modifications of the sonata thesis. The first of his own orchestral textures the composer heard were those of the symphonic cycle, Our Hunting Fathers, but the ‘symphonic’ qualities were those which should control, not determine the nature of, material conceived in response to potent verbal stimuli. The Frank Bridge Variations were individually brilliant character pieces and together a virtuoso display of thematic derivation, and Britten's command of such techniques was to prove no less apt in the Diversions for piano (left hand) and orchestra. But meanwhile the Piano Concerto had also drawn characters more effectively than consequences, and the Violin Concerto, though more creatively at odds with traditional sonata procedure in its first movement, had pointedly thrust the greatest expressive burden on to a final variation structure. Only with the Sinfonia da Requiem and the First Quartet did Britten fully recapture the convincing individuality of sonata practice he had shown in his first two scores.
Some Notes on Britten's Church Music
Authors: Dawney Michael
Published: February 2010

Any survey of what Britten has contributed to English music is naturally dominated by his outstanding achievement in opera, on account both of its sheer magnitude and of the ‘pioneering’ element in it. This has slightly drawn attention away from the hardly less remarkable character, importance (and volume) of his output in the field of choral music, where the originality of his contribution, instead of standing out starkly against an almost blank background, is more subtly thrown into relief against, and merged into, a securely established and respectable tradition of composition. Although still apparently ‘flourishing’ when Britten grew up, this tradition was no longer very vital, and part of his achievement is to have renewed and revitalized it so naturally and uniconoclastically that we tend to take its continuance for granted without quite realising how large a part he has played in bringing this about.
Holloway: The Works for Large Orchestra
Authors: Northcott Bayan
Published: February 2010

If one spends months on end in one's formative years listening to The Turn of the Screw and Peter Grimes, mixed up with the Five Orchestral Pieces and Jeux, The Dream of Gerontius and the dances from The Midsummer Marriage, the Four Last Songs, Agon and Le Marteau sans Maitre, curious transformations will take place that won't allow one to lose any of the elements, whatever the vicissitudes of later taste. One gradually recognizes that one is what one assimilates, whether one likes it or not, and so a revulsion from love to hate won't make any difference to the constituents; and that since there is no choice—these accidental conjunctions are here to stay—one had better knuckle down and cultivate one's native soil, with a due sense of one's independence upon it for the sustenance of life.
Dramatic use of Tonality in Peter Grimes
Authors: Payne Anthony
Published: February 2010

Much has been made of the importance of the tritone in the War Requiem. Not only does this interval colour many of the harmonies and melodic contours of the work, it is also an important agent in maintaining its characteristic tonal instability. Interestingly the composer's first large-scale masterpiece for voices and orchestra, Peter Grimes, is if anything even more dependent on tritone relationships, although unlike the Requiem it has few passages which are not either firmly in a key or else moving purposefully towards one. It could be said that whereas this interval provokes uncertainty in the later work, in Grimes it embodies incompatibility, for the opera's dramatic movement is generated by tonal progressions which swing back and forth between two great poles of A and E flat, keys at opposite ends of the tonal spectrum, to symbolise the impossibility of coexistence for Grimes and the Borough.
‘Billy Budd’ on BBC 2
Authors: Payne Anthony
Published: February 2010

Susanne Langer's codification of the process whereby the most strongly defined of two or more simultaneously presented art forms will swallow the others is peculiarly applicable to the problem of filming opera, an art form which itself illustrates her thesis in its transformation of words and drama into musical entities. In a filmed opera the cinematic side of the enterprise should not be a mere substitute for the opera's dramatic as opposed to musical elements, although it becomes so if a stage performance is filmed with entirely fixed cameras. It must in fact treat the opera as an entity and not fall into the trap of expanding or dwelling on the dramatic angle alone. The result of such indulgence would be a distortion which several operatic films in the past have produced. The drama balloons far beyond the composer's balanced creative integration, and swallows the music which then becomes no more than a background score. In the BBC Television film of Billy Budd, the producer Basil Coleman avoided this pitfall with conspicuous success. At the same time, he did not make the mistake of a timid use of the camera which while preserving opera's peculiar relationship between drama and music produces a dull film, but allowed it to be true to its own medium as well as to the music-drama. The setting on board HMS Indomitable would present the obvious attraction of pretty camera work around and about one of the most photogenic subjects in existence. Shots like this however were cut to a minimum, even at such a heaven-sent opportunity as the arrival of the pressed men, when a panoramic view of their approach over the sea would certainly have been justified. However the music renders all this sort of thing unnecessary. The sea, for instance, is never glimpsed in the film because in a sense it is always there in the music, or all that is needed of it. A shot of the boat load arriving from the Rights of Man would have usurped the function of the music at one of its most magical moments—Billy's bright fanfares on the wind, salt and clear as the sea air above, over an uneasy fade-out of the hauling song.
Letter from Prague
Authors: Cross Joan
Published: February 2010

In Prague, during August, I was taken to a performance given by young Russian dancers graduated from the Moscow and Leningrad Ballet Schools. They were all soloists, and the programme was made up of short divertissements from ballets in nearly every instance quite unfamiliar to me. I am no expert on ballet, though I have watched it often enough, but the veriest ignoramus would have recognised their great technical achievement and the unusual quality of their energy and enthusiasm.
Prokofieff's Orchestral Works
Authors: Swarsenski Hans
Published: February 2010

The proverbial stir which the first appearances of Prokofieff's works caused in the concert halls of Russia will never be quite forgotten. He was something like a square peg in a round hole, and as far as squareness goes, he was very square indeed—square rhythms, square forms and straightforward artistic aspirations—these at least were the features by which those few who understood him then, were most struck. The fact that there were still other aspects to his music was only realized later. At that time many æsthetic theories were being discussed and followed by the artistic and pseudo-artistic circles in which he moved. A pupil of Rimsky-Korsakoff, Liadov and Vitol and, although an admirer of their works, unconvinced by their theories, he was more open to influences not much appreciated by the academic set and was eager to embark on experiments in several directions. More clearly than in the orchestral works with which I am here concerned, this can be perceived in his early operas. Were it not for the strength of his personality—a personality as forceful then as it is today—much inconsequence of style might have been the result. It is his musicianship which has prevented him from following the same path as, for instance, Shostakovich, who, for as long as he was allowed to, remained an experimentalist and then went the well-trodden way of conventionalism. In Prokofieff's case, however, discrepancies which will come to light under close examination are smoothed over by a homogeneous style and by great technical skill.
The Later Operatic Works of Richard Strauss
Authors: Erhardt Otto
Published: February 2010

Almost exactly 350 years have passed since the invention of that marriage-of-the-arts which we call Opera. How frequently during this time has its impending collapse been prophesied; how often has it been pronounced dead! Yet again and again, like a woman who never ages, it has rejuvenated itself, kept alive, assumed a different shape, changed, its face and appeared in some new guise. And today once more, after a long period of stagnation, we find ourselves in the presence of a regeneration of the musical theatre with new goals and new tendencies both as regards creation and presentation.
The Inflence of Peasant Music on Modern Music
Authors: Bartók Béla
Published: February 2010

At the beginning of the twentieth century there was a turning point in the history of modern music.

The excesses of the romanticists began to be unbearable for many. There were composers who felt: “this road does not lead us anywhere; there is no other solution but a complete break with the nineteenth century.”

Invaluable help was given to this change (or let us rather call it rejuvenation) by a kind of peasant music unknown up till then.
Musical Life in Germany Since the War
Authors: Harth Walther
Published: February 2010

The outstanding characteristic of German musical life has always been its ubiquity. Another feature was the existence of music centres in which local activities were enhanced by the regular participation of world famous artists as guests. In the first rank of these centres was Berlin, with its three opera houses and six large symphony orchestras, with many fine concert halls and often three or four recitals on the same evening. In addition, the capitals of almost all the Federal German States, and some of the medium-sized provincial towns as well, could offer a standard of musical activity far higher than that of most provincial centres in other European countries. The Munich and Dresden Operas were world renowned; the orchestras of Hamburg, Leipzig, Cologne and Frankfort (to name only some of the most important) were of a high calibre. But in its entirety, German musical life embraced an untold number of symphony and opera orchestras in towns which were otherwise quite insignificant, and drew a wide circle of visitors to the opera and concert performances of Municipal Theatres and local choral and orchestral societies. Here the standard of achievement, compared with the international top level, was naturally not very high. But in educating the general public, in encouraging new recruits to Music, these smaller places performed a cultural task of the greatest importance. Germany was the country with most orchestras and most opera stages.
An Approach to the Russian Art-Song
Authors: Slobodskaya Oda
Published: February 2010

Of all the forms of Russian music it is perhaps in the Art-Song that we find the most comprehensive picture of this diverse and colourful people. The fact that Russia is not a country, but a continent, comprising many different races, tongues, customs and traditions accounts as much as any other single factor for the rich variety of their folklore. But in all this diversity there was one unifying factor: the vast illiterate masses were bound together by centuries of oppression; suffering and poverty were their common lot, their normal, accepted condition. Forced by the monotony of their miserable existence to find an outlet for their emotions, they found expression for their rich phantasy and alleviation of their frustration in Song and Dance. This produced a wealth of folklore, varied in rhythm and colour, which came to life a little more than a hundred years ago when Glinka discovered the treasures of this folklore and made use of them in his operas A Life for the Tsar and Russian and Ludmilla.
Carlisle Floyd's “Susannah”
Authors: Eyer Ronald
Published: February 2010

On September 27, 1956, a new and most promising creative talent was brought to national attention with the production by the New York City Opera Company of Carlisle Floyd's two-act musical drama, Susannah. Up to that night, Carlisle Floyd was almost as little-known in his native America as in Europe, and the following day the press, including the musical press, had to scurry around to his hotel to find out something about him.
A Slip of Mozart's: its Analytic Significance
Authors: Keller Hans
Published: February 2010

My method of musical analysis, which aims at nothing more obscure than showing the unity of contrasting themes, has received a certain amount of unwelcome journalistic publicity, and I am reminded that I must find a name for it before my critics do. Rudolph Reti, the respected author of The Thematic Process in Music (New York, 1951) which has had a stimulating influence on the development of my method, has suggested “Process-analysis” for what our respective analytical approaches have in common, but apart from the fact that their differences are as striking as their similarities, the term would not seem to convey a great deal, at any rate on this side of the Atlantic.
Chamber Cantatas: The Mastery of Alessandro Scarlatti
Authors: Edmunds John
Published: February 2010

Some fifty years ago E. J. Dent, the first and greatest scholar of Alessandro Scarlatti's music, wrote “His (Scarlatti's) best pupil, we may safely say, is Mozart.” The year of honouring Mozart seemed to me an appropriate time to honour also his ‘master’, whose music has been neglected—to our great loss—since the time of Dr. Burney at least. For, as Dent continues, “Almost all those characteristics of style that we are accustomed loosely to consider as essentially Mozartian, were learned by Mozart from the Italians of the preceding half century. Indeed, Mozart to some extent repeated the work of Scarlatti, uniting in himself the massive strength of Leo, the sweetness of Durante and Pergolesi, the swift energy of Vinci and the racy humour of Logroscino, together with that divine beauty of melody which belonged to Scarlatti alone.”
English and Russian Ballet: Echoes of a Controversy
Authors: Shaffer Peter
Published: February 2010

A pair of broadcasts on the Bolshoi Ballet given at the end of last year by James Monahan and Arnold Haskell served to crystallise much that has been said by many enthusiasts about the relative modernity of the Russian and British ballet companies. The controversy flared up on the first night of Romeo and Juliet and has not died yet. Its lines are now familiar: some blamed the Russians for presenting poster art; others praised them for doing just that, and thereby entertaining the simple-minded but enthusiastic hordes of people who nightly come to see them at the Bolshoi theatre. On the English side some have rejoiced in our greater complexity of idea, subtlety of approach, and dedication to pure dancing, whilst others have been moved to attack our ballet as being over sophisticated—the just deserts of an essentially inbred and decadent public.
Finnish National Opera
Authors: Bourke Gerard
Published: February 2010

The Finnish National Opera at Helsinki is now approaching the end of its first season as a National opera, having been reorganised with increased government support. Plans are also being made for building a new opera house close to the Olympic Stadium, but meanwhile performances are given four times a week, including ballet evenings, at the old Helsinki opera house built in 1879 as a model of the Maryinsky Theatre in Leningrad, and once used as a Russian garrison theatre.
Berg and Schoenberg
Authors: Stein Erwin
Published: February 2010

Biographies should be read with discretion. The portraits which they are meant to present are far too often created in the writer's own image. The tales they tell are usually lopsided and lack that depth of perspective which shows the whole of a character, with its contradictory features and its facets of changing inclinations and opinions. I for one prefer first-hand information, such as is contained in autobiographies—even if some of their facts should prove to be fiction, the way of telling them mirrors the author. In a sense, all creative artists are autobiographers. Composers, in particular, cannot help revealing themselves in their works. Schoenberg claimed that he, being a teacher of composition, had a rare opportunity of getting to know his students: the music they wrote disclosed not only their gifts, but also their characters.
Guide to Contemporary Hungarian Composers: (I) The Early Decades of the Twentieth Century
Authors: Weissmann John S.
Published: February 2010

Anybody who decides to inquire into the features and development of contemporary Hungarian music is obliged to take Bartók and Kodály as points of departure. And by so doing one is not merely advancing from the familiar to the unknown. Admittedly in “foreign” eyes they, and they alone, represent the music of their native country. But at the same time they have provided the greatest stimulus to, and exerted the strongest influence on, practically all who have followed them. To these Bartók and Kodály were the archetypes of music, uniting progress and tradition, genuinely and characteristically Magyar elements and general, European standards of achievement. They appeared to complement one another in the nature of their art and personality. Significantly, they are often described by Hungarian commentators as Castor and Pollux, the twin gods of the nation's music. They have much in common: both were dissatisfied with the state of music as they found it within the confines of their native land and in Europe in general. But in addition to the need of speaking a new language, there was also the need of speaking a new, genuinely Hungarian language as well: both turned to the surviving musical traditions of the community as a regenerating source of inspiration.
Some Reflections on “A Tale of Two Cities”
Authors: Klein John W.
Published: February 2010

Ruggiero Leoncavallo tells us that his most successful opera I Pagliacci was accepted by the publisher Sonzogno after he had read only the libretto. Perhaps this was not so hasty and ill-considered a decision as, at first sight, it may appear, for a “book” as unfailingly effective as that of I Pagliacci is almost fool-proof; besides, a really dramatic libretto is a tremendous incentive to an imaginative composer. Triumphantly Bizet emerges from the slightly sentimental romanticism of his early operas the moment he receives Daudet's moving Arlésienne and, shortly afterwards, the spectacular libretto of Carmen. Moreover, we have only to note how Verdi's powers soared when, in his extreme old age, they were stimulated by Boito, a librettist at last worthy of his great collaborator's genius.
Knowing Things Backwards
Authors: Keller Hans
Published: February 2010

It follows that. Folgerung. That doesn't follow. Non sequitur. Wherever we look, logical consistency or inconsistency is expressed metaphorically in terms of time. So elementally do we link “after” and “because” that the most common fallacy, by which historians make a living, is post hoc ergo propter hoc: “thereafter, hence because of it.” Conversely, we should say that propter hoc ergo post hoc must inevitably be valid: “because of it, hence thereafter.” There is, however, one respect in which this need not be held to be true—the teleological. Causa finalis, the ultimate purpose, lies inevitably in the future, as indeed does every purpose. Tomorrow's concert causes today's rehearsal. True, your reason for rehearsing necessarily precedes your rehearsal, but the cause of your reason may be said to lie in the future inasmuch as the future is foreseeable. In this sense, then, propter hoc ergo post hoc can be fallacious too. Tomorrow you have a concert. It doesn't follow that you want a rehearsal today; it precedes.
The Juniors of the Royal Ballet at Covent Garden
Authors: Monahan James
Published: February 2010

‘The Royal Ballet, formerly the Sadler's Wells Theatre Ballet,’ is a mouthful of nomenclature. With the virtual unification, recently announced, of the two component companies of the Royal Ballet, this long-winded title may be expected to pass, unregretted, out of use. Be that as it may, it is the junior company of the Royal Ballet which this title has denoted in these past months and it was, of course, these juniors who—in the transatlantic absence of their seniors—came, about Christmas time, briefly to Covent Garden; it was their first visit and it was adventurous, important (as a signpost to the future) and successful.
Arnold van Wyk: Recently Published Works
Authors: Ferguson Howard
Published: February 2010

Three recently published works by Arnold van Wyk draw renewed attention to this most individual and accomplished South African composer. They are his 1st String Quartet (miniature score and parts), the Pastorale e Capriccio for piano solo, and an important cycle of five songs for voice and piano, Van Liefde en Verlatenheid (Of Love and Forsakenness). All three works were performed during the 1957 series of Wigmore Hall concerts devoted to South African music; and the song cycle was given at the I.S.C.M. Festival in Israel in 1954.
Britten's New Opera for Children: “Noye's Fludde”
Authors: Stein Erwin
Published: February 2010

Britten's setting of the Chester Miracle Play is an opera for children of any age, but teenagers prevail among its performers, in the orchestra pit as well as on the stage—numerically at least. God's voice, which directs the stage events, is represented by a speaker. Noah, the principal part, is a bass, of course. His wife is a contralto; and she appears as a quarrelsome, comic figure who brings some controversy into a play that otherwise offers little opportunity for dramatic conflict. But the bulk of the cast consists of children: Noah's sons Sem, Ham and Japhet, who have important parts to play; their wives, who help to build the ark; then there is a group of girls from condemned mankind, who are Mrs. Noah's gossips; and finally, there is a big chorus of quadrupeds and birds which Noah is called upon to save.
The Interpretation of Picturesque Elements in Wolf's Songs
Authors: Hamburger Paul
Published: February 2010

An opera singer, except on those rare occasions when he relates the speech of others, maintains the identity of the character in which he is cast. The performer of epical and lyrical music, on the other hand, i.e., the oratorio and Lieder singer, can be a protagonist, i.e., claim his identity with the “acting subject”, only when and as long as the poet and composer demand it. One can almost recognise a good Evangelist by the way he sings the colon after the words “and he said unto them”. But apart from the singer's awareness of direct and indirect speech—a condensation, as it were, of dramatic explicitness into epical stylization—he has to come to terms with the world of inanimate objects, or rather their sensuous perception by poet and composer, that crowds the pages of concerted vocal music. One would think that a bird-call, heard or recollected by the poet, would find its exact, that is, stylistically truthful, representation in the poem; would be taken over and transplanted into the medium of sound by the composer without loss or change of meaning, and would, furthermore, find its exact equivalent when related by the acting subject. That this is at best an over-schematic view of things forms the glory of lyrical music and the despair of its interpreters.
Creative Trends in Latin American Music-II
Authors: Chase Gilbert
Published: February 2010

Leaving the continent of South America we come to Panamá and the five Central American Republics. In Panamá we find a composer whose star is rapidly rising, Roque Cordero (b. 1917), previously mentioned as one of the prize-winners of the Caracas Festival. Cordero studied with Ernst Křenek in the United States on a Guggenheim Fellowship and became addicted to twelve-note writing, which, however, he employs freely rather than dogmatically. Like so many others, he began along the path of folkloristic nationalism with a Capricho Interiorano (1939) for orchestra, based on the mejorana, a typical Panamanian dance; continuing with the Panamanian Overture No. II, and the ballet Setetule, on themes of the Cuna Indians of Panamá. But his main trend has been towards subjective expression in symphonic form, initiated with his Symphony I (1945) and reaching its culmination to date in his Symphony II (in one movement), composed for the Caracas Festival in 1957. This is an intensely dramatic and emotional utterance, saved from mere rhetoric not only by its communicative sincerity (which called forth an ovation from a public rather recalcitrant to musical modernism) but also by its solid musical structure.
The Thematic Technique of Copland's Recent Works
Authors: Evans Peter
Published: February 2010

Having been a prey for so long to American initiative in the sphere of popular music, the English listener to serious American music tends either to seek out recognisably ‘popular’ elements (with welcome or disdain), or to affect an indifference which savours more of chauvinism than of aesthetic judgment. Aaron Copland, though accorded a degree of recognition, has necessarily suffered from this astigmatic view since so much of hismusic has been written for films and for folk-derived ballet. Works like the dance episodes from Rodeo and the orchestral piece Quiet City represent an earnest striving towards easy comprehensibility, and an acquaintance with their style, whether we find this stimulating or unduly attenuated, is a far from adequate basis for an estimate ofthe composer. The calibre of the lesser-known works written before he sought wider communication, though pointed out by his apologists, was too easily underestimated while he was offering more easily digested music, and even his present creative phase, in which he has struck a new stylistic balance, has not as yet changed the basis of his reputation.
The Music of Benjamin Lees
Authors: Cooke Deryck
Published: February 2010

One of the most disquieting features of the contemporary musical scene is that more composers than ever before are being ‘born out of their time’. There have been occasional examples before—Mendelssohn and Brahms, one feels, would have been more at home in the eighteenth century; but today the temporal exile is becoming a familiar figure, owing to the unprecedentedly swift development of musical language. From Debussy onwards, the characteristic twentieth-century composer has sensibly insisted that each new work shall break new ground, but by now this entirely healthy, forward-looking tendency has developed into an obsession with the new for its own sake. The restless technical curiosity of certain outstanding composers of high integrity, together with the pure snobbism of others, is bringing us perilously near the stage where each new work will amount to a complete stylistic revolution in itself.
Berlioz and “The Trojans” II: Towards a Free Structure
Authors: Dickinson A. E. F.
Published: February 2010

In Berlioz's Aeneid the stage is, cumulatively, crowded, and the actors are concerned with a present or imminent crisis. There is no space for those emotional luxuries of events recollected in a leisurely and glowing context, on which Virgil was able to draw freely for one epic style. Aeneas is kept significantly on the move, noting rather than confronting a deteriorating situation at Troy, making his way up from a ‘scratch’ reputation at Carthage, letting himself go with Dido, being made to regret it, facing Dido for one awful interview, and eventually leaping to duty and his ship in a glow of religious patriotism, but without a theme to call his own. Nothing is left of the ‘I, Aeneas …’ with which he first revealed himself to an alien monarch. Nor does Berlioz exploit Cassandra's prophecies. Her visions of the new Troy, to which the whole drama leads, are peremptory and unrelated to the established patriotic theme (except for two distorted bars after Polyxena's suicide). The duty warnings of Hector and Mercury are equally uncoordinated. The orchestra underlines, without pursuing further, Dido's initial disturbance of spirit (dialogue with Anna). Her final greeting to death is prolonged but unreminiscent, apart from one phrase. The rest—Coroebus, Iopas, Hylas, sentries, Anna, Narbal—keep to their declared moods of male devotion, nature-worship, nostalgia, anti-nostalgia, match-making, politics, with more subtle but still impromptu examples of opposed motives in the ensembles. The peoples concerned move from one occasion to another, to smile or to frown. Orchestral interludes implement gaps for diversionary dance-drama and troop-movement.
Arthur Benjamin 1893–1960
Authors: Howells Herbert
Published: February 2010

Arthur Benjamin endured two serious disabilities. He had conquered a large part of the listening world with an enchanting brevity (Jamaican Rumba). And he was an unashamed Romantic. By these two circumstances, rather than on evidence of greater validity, he was assessed. The first enormously extended his popular fame but reduced his stature in the view of high-powered criticism. The second appeared to make him an anachronistic figure.
An International Conference of Composers
Authors: Reti Jean
Published: February 2010

When the International Conference of Composers opened in Stratford, Canada, in August, a welcome sense of naivety and new world vibrancy seemed to make it distinct from its old world counterparts in the various centres of Europe. It was obvious from the beginning that an attempt was being made to encompass many aspects of modern techniques both in the announced panels for discussion and in the selection of works to be performed.
Serial Composition Today
Authors: Hamilton Iain
Published: February 2010

I am sure that many composers here today would agree with me that a separate session on serial music is somewhat dangerous. It suggests that it is some other form of composition and that its problems are something apart. In 1960 few would deny the validity and power of music which is not tonal. If one fails to accept the great new forces of our time, one is not actually living in our time. If one seeks to ignore or ridicule such great forces as the struggle for racial equality or communism, or if one fails to acknowledge to oneself that we live in an Atomic age and that much of our thought and life is bound to be conditioned by it, if we by-pass these real issues and developments, then we lose the stimulation of our age. Whether we are in agreement with what has resulted from these forces or how they have been managed is another matter and of less importance than the fact that we should recognise them for what they are. Acceptance of, but not necessarily capitulation to, such great forces implies courage and an open mind. From such an acceptance could follow a possibility that the best results might be encouraged. But in saying that, I presuppose a great many things amongst which open-mindedness and a true enthusiasm for new ideas are not the least important. This panel session deals with just such a great force in the creative musical thought of our century and in this paper I shall deal with what seems to be the crux of the problem of creative musical thought today. I shall deal with no great technicalities or obscurities but try to show you how I personally feel that the great forces set in motion by Schoenberg, and developed by Webern, have done more than anything to face squarely the great dilemma which exists in music today.
1. Sándor Veress
Authors: Demény János
Published: February 2010

Sándor Veress, who was born in 1907 at Kolozsvár, a major town of Transylvania (now Cluj, Rumania), studied at the Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, with Kodály for composition, Bartók for piano, and Lajtha for folksong research. From the age of twenty he was a prolific composer, of marked individuality—already strongly evident in the works of his first period, written in a very distinctive neo-classical contrapuntal idiom with strong national inflexions. By 1939 he had produced an impressive body of works, including two powerful and concentrated string quartets, a series of witty chamber-music sonatinas (1931–33) and the more expansive Violin Sonata No.2 (1939), a Partita for small orchestra (1936), the lyrical and poetic two-movement Violin Concerto (1937–39), a ‘Transylvanian Cantata’ for mixed chorus (1935), anda ballet The Magic Flute(1937).
Schoenberg and the ‘Logic’ of Atonality
Authors: Hopkins G. W.
Published: February 2010

In his recent biography of Schoenberg, Willi Reich quotes the composer's acknowledgement of ‘the compulsion of an inexorable but unconscious logic of harmonic construction’, and of ‘an inner compulsion that is stronger than education’, without making the point that musical analysts still tend to find atonal logic inextricable, and that the compositional procedures of a piece such as Op. 11 No. 3 can still not adequately be taught—even if it has made an appearance in a recent GCE syllabus. Reich himself ‘explains’ the emancipation of the dissonance as a thickening of polyphonic thought: there are ‘no dissonant chords’ in a horizontal line. It is, of course, a great deal less simple than that.
Sergei Rachmaninoff: A Twentieth-Century Composer
Authors: Flanagan William
Published: February 2010

The music of Sergei Rachmaninoff has remained up to the present day a controversial matter over which there has been little actual controversy. I do not mean to suggest that his music is, or ever has been, subject-matter for the battle cry of advance-guard partisanship, but I do submit that the music has achieved an authentic, international popularity that has nothing to do with mere vogue; and that, from the critic's point-of-view, a consistently popular composer, good or bad, is automatically an important one. Actually, Rachmaninoff spent a good part of his life by-passing the pressing issues of this century's “modern” musical thought—not in terms of belligerent reaction but, as the music to 1917 suggests, simply by ignoring it. In a similar way the twentieth-century critical mind has ignored him. The works on which his popularity rests, although typical enough, are far from his most progressive; they tell, really, only a part of the story.
The Musical Offering
Authors: Markevitch Igor
Published: February 2010

The work consists of two fugues (or ricercari), II canons and a sonata for flute, violin, ‘cello and clavichord. With the exception of the sonata and one perpetual canon, the music of the original is not scored, and looks rather theoretical and forbidding to the music lover not initiated into the secrets of counterpoint. Bach indicates the form of the canons only by giving their principal line and the entries and number of the voices; they must first be worked out before they can be read or played, and technically they are often extremely subtle. In one instance two voices move simultaneously in opposite directions; in another one voice announces a variation of the theme, a second a different variation, which is also played by a third, but at half the speed (per augmentationem) and in the exact inversion (per contrario motu); or the canon strangely modulates at the end of each repeat and passes step by step through the keys of the tonal system, rising ad infinitum, like Jacob's ladder. And over one canon Bach simply wrote “Seek and ye shall find,” without even telling us the number of voices! … I myself have found no fewer than four solutions: two equally satisfactory and correct, and two rather modern in style.
Some Contemporary Walloon Composers
Authors: Wangermée Robert
Published: February 2010

Since the 19th century more or less homogeneous national schools have appeared in the majority of European countries, but in spite of this, one can scarcely yet speak of Belgian music. It would be wrong to seek the reason of this discrepancy in the linguistic division of Belgium into Flanders and the Walloon country. Indeed, the language of music has no need to respect the frontiers which separate spoken languages; besides, in spite of the nationalist attempts of Peter Benoit at the end of the 19th century, it is hard to believe in the existence of Flemish music either. It would be still more fruitless to attempt to define at all clearly the characteristics of Walloon music. There are Walloon musicians, but that is another matter, for they have their origins in diverse tendencies which may be connected up with the great international movements. What matters, in the long run, is that among these musicians there are some artists of outstanding talent, who have been able to reveal an original personality transcending these movements.
The Songs and Romances of A. T. Gretchaninoff
Authors: Pastukhov V. L.
Published: February 2010

A. T. Gretchaninoff's work as a composer embraces all branches of music. In opera, in symphony, in chamber music and in liturgical music, Gretchaninoff has created inspired and profound works which have enriched Russian musical literature. But perhaps the most deeply felt and original of his compositions are in the field of song. His subtle knowledge of the potentialities of the human voice, and the extraordinarily beautiful piano accompaniment, which never intrudes but always gives expressive illustration to the text, make his romances and songs unsurpassed in the vocal literature of Russia and, indeed, of the rest of the world. Many of his songs long ago became popular both in Russia and in other countries. Thus, at the beginning of this century there was no important singer in Russia whose repertory did not include Gretchaninoff's songs. More than that, they spread among the mass of the people and became a part of its heritage. In every home where there was an interest in music or song, one heard the famous Berceuse (Op. 1, No. 5), Quand la hache tombe (Op. 1, No. 2), Triste est la steppe (Op. 5, No. 1), and many Other songs written by Gretchaninoff in his youth. It may be said that Gretchaninoff's songs were as popular in Russia at that time as Schubert's or Schumann's are in Germany. Subsequently these songs spread to Western Europe and America as well. The songs of Gretchaninoff's early period gained wide popularity, being most easily understood by the wide public. But the most musically valuable and the most mature and inspired of his songs remained relatively less well-known. And yet it is precisely in these songs that the composer's individuality and musical inspiration attained their full stature.
A Children's Orchestra Goes Abroad
Authors: Russell Leslie
Published: February 2010

The idea of young people working as a team, whether through sport, art or music is always of the greatest value, for it helps to produce concentration, “give and take”, and infectious enthusiasm. It was with this in mind that the London Schools Symphony Orchestra was formed.

For more than six years London school children have listened to orchestral music—sponsored by the London County Council—played by the London Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by myself. They have also had the opportunity of learning orchestral instruments, often free of charge and on loan, in their own schools.
Frederick Delius
Authors: Beecham Thomas
Published: February 2010

Of all men in any walk of life that I have known during a career spent almost as much in other countries as in my own, Frederick Delius is the most remarkable. His biographers have styled him an Englishman, born of German parents settled in Yorkshire in the early part of the nineteenth century, and this is correct so far as it goes. But it does not take us nearly far enough in probing the problem of a highly complex personality, and the truth is that Delius was of no decided nationality but a citizen of all Europe, with a marked intellectual bias towards the northern part of it. His family was almost definitely of Dutch origin, and some time in the sixteenth century had changed its patronymic from Delij or Deligh to a latinized form of it, a common enough practice at the time. A member of it was numbered among the chaplains of Edward VI of England and others are traceable to Spain, France and Germany. But whatever were the diverse elements that united to make up the increasing amalgam of Frederick, anything less Teutonic would be hard to imagine. His earthy solidity and delicate romanticism were English, his uncompromising logic and analytical insight French, and his spiritual roots went down deep to that layer of far northern culture which, half Icelandic, half Celtic, gave birth centuries ago to the beautiful folk-music of Scotland and Ireland and in the nineteenth century to the boundless imaginative genius of Ibsen.
Opera Workshops in the United States
Authors: RePass Richard
Published: February 2010

Observers of the American musical scene tend to decry the commercialization of the musical life in the United States, its subservience to the mass entertainment media (radio, television, and the cinema), and its excessive centralization along a Hollywood-New York axis of monolithic agencies and frenetic publicity bureau. All this is true; but it represents only one side of the picture. Statistics may not in themselves prove very much, but they show a tremendous and healthy growth in the volume of musical activity throughout the United States—symphony orchestras in scores of communities, approximately three hundred music schools scattered throughout the nation, and increasing attention to serious music in the schools, colleges, and universities.
John Stanley (1713–1786)
Authors: Finzi Gerald
Published: February 2010

No period of English music is in greater need of revaluation than the 18th century. Its history has yet to be written. In general there is a complete lack of biographical and critical literature. Documents and letters are practically non-existent. Work remains uncollected and judgments are still based on 19th century estimates, which were founded upon insufficient knowledge and less understanding. Until recently most new editions of the period attempted to fit the 18th century view-point into a 19th century canon, and they were not only stylistically bad but often texturally incorrect. The revival of any unfamiliar work of the period was, and still is, too often greeted with patronising disparagement or remarks about the superiority of Handel. That these composers were not of the stature of Handel can never be denied; but we should remember Francis Quarles's “if he cannot bring a cedar let him bring a shrub.” That they were individuals, with styles of their own, was perfectly clear to their contemporaries and is equally clear to us today once we penetrate the common language of their age sufficiently to understand the varying intonations of those who used it.
The Pittsburgh Festival: A Survey of Modern Music
Authors: Mason Colin
Published: February 2010

At the end of last November, Pittsburgh, on the initiative of Roy Harris, resident composer of the Pennsylvania College for Women, organized an ambitious First International Contemporary Music Festival. It was an attempt to give a survey of music written in the last quarter-century, and although lasting only one week, boldly challenged comparison with the American-sponsored Festival of Twentieth-century Masterpieces held in Paris throughout last May. It says much for all concerned that the Pittsburgh festival emerged from the comparison with much credit.
Richard Strauss and Zürich
Authors: Schuh Willi
Published: February 2010

The Zürich Stadttheater is probably the only one among the medium-sized German speaking theatres that can boast of having produced the whole Strauss repertoire, with the exception of Guntram, an early work, written very much under Wagnerian influence. In the main, even operas which make as great demands as Die Frau ohne Schatten were successfully presented by the resident company with only occasional guest artists. Capriccio and Die Liebe der Danae are the only ones which so far have only been given by the visiting Vienna and Munich Staatsoper.
Strawinsky's Septet (1953)
Authors: Stein Erwin
Published: February 2010

Strawinsky often surprises his admirers. When they believe themselves to have discovered his æsthetic aims or located his place in history, he suddenly escapes from their observant eyes to emerge on quite a different spot where nobody had suspected him to dwell. His most recent works, the Cantata on old English poems, the Septet, and the Shakespeare Songs, show a contrapuntal strictness of a very special kind, which he has never attempted before.
An Unfulfilled Promise
Authors: Weissmann John S.
Published: February 2010

The news that Halsey Stevens, an American University professor, was preparing a book on Bartók, aroused keen interest among sympathisers with the Hungarian composer, and publication-date was impatiently awaited. The author received very generous assistance from every quarter: a research grant from his university, and direct and indirect material information from a large number of people most of whose help is duly acknowledged in the preface. Why was it, then, that the book did not come up to expectations? The answer lies, partly, in Prof. Stevens's self-imposed limitations. The title says: “The Life and Music of Béla Bartók”, and Prof. Stevens seems to be careful to confine himself, almost literally, to the description of the two points his title indicates. His aims are more clearly defined in the foreword, where he says: “This book is concerned primarily with Bartók's music, approached from both the analytical and the critical point of view” (though the latter point of view is rather tentatively approached), and in a passage later on in the book: “… it has nowhere been the intention in this book to examine Bartók's work from the standpoint of its motivations, physical, psychological, or otherwise …” (p.250). I submit that this approach, though conducive of valuable information, is essentially a wrong one to adopt.
Portrait of a Choreographer
Authors: Piper Myfanwy
Published: February 2010

John Cranko is a South African. He is twenty-six and he came to England a few weeks before his twentieth birthday. He knew no one in England at all except one young dancer from Capetown in the Sadler's Wells Theatre Company. But he knew exactly what he wanted and why he had come. He intended to be a choreographer and wanted to work, to that end, as a dancer in a first class company.