Keen to understand more of the setting for his musical tastes, I asked him about his studies with Fricker:

We talked about who was there, and Smalley raised Holloway, with whom I am speaking soon:

Looking through the programme of concerts, we arrived at Monday, 17 August 1964:

I asked Smalley about the pianist Margaret Kitchin:

Smalley didn’t recall the Melos Ensemble’s concert that followed Davies’s organ recital. Nevertheless, I have included his comments since they help to establish the extent of memories of these events. It is interesting that the repertoire of one of the concerts immediately suggested Leonard Stein as the pianist:

Smalley was slightly less tentative about his memory of the following night’s concert of Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time:

I asked Smalley about Dartington:

Finally we reached ‘Opera Today’, which has been remembered by many with whom I have spoken:

He didn’t attend the McGaw piano recital:

Smalley then makes some general comments about the programme:

Smalley remembered Pierrot Lunaire only slightly:

He knew Goehr’s Three Piano Pieces, but couldn’t recall Stein’s performance:

We came to Eisler’s Fourteen Ways of Describing Rain:

I asked Smalley about Tristram Fry, who played in the concert on 19 August 1965:

I have been uncertain about which of Stockhausen’s Klavierstücke Smalley performed. I asked him about this, along with what he remembered from his concert:

He connects the participants’ concert to Dartington:

I asked Smalley whether any improvisation took place:

In my interview with Gilbert, the first seminar on ‘rhythm’ had been an important topic. I asked Smalley about this seminar, and although he couldn’t remember the discussion, the topic was familiar:

What of Michael Tippett?

Did it feel like there was ‘movement’ of young people at the time towards new music?

Smalley on Pulses:

Permission, as always, was sought for my use of the audio from our discussion:

Finally, his comment on the blog:

Was there some need that the WCSSs filled?

The following comment about optimism goes to the atmosphere of the events:

In a recent post Caroline Mustill mentioned her surprise at hearing and reading on this blog that the WCSSs ended with damage to the property. I asked Davies why there were only two WCSSs:

This tallies with Northcott’s recollection, and also with a letter that Hugh Wood showed me, written by ‘Biddy’ Mackintosh and indicating that there was some damage to the property of Cranborne Chase.

One of the reasons I wanted to interview Davies was to clarify how the event came about in the first instance. Birtwistle’s version has it that he put an ad in the Musical Times and that people simply came. When I saw Bayan Northcott on 25 January at Wigmore Hall for a BCMG concert of Leopardi Fragments, The World is Discovered and The Deluge, he said ‘don’t believe a word of what Harry tells you, things don’t just happen’. Davies asked me if I had spoken to Birtwistle, so I told him Birtwistle’s had told me, hoping that Davies would fill out the picture:

Davies had nothing more to add to the explanation. Although Davies is considered one of the driving forces behind the event, he had returned from Princeton only shortly before the start of the 1964 event, and it is likely that he had little to do with the school’s planning.

What of the legacy of the WCSSs:

Davies’s reference to Bayan Northcott reflects the centrality of Northcott’s contribution to my understanding of these events; many of the questions that I was asking were quoting or paraphrasing him.

And how did this event compare to Darmstadt?

That idea quickly dismissed, Davies tells me about meeting Stockhausen:

I’m reminded of Cavell:

‘I believe it is true to say that modernist art – roughly, the art of one’s own generation – has not become a problem for the philosophy contemporary with it (in England and America anyway) [...]‘ Cavell 1976, in Contemplating Music: Community of discourse By Ruth Katz, Carl Dahlhaus.

________________________
What then was Davies’s role there?

His teaching was of Mahler, and Bach, canons and rhythm. I will return to Mahler later, but first, here is Davies’s recollection of his teaching about rhythm:

What, then, did he think his students expected of his teaching?

I asked Davies about his canonic teaching, quoting Northcott’s who had recorded that Davies said that he was writing ‘a canon a day’:

As to his teaching of Bach Inventions:

That his teaching drew on Ratz’s Einfuhrung in die musikalische Formenlehre (actually published in 1951) places Davies firmly within the Schoenbergian tradition that was one of the School’s hallmarks. (See Trackings: composers speak with Richard Dufallo, OUP, 1989). I asked him about Die Reihe:

Given that Davies was teaching Mahler’s Third Symphony at the WCSS, I wanted to know more about what it meant to write a ‘Symphony’ the mid-1960 (it’s not until the mid-1970s that Davies first uses the term in the title of one of his works):

I then quoted Northcott, who quoted Davies saying that the first movement of Mahler’s Third Symphony: ‘should have ended [after the development], that the entire recapitulation is a caving in to convention and therefore a lie’ (see here):

I asked a more specific question about the difficulty of analysing his First Symphony in the light of the problem of recapitulation in Mahler’s Third Symphony:

I asked for his memory of various performances and discussions. Firstly, the Opera Today discussion to which Gilbert’s response was so strong:

His memory of the outdoor concert was no better:

Throughout the interview Davies was quick to tell me if he didn’t remember the events or conversations about which I was asking. He did remember Beardslee’s performance of Pierrot Lunaire:

What  happened between Ecce Manus, composed for the WCSS, and Revelation and Fall, composed soon after?

What of Tragoedia and the significance of this performance for Birtwistle?

________________________

Finally, throughout this research the Melos Ensemble had been discussed as the new music ensemble in Britain at that time. The following makes clear how avant-garde Davies and his contemporaries were and how difficult their demands on the players:

________________________

Increasingly my knowledge of the facts of these events – who was there, what was discussed, what was performed – exceeds that of my interviewees. It is interesting that Birtwistle and Davies, as two of the organizers, have little memory of many of the events. For others, such as Gilbert, the WCSSs were significant points in their development as composers, which reinforces the importance of speaking with as diverse a range of composers and performers as possible.

The discussion began with some general comments about the WCSS, the first of which was Mustill’s observation about the small children present:

Stephen Pruslin then cut across the conversation with his thoughts about the feel of the event and the significance of the WCSSs. ‘Even while we were all there, it already felt legendary’:

I’m intruigued by the notion that this was an event that ‘would be remembered’, a topic to which we returned later in the conversation:

Such comments problematize my casual (and frequent!) use of the word ‘significant’. In the case of the WCSSs their ‘significance’ is reflected neither in column inches nor in scholarly citations. To what extent is the importance of an event predicated on its exclusivity? If ‘everyone was there’ then no matter its importance at the time, there is little need to publish its details, for who of importance does not already know? On the other hand, it’s faulty logic to assume that the lack of widespread knowledge of the events is indicative of the events’ importance. To some extent these are questions that are less important to me than consideration of musical responses, since on the whole composers are less articulate in prose than in music. Nonetheless, I came to this topic of research partly because there were works, programmes and aesthetic connections that didn’t make sense, and that now, after some research, make much more sense. I wonder what those who are under 40 and who attended the Wigmore Hall on the 13 December 2009 made of this programme?

Machaut Hoquetus David
Harrison Birtwistle Double Hocket
JS Bach Three Fugues from the Art of Fugue – Contrapunctus VII
Harrison Birtwistle Lied
JS Bach Three Fugues from the Art of Fugue – Contrapunctus XII
Harrison Birtwistle Verses
JS Bach Three Fugues from the Art of Fugue – Contrapunctus XVII
Christian Mason New Work (World première tour)
Ockeghem Ut heremita solus

With my critic’s hat on, I found Mason’s composition a work that projected a clear sense of its place in relation to the history of situating Bach and Birtwistle side-by-side: it was brighter, shinier, and more exuberant than other works on the programme (or indeed the works by Birtwistle or Davies before the late 1960s); it also made me want to sit down with a score and contemplate Mason’s technique, which struck me as able to comment eloquently on the music of an earlier era, particularly in those moments when the facility of his technique qua technique seemed palpable.

But I digress. What did the event mean to the girls at the school?

_____________________________________

Pruslin, full of anecdotes, raises Emanuel Hurwitz:

Writing of blogs, Mustill had listened to the recordings here and comments about the party that ended the 1965 WCSS:

All those I have interviewed to have spoken about ‘Biddy’ Mackintosh with the highest regard:

I gave a copy of the concert programmes to Mustill and Pruslin, who went through, mentioning works that they recalled as most interesting.
Mustill on the outdoor concert, Friday, 21 August 1964:

Mustill gives an insight into the concert venues at the school:

Pruslin on his lecture on Mozart’s opera, 20 August 1964. His comments here are less about the content of his lecture, than that this lecture was the moment that lead to the libretto for Punch and Judy. Indeed, Pruslin here recounts telling Birtwistle about structural problems with Don Giovanni that precipitated the collaboration.

_____________________________________

We come, again, to Tragoedia:

But no Stravinsky:

The end of the WCSSs was raised, with Pruslin giving a straightforward answer. Immediately the conversation shifts to the genesis of the Pierrot Players:

I asked about works that, although not strictly works of music theatre, nevertheless responded to the ideas of music theatre in terms of drama or rhetoric:

It was Mustill who brought up the financial backing needed to write opera:

_____________________________________

Were there any late night concerts or informal events?

To return to the earlier topic of Darmstadt, Pruslin recounts his experience performing at the famous School, where he performed Tippett:

He continues with an anecdote about Tippett years later:

One of my continuing questions is about the age of those who participated, and how this differed from Darmstadt:

_____________________________________

What of Gilbert’s comment about the WCSSs as a place where new conventions were formed?

_____________________________________

The interview with Mustill and Pruslin is particularly interesting for their close friendship with Birtwistle and Davies. The parts of the conversation posted here are those relating most closely to the WCSSs, but the conversation also included much less relevant material. Of the latter, the topic that returned several times was food, and of Birtwistle and Davies as excellent cooks exploring food at the time when British food was markedly changing, with rationing a thing of the past and influences from Europe becoming popular.

The name Melanie Daiken came up as an attendee who isn’t listed elsewhere on this blog.

[....]

Nyman was born in 1944 and went to school up in Walthamstow where he started making a bit of pocket money as a music copyist when he was 13 or 14. He had an excellent hand. He was at the Royal Academy of Music before becoming one of [Thurston] Dart’s musicology students. He had four or five compositions performed in the early Sixties, at least one at an Arts Council-sponsored concert. It was like a cross between Shostakovich and Hindemith.

When he went to the Warour Castle Summer School in 1965, and listened to lectures by Alexander Goehr and met the new, serially-committed generation of young British composers. He left Wardour convinced of the error of his former tonal ways of composition, sat down and started to write serial music, got as far as about 12 bars, and gave up altogether. He felt if he couldn’t be serial he couldn’t be a composer.

Dat proposed he go abroad for a year, put him in the way of a British Council exchange with Romania, and suggested he study folk music there. It was the idea antidote to Wardour. European art music was not the only kind worth taking seriously.

[....]

Tom Sutcliffe, The Guardian, July 20, 1984, 9.

Of course, all my sources for this information, though not directly citing each other, may be apocryphal. It reminds me as I am preparing to interview Davies of the importance of asking questions that have already been answered to provide alternate sources for future scholarship.

Ahead with Stockhausen

[….]

New works by Peter Maxwell Davies and Harrison Birtwistle, incomplete versions of which had been played at the Wardour Castle summer school, were given first London performances on December 3 at the Commonwealth Institute by the Melos Ensemble under Lawrence Foster. Maxwell Davies’s Four in Nomines were separated by his exquisite instrumentations of keyboard ‘In Nomines’ by Taverner, Bull and Blitheman. The new poised poignantly and instructively between the old. Maxwell Davies’s material is derived from Taverner’s ‘In Nomine’ and he exploits it with great ingenuity. His third ‘In Nomine,’ a six-part canon, set up a structural dance-like beat against which the rhythmic patterns of the canons appear at their most effective.

Birtwistle’s Tragoedia is a fierce agon between instrumental groups and solos. Thus, the cello, perhaps the most powerful voice, roars powerfully for itself, yet also supports the other strings in their encounters with the fearsome ostinati of the woodwinds. Instrumental capacities are stretched to their uttermost and their precarious straining, as of the just possible, recalls the Grosse Fugue.

Although Lawrence Foster and his players did not generate quite the same tension as they did at Wardour Castle, when the work created something of a sensation, the bold ‘Tragoedia’ shows how it is still possible to write music whose Expressionist fervour is a masterly blend of ‘blood-boltered barbarism’ and tenderness.

Patrick Carnegy [who presumably attended the WCSS performance]

The Observer Weekend Review, ‘The Arts’, December 12, 1965, 25.

Contemporary Music

Last night’s concert at the Commonwealth Institute, part of a 4-day festival of contemporary music, presented a broad conspectus of modern instrumental music, some of it British, including a set of ‘In Nomines’ by Peter Maxwell Davies and the first London performance of Harrison Birtwhistle’s [sic] heralded ‘Tragoedia.’ Birtwhistle wrote his ‘Tragoedia’ for the Melos Ensemble, and the ensemble gave its first performance in August in the rather more evocative surroundings of Wardour Castle. By all accounts that was a memorable occasion, with Birtwhistle’s powerfully symmetrical structure and brilliantly conceived writing for wind, strings, and percussion creating an unforgettable impression in the context of the summer school. The test of the work, however, was that it should be able to stand transplantation ot the less hothouse atmosphere of London, and this, last night, it most certainly did, in a performance by the Melos which I would have rated outstanding, if I had not been told that the Wardour one was even better.

One doubts whether an intimate knowledge of Greek drama, around which the ‘Tragoedia’ is formulated, is at all necessary for an appreciation of the music; it is, quite plainly, an intense satisfying structural and dramatic entity, with the complex techniques of strophe and antistrophe, and so on, take their place with no sense of strain. This, I know, is a rather unhelpful dismissal of the whole aesthetic basis of the composition; but after only a single performance I find myself unable to analyse my pleasure and satisfaction in any more complex terms.

Maxwell Davies’s ‘In Nomines’ proved more assimilable at first acquaintance. Three of the pieces are instrumentations of works by Taverner, Bull and Blitheman, and although the composer asserts that they were made only to arrive at a suitable state of mind for his own pieces, the results are both enchanting and illuminating. The new movements affirm Maxwell Davies’s ability to write striking music in pre-Renaissance terms without indulging in mock archaisms which would be both insignificant and out of place. The ‘In Nomine’ for Britten’s fiftieth birthday, which seemed to start with an intonation from the Taverner piece, was particularly moving in this respect.

Stephen Walsh

The Guardian, Saturday, December 4, 1965, 6

Composers at School

There is every sign that this Wardour Castle Summer School of Music, now in its second year, is becoming an important feature of the English musical landscape. It is oriented more towards contemporary composition than any other such school, and the usual proliferation of masterclasses in performing music rather recedes into the background. Thus last week’s principal events were performances of selected music by the 50 or so composers gathered there, by leading modern composers and by the school’s directors, Harrison Birtwistle, Alexander Goehr and Peter Maxwell Davies – a wayward yet beguiling trio, with great professional acumen.

It struck me, though, that the school’s activities could have been more closely integrated to add to the stimulus.

For instance, two of the concerts included works involving taped electronic sound. There was a ‘Prelude’ for piano and tape (in which the soloist on Tuesday was the distinguished American Schoenberg scholar, Leonard Stein) which doodled along through its many short sections quite amiably but to no specific purpose. However, ‘Philomel,’ written by the archpriest of electronic music at Princeton University, Milton Babbitt, and given its European première by Miss Bethany Beardslee on Sunday, is a stunning realisation for soprano, recorded soprano and synthesises sound of the final metamorphosis in Ovid’s account of the gory myth. The vocal line and accompaniment in this dramatic scena fit together as superbly as those in the five great Schubert songs which Miss Beardslee sang earlier, and I can well imagine a version of the whole tale done in this fashion.

Miss Beardslee also sang intensely in Schoenberg’s ‘Pierrot Lunaire’ on Tuesday [sic, the performance was on Monday], performing in costume against a sort of backcloth – an enterprising venture, since ‘Pierrot’ was originally heard in a cabaret like this, but unfortunately here the visual excitement was missing; it looked rather a rushed job.

Buried treasure

Now these three works at least should have been heard before Monday’s ‘teach-in’ on the problems of form in contemporary composition, for they give valuable clues as to how to find the buried treasure of a new musical language. All music has a dramatic basis, I submit, whether ritualistic or personally autobiographical, and, in the search for new idioms, a clear dramatic impulse often facilitates the formation of the musical image.

This point was clearly lost on our 50 composers, whose verbal contributions tended to grind personal axes instead of exploring objectively the various issues.

More careful administration should further prevent us from hearing under-rehearsed concerts of both old and new music. I was sorry, for example, that only half of Robin Holloway’s Cantata on texts by Edward Benlowes (a minor Metaphysical poet), reached concert-pitch for its première on Wednesday. Its several little sections, ornate lines and decorative textures came across very effectively.

In his settings of two D. H. Lawrence poems, a former R.C.M. student, Roger Smalley, displays considerable maturity allowing the high-voltage vocal lines to make a powerful impact against the dark, pungent wind and piano textures. Smalley wrote his work for fellow members of the R.C.M. Composers’ Ensemble, who also played music by John Cage, etc., with spell-binding creative exuberance.

I also heard in rehearsal and saw the score of Harrison Birtwistle’s large-scale ‘Tragoedia,’ commissioned and given its première by the Melos Ensemble on Thursday. This imaginative conception stems from the structural facets of Greek theatre, and thus is in several concise movements – Fanfare, Prologue, Parados, etc. Its eloquent thematic material and strong inner growth, and its brilliant scoring for string quartet, wind and harp, make up, I guess, Birtwistle’s finest work to date. It’s the true Director’s work all right.

Meirion Bowen

The Observer Weekend Review, August 22, 1965

Having gone through the concert programme, Northcott moved on to his memories of the other classes and activities from the 1965 school. Maxwell Davies’ analysis classes included Bach Inventions, Pierrot Lunaire and the first movement of Mahler’s Third Symphony, all as advertised.

There are some implications of his teaching of Mahler 3 that will become apparent in my review of Peter Maxwell Davies Studies to be published in Music & Letters.

Unlike the other interviews recorded thus far, I have known both Gilbert and Lumsdaine for five years, during which time we have spoken at length about a whole range of music (and much else besides). I also know their music well and I currently work for UYMP, which publishes both composers.

The first excerpt from the interview covers similar ground to that recounted by Hall, of the discussion that took place on 19 August, 1964, listed in the programme of events as ‘Discussion: Opera Today’:

‘The discussion verged and merged into music theatre, not opera at all, and a whole new set of conventions were drafted at that discussion’

Gilbert and Lumsdaine continued:

I asked them: were Eisler and Brecht part of that discussion?

I was curious about the impact that this event had on works that were not operatic or music theatre. In have elsewhere argued that Kelly Ground is a work that responds to opera, but which is not operatic. If the impact of the discussion of opera is as significant as Gilbert suggests that it is, then surely it impacts on works beyond those that are immediately dramatic:

To close this section of the interview, I asked them about the current position of Eisler and Brecht, since they currently play only a small part in London’s music contemporary musical scene. They waved away my question (suggesting the interest in these composers is cyclic) before offering their opinions on Eisler:

In the evening of the day following the discussion Opera Today, Stephen Pruslin gave a lecture on ‘Musical Characterization in Mozart Opera’:

What of Michael Tippett?

____________________________

I know that improvisation formed a significant part of the SPNM composer weekends that Lumsdaine, Gilbert and Don Banks founded in 1967, and so I asked about improvisation at the WCSSs:

Lumsdaine’s description of improvisation as occurring within a framework is very much how it functions in his compositions from the 1970s, which incorporate improvisation within a frame of highly structured (carefully, precisely, obviously, structured) music. His assembling of different ideas, techniques or approaches stands as an obvious metaphor for the way in which people came together within the framework of the WCSS. For Lumsdaine and Gilbert, the boundary lines between improvisation (immediate response, discussion, inter-influence) and framework (preconceived, taught, directed response) are clearly delineated, with movement between the fields generating hierarchies – in itself not a bad thing (Lumsdaine’s music is formed by a such a process) – but with implications for all participants.

Parenthetically, the balances here are precarious, maintaining, for example, the ability for Gilbert to considered himself a student at these events and Lumsdaine not, yet without the power imbalances that would render this difference significant. In the interview the topic of ‘tutors’ arose (Davies, Goehr and Wood) and Gilbert mentioned the ‘students’ in these ‘classes’. Lumsdaine, perplexed, asked:

To return to rhythm and dissonance, Gilbert and Lumsdaine continue, speaking about the seminar on ‘rhythm’ (the first seminar of 1964, Sunday 16th):

I asked: had people read the discussions of rhythm in Die Reihe?

____________________________

What, then, of repertoire from Europe? Boulez? Stockhausen? Messiaen?

Firstly, Messiaen:

Gilbert’s take on the performance (Tuesday, 18 August 1964) of Quatuor pour la fin du temps:

The Messiaen discussion lead to Boulez/Stockhausen:

There remains some confusion about exactly which pieces by Stockhausen were played in Smalley’s recital:

Number IX is the works with the repeated chords. The sources I have that also suggest number IX are derived from Gilbert’s memory, and offer therefore no corroboration.

____________________________

What of music from the US? Feldman? Cage? Babbitt?

I asked: was there much American music performed?

____________________________

I asked them to tell me about John Alldis and the choir:

____________________________

What of the SPNM and the place of the WCSSs in the context of what was going on?

How many composers where there?

____________________________

I have a good knowledge of the concerts that were programmed, and several of the interviews I have undertaken have fleshed out details and memories of these events. I need to know more about the events that aren’t listed in the programmes, and I first began the interview with Gilbert and Lumsdaine by asking what went on alongside the programmed events:

They returned to the issue of flexibility later in the interview:

There are some changes to programmes that remain for me confusing. Having in a previous post suggested that Ring a Dumb Carillon wasn’t performed, Gilbert suggests it was, and in so doing they both comment on flexibility in programming:

The students also performed lunchtime concerts. I asked: who performed in those?

Alan Hacker and Roger Smalley gave informal concerts too:

____________________________

Gilbert and Lumsdaine also made some comments about specific concerts.

Sunday 16th August

5.0 p.m. Lecture

in the Assembly Room

8.30 p.m. Concert

Gilbert suggests that Neville Gambier’s Suite for String Trio was performed. On the flyer given to me by Michael Hall (a preliminary programme) this composition was crossed out, and it was not included in the printed programme.

There is little information available about Neville Gambier, so I asked who he was:

I asked Gilbert if he remembered what Goehr had said in his lecture. Although he missed the lecture, their response is significant, suggesting how well-known Goehr’s ideas were at the time (and also the waning influence of Fricker and Hamilton):

Monday, 17th August

Recital 5.0 p.m.

Early Organ Music

Peter Maxwell Davies will introduce and play early music on a newly restored Snitzler organ. Works by: Dunstable, Taverner, Byrd, Tomkins, Gabrielli, Scheidt, Zipoli etc.

Monday Seminars (this except runs into their comments, excerpted above, about students and teaching):

Thursday, 20th August

5.0 p.m. Recital

in the Assembly Room, Susan McGaw

Friday, 21st August

8.30 p.m. Concert

at Old Wardour Castle

Gilbert suggests a concert in 1965 that took place outside, although it is not obvious which concert this is; perhaps it was not listed in the programme.

Saturday, 22nd August

Gilbert’s memory of the Participant’s Concert differs from the programme, with works by the students of the school also being performed. He also explains the genesis of the events:

Friday, 20 August at 8 p.m

Tragoedia

____________________________

Finally, some more general comments about the 2nd WCSS and it’s legacy:

I asked why there were only 2 WCSSs:

____________________________

*Hall, Michael (2003) Between Two Worlds: The Music of David Lumsdaine (Todmorden, Arc Publications), 31-32

Amongst their other comments, they indicated that the following people were (or may have been) there:

Anthony Payne, Peter Hayworth (opera discussion?), Julian Rushton?

1964

Michael Graubart

David Ellis

John Tilbury

1965

Tim Souster

Michael Graubart

Harry Hancock

Most notable among the summer schools have been the Wardour Castle Summer School of Music, a joint venture that Davies, Harrison Birtwistle and Alexander Goehr undertook in 1964 and 1965′. (217)

Grange’s second mention of the WCSSs (228-9) is more interesting as he connects Maxwell Davies’ earlier experience at Wardour with his vision for Dartington. Grange begins by quoting Seabrook:

Max was unequivocal in his desire to turn Dartington into something much more like a serious musician’s forcing house. Indeed, he more than once expressed the desire to restrict attendance to professional musicians seeking higher tuition. (Seabrook, Max, 182) (Grange 228)

Grange then comments:

Such a desire is strongly reminiscent of another teaching venture that Davies undertook with Birtwistle and Goehr, earlier in 1964 and 1965, the Wardour Castle Summer School of Music, which can now, in retrospect, be seen as an important first indication of what were to become the defining characteristics of the Dartington experience. (228)

My understanding of the WCSSs is that they remain remarkable for the ways they differ from Dartington, and in particular that they were a gathering of disparate people that resulted in discussions, arguments, debates and shared understandings, a situation very unlike a ‘forcing house’. Certainly the initial impetus for the WCSS was to provide further extension to the students at Cranborne Chase and not for their professional advancement. The focus was not on the ‘training of professional musicians’ (Grange 228), and the teaching was highly informal. Indeed, Birtwislte describes the event as a framework within which all sorts of things might happen (see my interview with him in the previous post), and Lumsdaine and Gilbert comment specifically on the informality of the teaching and its limited role at the school. They begin with some thoughts about the differences between Dartington (in the era at least 15 years before that about which Grange writes) and Wardour:

The crucial part of this (in terms of this post) is Lumsdaine’s memory of the WCSSs for the freedom it encouraged in interpretations of music, and that the discussions were participant-lead.
Grange continues:

The idea for the Wardour Castle venture initially came from Birtwistle, who at the time had a position teaching wood-wind at Cranborne Chase, a private school in Dorset which had the ruins of Wardour Castle in its grounds. Birtwistle invited his former colleagues from the so-called Manchester Group to help with the teaching, and resident professional performers including the Melos Ensemble were integrated into the programme and available to perform new works. Seabrook states of Davies’s own recollections of the Wardour Castle Summer School:

It was, Max recalls, much like Dartington, but considerably more intense, because everyone there was planning in earnest to become a professional musician. (Seabrook, Max, 88) (Grange 229)

Whilst I don’t dispute Maxwell Davies’ recollection of the events (and I have not spoken with him about them), certainly there seem to be a large number of people who attended who weren’t as driven towards furthering their professional careers as the quote suggests (I’m thinking of, for example, Northcott’s comment on why he attended: ‘why not?’.

Later, writing about the changes that Maxwell Davies brought about, Grange suggests that:

It was rather a surprise that, though, that the first composer he should invite in 1980 was Brian Ferneyhough. At that time Ferneyhough was only just emerging as a significant compositional voice, and although it was clear that Davies’s musical priorities lay in a very different direction, he was genuinely intrigued by what Ferneyhough had to say. However, Ferneyhough, already a well-established teacher on the Continent, ran his composition course in a very independent manner, so from 1981 Davies returned to the well-tried team teaching of the Wardour Castle Summer School, working alongside Anthony Payne in 1981 and Robert Saxton in subsequent years. (229)

Firstly, more research is needed on the years between 1965 and 1980 to track the influence of the WCSSs and I suggest that the relationship between Maxwell Davies and Ferneyhough is more complex than the stylistic debates of the 1980s have engendered. Secondly, it is noteworthy (at least) that Ferneyhough was at the 1965 WCSS, and Anthony Payne (see below) was there in 1964 and 1965 (according to Gilbert’s recollection). It is slightly misleading to suggest that the reality of the teaching at Dartington followed what went on at Wardour, since the former was far more structured than the latter and drew a very different kind of participant.

Grange, Philip (2009), ‘Peter Maxwell Davies at Dartington: the composer as teacher’, Peter Maxwell Davies Studies, ed. Kenneth Gloag and Nicholas Jones (CUP).

Gilbert on Anthony Payne (in response to my question about the presence of critics):

I began by asking some specific questions about serialism and whether or not it was a concept that was ‘vetoed’ as Anthony Gilbert had suggested to me that it had been. (The interview with Gilbert will be posted soon.) Not gaining much of a response beyond  ’I don’t know’ I outlined something of the level of detail I knew about the events, filling in space much as I am as I write this, hoping for a topic that most piqued his interest. It seems that Birtwistle is good at forgetting, which, as this week’s obituary for Alexander Piatigorsky reminded me, is ‘essential’.

Birtwistle mentioned that there had been a tiered system of students, and that Wood ‘took the third lot, Max took the second, and Sandy the first’ (LS100060 4’45″). I asked Birtwistle whether he had done any of this kind of teaching:

HB: ‘no’

M: ‘So what were you doing’:

HB: ‘just hanging out’ [laughter]

(LS100060 5’57″)

At this point the interview had consisted of a series of not-quite-meetings indicative of a patient interviewee waiting for me to ask the right questions. Birtwislte then suggested that:

Most of my subsequent questions, focussing on the specifics of what went on, were unfruitful, partly due to Birtwistle’s memory of the specifics of the events or perhaps to his reluctance to share his memories. However, a number of times he focussed my attention on the manner in which the event arose, seemingly through the collective interest of an extraordinary collection of composers and performers. As the financial records show, aside from a small amount from the Arts Council (£350) in 1965, the costs of the summer schools were covered by the subscriptions paid by students. It opens an important question, which is one that stands behind so many inquiries of the past: how was it that so many who were to become so prominent all gathered at the same time as a self-sufficient collective? Birtwistle’s reluctance to answer my question about his role, prepared the conversation with the space to ask this question, downplaying his role as the official WCSS organiser. In a sense, was his role less significant than the willingness of the musical community to be self-supporting in this endeavour? Why is it that now a similar event could not take place? and what are the changes that have taken place in the music scene such that a similar event hasn’t again occurred? Birtwistle’s forgetting of the details usefully directed our conversation (or, at least, my interpretation of it) towards other ideas, ones that he could offer and that were unlikely to be found in my other interviews.

Given that my intention to study the past is so that I can better understand the present and look to the future, such questions are entirely relevant to this research.

Birtwistle continued musing on the events, on why they ended, what made them unique, and some of the works performed:

He continues, noting the obscurity of much of the repertoire programmed:

I asked Birtwistle what the need was for the WCSSs:

So far in my research I have been struggling to find a reason for why Michael Tippett was there given that he was the only composer of his age to attend. David Lumsdaine (post forthcoming) suggested simply that people were fond of him, and others (Northcott, as well as Hall) have noted that he had worked with Walter Goehr and therefore well known to Alexander Goehr. Having spoken to Birtwistle, the attendence of Tippett (like several other aspects of the WCSSs) seems to be straightforward:

Similarly, I asked Birtwistle about improvisation and what its role was at the WCSSs. He replied that there was none as far as he remembered (LS100060, 36’01″). I asked about Cardew and the lack of pieces from him. Birtwistle replied that in that sense ‘there was no programme’ and that the choice of works was more haphazard, not designed to project any particular:

______

In the 1965 programme for Sunday 15 August is a references to an exhibition that could be viewed during the interval. I asked Birtwistle about this:

______

One of the most public pairings that started at the WCSS is between Birtwistle and Stephen Pruslin. It dates more precisely the beginning of Punch and Judy.

______

Immediately after the 1965 WCSS, Birtwistle composed Verses, and work for clarinet and piano. I had attended a performance of it the evening before the interview, so I asked him about what was preoccuping him when he wrote it:

______

Since every good story needs some intrigue…:

______

Finally, I asked him for permission to use excerpts from the recording on this blog. It’s part of my ongoing working to record these conversations and for them to occur at the end of the interview, such that the interviewee knows what has been said and is best placed to grant meaningful permission. In this case, Birtwistle gave permission, the very topic sparking a tangential thought about how the WCSSs came about:

The greatest strength of Anderson’s work is to focus attention on the change in value of information. What was once a product is now given freely to heighten the value of another product. For this blog, conducting research involves monetary cost that is counterbalanced by my ability to sell the musicological skills that this blog displays. One of the frustrations (widely shared) of scholarly publishing is that word limits and reader interest restrict the level detail that can be disseminated in any one article of monograph. Data is deployed as necessary to providing evidence to support an argument. The problem for other researchers is that without the data sets (to borrow terms from scientific enquiry) the results are unable to be verified by repeated (and varied) analysis. Whilst my aim is not to prove the arguments I engage, nevertheless it is essential that I make available as much of the raw data of this research as possible. The first motivation for this blog was to make available details that I was unable to access during my doctoral studies. These details are for the most part of low level interest, but build a picture of a era and its contemporary understanding and will be useful for the research of others. One of the most exciting aspects of working with a blog is the ease with which different levels of data and argument can be connected and filtered.

Similarly, statistics such as ‘views per day’ and ‘referrer’ are available to me at the click of a button, bringing immediate feedback that shapes new avenues of research. Recently there were a large number of views referred to the blog by Wikipedia. For anyone interested in contemporary copyright issues Wikipedia is (and has been for some time) one of the most visible aspects of the changes in citation.

Over the past couple of months significant changes have been made to wikipedia’s Melos Ensemble article, which now includes information about their involvement with the Wardour Castle Summer Schools, using information from this blog. It’s information that is all clearly cited and it’s an excellent entry. One of the main contributors is identified by the name Gerda Arendt, who has also contributed articles on several of the Melos Ensemble’s members, and much else besides. What interested me was a discussion that took place on Arendt’s ‘user talk’ section of wikipedia. One of the posts, written by someone known as Eebahgum, included the following:

The Wardour Castle Summer Schools are indeed interesting: but Dr Hooper, the researcher in your link (external, a blog), has collected much information on the subject already, and lays it out as being his own research. In justice to him I would steer away from actually making an article on the subject as it is enough to redirect the reader to Dr Hooper’s webpage. You could also add in the other site (Boosey and Hawkes Composers site) with a timeline on Harrison Birtwistle which gives the dates and the fact that HB, Alexander Goehr and Maxwell Davies were co-founders and Tippett the President. That site also explains that the reason for the site being chosen was that Birtwistle held a teaching post at the school at New Wardour Castle and make the links accordingly. (00:40, 16 December 2009 (UTC))

Arendt replied with:

Thank you for your detailed response on my talk! I changed WCSS and incorporated your Boosey as ref. A no-blog source for the concerts there would be desirable but I don’t see one at the moment and think the special kind of programming there is worth mentioning, just the facts. (12:39, 16 December 2009 (UTC))

Two aspects of this are worthy of note. Firstly, the value of citing other research is alive and well, bolstered by a quest for accuracy. Secondly, the nature of this blog as a research project is helping to identify its contents as my work, to be cited rather than copied. Of course, I am pleased that the blog is useful for others in forming new understandings of what went on and its continuing significance and I look forward to its cited use in future wikipedia articles.

Finally, the information about links to this blog is presented to me as part of my work, not as something that I need actively to seek out. This means that I am better able to keep track of the aspects of the WCSS that need closer investigation. The recording company NMC linked to this blog in one of their tweets, which has directed people to listen to the comments by Bayan Northcott (one of NMC’s long-time associates) contained in several recent posts. NMC was alerted to by post about him by way of google alerts (as they will to this post, so hello!), and I have subsequently set up several of these to alerts me to new discussions of the Wardour Castle Summer Schools.

It’s nice when it all works and links together.

Sunday, 15 August at 8 p.m.

BETHANY BEARDSLEE, soprano

EMMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

STEPHEN PRUSLIN, pianoforte

I. Five Songs . . Schubert

Ganymed (Goethe)

Auflösung (Mayrhofer)

Nachtviolen (Mayrhofer)

Auf dem Wasser zu singen (Stoliberg)

An Sylvia (Shakespeare)

II. Chansons de Bilitis (Pierre Louys) . . Debussy

III. Sonata No. 13 in B-flat major for piano and violin, K. 454 . . Mozart

INTERVAL – 25 MINUTES

IV. Two Songs . . Schoenberg

Ich darf nicht dankend (Stefan George)

In diesen Wintertagen (G. Henckel)

Three Songs, opus 25 (Hildegard Jone) . . Webern

Wie bin ich froh

Des Herzens Purpurvogel

Sterne, Ihr silbernen Bienen

V. Philomel for soprano, recorded soprano, and synthesized sound . . Milton Babbitt

To begin, Northcott made some general remarks about Bethany Beardslee, one of the featured performers of the 1965 WCSS:

Monday, 16 August at 8 p.m.

BETHANY BEARDSLEE, soprano

Melos Ensemble

EMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

CECIL ARONOWITZ, viola

TERENCE WEIL, cello

COLIN CHAMBERS, flute and piccolo

GERVASE DE PEYER, clarinet

ALAN HACKER, bass clarinet

ERIC ROSEBERRY, piano

EDWARD DOWNES, director

I. Trio No. 1 in B-flat major for pianoforte, violin, and violoncello, opus 99 . . Schubert

INTERVAL – 25 MINUTES

II. Pierrot Lunaire, opus 21 . . Schoenberg

This was one of the most significant concerts of the 1965 summer school, and the impact of the Pierrot Lunaire here is deep and long lasting. Northcott suggests that this may well have been the genesis of the Pierrot Players. First, thought, he confirms some of Hugh Wood’s information about the lighting:

Northcott then describes the performance, particularly striking for its information about Maxwell Davies:

Tuesday, 17 August at 5 p.m.

RECITAL

by LEONARD STEIN, piano

Bagatelles . . Beethoven

Three Piano Pieces . . Alexander Goehr

Prelude for Piano and Tape . . Subotnick

(short pause)

Cocktail Music . . Salvatore Martirano

Piano Pieces OP. 23 . . Schoenberg

NB there was no performance of Boulez’s Third Piano Sonata as one of the earlier flyers had indicated. Part of Northcott’s response to my question about Boulez was to mention that Bill Colleran has set up a shop in the hall for the summer school, selling, amongst other things, Boulez’s Third Piano Sonata.

Wednesday, 18 August at 8 p.m.

Melos Ensemble:

EMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

KAY HURWITZ, viola

LEONARD FRIEDMAN, violin

CECIL ARONOWITZ, viola

TERENCE WEIL, cello

WILLIAM BENNETT, flute

ALAN HACKER, bass clarinet

ERIC ROSENBERRY, piano

STEPHEN PRUSLIN, piano

BARBARA ELSY, Soprano

PAULINE STEVENS, contralto

IAN PARTRIDGE, tenor

GEOFFREY SHAW, bass

ALEXANDER GOEHR, director

I. Busoni – Canonic Variations and Fugue for pianoforte on the theme of King Frederick the Great from Bach’s Musical Offering.

followed by

II. Bach – Six Part Ricercar from the Musical Offering.

The six-part ricercar, which follows the Busoni work, will be performed in an instrumental arrangement by Alexander Goehr.

III. Mozart: Quartet for flute, violin, viola, and violoncello in D major, K. 285

IV. Cantata on texts by Edward Benlowes . . Robin Holloway

First performance written for Summer School

V. Cryes of London . . Orlando Gibbons

VI. Fourteen Ways of Describing Rain . . Hanns Eisler

Holloway’s Cantata was performed only in part:

Thursday, 19 August at 5 p.m.

BARBARA ELSY, Soprano

PAULINE STEVENS, contralto

IAN PARTRIDGE, tenor

GEOFFREY SHAW, bass

TRISTRAM FRY, percussion

Aquil Altera . . Jacapo da Bologna

In tua memoria . . Arnold de Lantins

Westron Wynde . . Anon

Western Wind Mass . . John Taverner

Pause

Veni sancte spiritus . . Robert Sherlaw Johnson

(First performance written for Summer School)

Little Cantata of Proverbs (Blake) . . Alexander Goehr

_________

Sibylla Delphica

La nuit Froide et Sombre

Fuyone Tous

Bonjour mon coer

Ich weiss ich ein madlein . . Orlando di Lasso

Northcott’s comments here are more valuable for their suggestions of the flavour of the time than there are to the concert at hand. He begins with Alexander Goehr:

And continues with Bill Hopkins:

The earlier concert flyer had given Birtwistle’s Ring a Dumb Carillon as having it’s first performance at this concert. The published programme booklet (submitted to the Arts Council) didn’t list it as one of the pieces performed, but Northcott seemed to think that it was performed:

Friday, 20 August at 8 p.m.

EMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

LEONARD FRIEDMAN, violin

CECIL ARONOWITZ, viola

TERENCE WEIL, cello

WILLIAM BENNETT, flute

PETER GRAEME, oboe

WILLIAM WATERHOUSE, bassoon

NEIL SANDERS, horn

HILLARY WILSON, harp

BARBARA ELSY, soprano

PAULINE STEVENS, contralto

IAN PARTRIDGE, tenor

GEOFFREY SHAW, bass

MEMBERS OF THE SUMMER SCHOOL

LAWRENCE FOSTER, director

PETER MAXWELL DAVIES, director

I. Canon for Syntagma Musicum (1619) . . Michael Praetorius

_________

II. Dunstable:

voices and instruments: Sanctus and Agnus Dei

organ: Sub tuam protectionem

voices and instruments: Motet, “Veni Sancte Spiritus – Veni Creator”

III. (a) Plainsong, Gloria Tibi Trinitas

(b) Benedictus, from “Gloria Tibit Trinitas” Mass . . John Taverner

(c) In Nomine . . John Taverner

(d) In Nomine . . Thomas Tallis

(e) Gloria Tibi Trinitas . . John Blitheman

(f) Two “In Nomines” . . Peter Maxwell Davies

(g) Fantasia (In Nomine) . . Henry Purcell

The two new “In Nomines” use the plainsong, and the instrumental versions of the Tallis and Blitheman are by Maxwell Davies.

Tragoedia . . Harrison Birtwistle

First performance, commissioned by the Melos Ensemble for the Summer School

INTERVAL – 25 MINUTES

V. Motet – Ecce Manus Tradentis . . Peter Maxwell Davies

Again, this is one of the most significant concerts of the summer school. Northcott began his comments with the Maxwell Davies arrangement of Taverner, Tallis, Blitheman and Purcell. The programme here is slightly misleading, and the music performed is now entitled Seven In Nomine. Maxwell Davies’s website gives a programme note in which he writes that the first five were premiered at the Wardour Castle Summer School in ‘September [sic] 1965′ with the complete work performed for the first time in December 1965.

Then came Tragoedia. Northcott here is fascinating:

[Edit, 8 January 2010, Birtwistle indicated to me that the changes to Tragoedia were minor:

Northcott’s comments about the Times review (here) are here noteworthy and it seems likely that Northcott is right and that the entire work was performed in this concert. Northcott then moves on to Ecce Manus:

Saturday, 21 August at 5 p.m.

RECITAL

ROGER SMALLEY, piano

BRIAN DENNIS, baritone

WILLIAM YORK, clarinet

JOHN WHITE, tenor horn

Two Pieces from Amores for prepared piano . . John Cage

Last Pieces . . Morton Feldman

February Pieces I, II, III . . Cornelius Cardew

Neumes Rhythmiques

Ile de Feu I . . Messiaen

_________

Pause

_________

Piano Pieces . . Karlheinz Stockhausen

Two Poems of D. H. Lawrence

for baritone, clarinet, tenor horn, piano (1st performance) . . Roger Smalley

Participants’ Concert:

Bach: Double Concerto for 2 vioins in D minor. Leonard Freeman and Emanuel Hurwitz.

Bach: Cantata conducted by John Aldis and sung by participants. Solo parts by Barbara Elsy, Pauline Stevens, Geffrey Shaw and Ian Partridge.

March ‘Verdi’ from Macbeth played by Participants and conducted by Alan Hacker.

David Bedford: Dream of the Seven Lost Stars written for the Summer School and conducted by John Aldis.

I showed Northcott the above programme, and then some of the other information from different sources. He seemed vague about the other works, recalling clearly only the Bedford:

He began with some contextual remarks about the scene, and the position of Maxwell Davies, Birtwistle and Goehr.

First a comment about the number of people in attendence:

He continues, providing a context for understanding how they were able to draw so many participants:

On the morning of the first day, the participants made their way to Tisbury:

Upon arrival, Northcott first met Bill Hopkins and Robin Holloway:

On Saturday, 15th August there was a dinner and people explored the house.

On Sunday, 16th at 9am:
Composition class with Alexander Goehr, talking about rhythm and articulation

Then there was a rehearsal of the choir, conducted by John Alldis:

Lunch; then a composition class with Alexander Goehr:

Tea, then at 5.0 p.m. a lecture by Alexander Goehr:

Music in Our Time
ALEXANDER GOEHR will lecture on certain aspects of contemporary music with particular reference to works being performed in the evening concert.

Following the lecture was more choir practice, dinner and a concert by the Melos Ensemble, introduced by Michael Tippett:

8.30 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room

MUSIC IN OUR TIME
Introduced by Michael Tippett
A concert of contemporary English Music.
MELOS ENSEMBLE
Three Piano Pieces – Hugh Wood
Monody for Corpus Christi – Harrison Birtwistle
Piano Sonata – Anthony Gilbert
Second Piano Sonata – Michael Tippett
Five Little Pieces (first performance) – Peter Maxwell Davies
Suite Op.11 – Alexander Goehr

Monday, 17th, 9am:
Composition class with Hugh Wood, analyzing Schoenberg’s op. 19, no. 4:

Then more choir with Maxwell Davies, lunch and composition class with Alexander Goehr and Michael Tippett:

5.0 p.m:

Early Organ Music            Recital 5.0 p.m.
Peter Maxwell Davies will introduce and play early music on a newly restored Snitzler organ. Works by: Dunstable, Taverner, Byrd, Tomkins, Gabrielli, Scheidt, Zipoli etc.

Then a choir rehearsal with John Alldis, and the evening concert:

Chamber Concert 8.30 p.m.
Melos Ensemble
Pianoforte Trio in F sharp minor Haydn
Six Little Piano Pieces, op. 19 Schoenberg
Seven Sketches, op. 9 Bartok
Première Rhapsodie for clarinet and piano Debussy
Four Pieces for clarinet and piano, op.5 Berg
Fantasia in C minor, K475 Mozart
Trio for Piano, Violin and Horn, op.40 Brahms

Tuesday, 18th

Composition class at 9am:

then choir:

and composition class with Maxwell Davies, talking canonic and rhythmic aspects of his work, with an aside about Britten’s War Requiem [late in the interview Northcott clarified that this aside was actually made on the Friday, after the rehearsal for the evening concert at the Old Wardour Castle], Stravinsky’s Threni:

Quartet for the End of Time Lecture 5.0 p.m.
Olivier Messiaen, the Man and His Music
given by Hugh Wood

Then more choir, in Northcott’s account including Verdi’s Ave Maria and Bruckner’s Gradual: Christus factus est. Neither of these pieces appears in the published programmes:

The evening concert was as follows:

Clarinet Trio in E flat K498            Mozart
Four Impromptus, op. 142            Schubert
Quatuor pour la fin du temps Olivier Messiaen

The Melos Ensemble performed; Nortcott comments on their presence at the WCSSs:

Wednesday, 19th:

Instead of composition class, in the morning was the first workshop by members of the Melos Ensemble of works especially composed for the WCSS. All of those who had nominated themselves as composers were invited to write a work for this occasion. The pieces rehearsed were by Edward Cowie, Philip Pilkington. (LS100049, 33’57″)

Northcott didn’t attend the 5.0 p.m. recital of Bach, Rameau and Couperin, but did return for the evening discussion about opera:

Opera Today 8.0 p.m.
Alexander Goehr, Peter Maxwell Davies, Michael Tippett
Chairman: Harrison Birtwistle

Thursday, 20th:

The 9am composition class was devoted to listening to a recording Messiaen’s Turangalîla:

Northcott confirmed the McGaw recital as following the printed programme, with Mendelssohn, C.P.E. Bach and Satie. Northcott missed the Pruslin (then aged 24) lecture, Characterization in Mozart Opera.

Following the lecture was a concert including music by Cage and Feldman, put on by Roger Smalley and David Bedford, which doesn’t appear in any programmes:

Friday, 21st:

Owing to the ‘glorious weather’ Northcott took leave of the official routine and spent time talking to Patrick Carnegie.

After the break was a composition class, with Northcott’s piece being workshopped. The following is included for those interested in Northcott’s early composition:

After lunch, Northcott, with Edward Cowie and Maxwell Davies walked to the Old Wardour Castle, discussing conducting along the way. The evening concert took place there and there was a rehearsal.

8.30 pm Old Wardour Castle
Nocturnal
A concert in the open air of English and Italian echo-music from the 16th and 17th centuries for brass and voices
Given by: Gabrieli Ensemble and Choir conducted by Peter Maxwell Davies, Alexander Goehr.
Music by Maschera, Isaac, A and G. Gabrielli

Wood’s files included a document which gives the details of this concert:

Canzon Cornetto a 4 Scheidt
Quam Pulchra Es Dunstable
Courant Dolorosa a 4 Scheidt
Paduan a 4 Scheidt
Cor Mio, mentre vi miro Monteverdi
Air, Corante, Allemande, Corante, Saraband Cocke
INTERVAL
Sonata, Hora decima No. 6 Johannes Pezel
Sonata, Hora decima No. 39 Pezel
Adieu, Adieu, my heart’s lust Cornish
Fair Phyllis I saw Farmer
Draw on, sweet night Wilbye
April is in my mistress’s face Morley
Canzon Primi Toni a 8 Morley
Canzon Septimi Toni a 8 G. Gabrielli

Northcott comments on the concert, some of the problems in performance and confirms the contents of the concert.

Saturday, 22nd:

Most of the day was spent rehearsing for the evening participants’ concert.

The programme is as follows:

Concert 8.30 p.m.
Participants Concert
A concert given by the participants of the summer school
Conductors: John Carewe, Michael Tippett
Morgengesang C. P. E. Bach
Sequentia Sanctia Evangeli Secundam Lucan [sic, Sequentia Sancti Evangelii Secundum Lucam], in illo Tempore XXII 14-20 Peter Maxwell Davies
Ave Maria Verdi
Gradual: Christus factus est Bruckner
Music for a film scene Schoenberg
Canzona II David Ellis
Movement Neville Gambier
Castle Music Anthony Gilbert
Serenade Op.11 Brahms [three movements only]

Northcott’s comments here are especially enlightening, with asides about compositional priorities at the time (‘relevance’, ‘unity’) and the notion of basing works on early music. He neglects to mention Tippett’s Little Music for Strings, although he does mention Tippett as being there conducting the rehearsal for this.

The day ended with a late-night party.

Sunday, 23rd:

Bill Hopkins drove Northcott, Robin Holloway and Anne Carr-Boyd back to London.

[p 1]

Wardour Castle

Concerts and Lectures

16–22 August 1964

President Michael Tippett

Musical Director Harrison Birtwistle

Price 5’-

[p 2]

[map of Tisbury]

[p 3]

Contents

Acknowledgements                        4

The Composers and Artists            5

Programmes

16 August            Lecture            13

Concert            13

17 August            Recital            19

Concert            19

18 August            Lecture            25

Concert            25

19 August            Recital            31

Discussion            31

20 August            Recital            37

Lecture            37

21 August            Concert            41

22 August            Concert            41

[p 4]

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the Headmistress, Miss C. B. Galton, and the Governors of Cranborne Chase School for kindly allowing us to use the Castle, both for the Concerts and the Summer School; and the following people for their invaluable assistance:

Mrs. M. I. Mackintosh

Honorary Secretary

Mr. H. O. Young

Honorary Treasurer

Miss G. Selby-Smith

Honorary Librarian

Mrs. T. Hetherington

Miss Caroline Philips

Mrs. R. Porteous

Mr. Michael Thomas

for the loan of organ and harpsichord

The Revd. C. J. Godfrey

for the use of Donhead St. Andrew parish church

The Ministry of Works

for the permission to use the grounds of the Old Castle

Cover Design and Book            Anthony Denning

Programme Notes                        Anthony Gilbert

[p 5]

Notes on the Composers and Artists

[p 6/7]

Harrison Birtwistle

was born in 1934; he studied at the Royal Manchester College of Music and subsequently at the Royal Academy of Music. He is now teaching music at Cranborne Chase School. His works include: Refrains and Choruses, performed 1959 Cheltenham Festival; Music for Sleep, a work for children; Chorales for Orchestra; The World is Discovered, performed at this year’s I.S.C.M. Festival; Entr’acts and Sappho Fragments, performed at this year’s Cheltenham Festival; and Three Movement with Fanfares, commissioned by The Worship Company of Musicians for this year’s City of London Festival

Peter Maxwell Davies

was born in Manchester in 1934, and studied  1952-57 at Manchester University, and Manchester College of Music; 1957-58, Italian Government Scholarship; studied composition with Petrassi in Rome. Director of Music at the Grammar School, Cirencester, and for the past 18 months he has been at Princeton, New Jersey. His works include: Sonata for Trumpet and Piano, 1955; Five Piano Pieces, 1956; Alma Redemptoris Mater, 1957; St. Michael, for wind instruments first performed at the Cheltenham Festival, 1957; Prolation, for orchestra, 1958; Five Motets for a capella choir, 1959; O Magnum Mysterium, for choir, instruments and organ, 1960. His Sinfonia was presented at the Cheltenham Festival by the English Chamber Orchestra in 1962

Anthony Gilbert

was born in London in 1934. He started to study music in 1958; harmony and counterpoint with Anthony Milner; composition briefly with Mátyás Seiber; then since 1959 with Alexander Goehr. Works include: a Duo for Violin and Viola, a Serenade for Six Instruments (commissioned by the S.P.N.M.); and a recently completed Mass for choir and brass.

Alexander Goehr

was born in 1932 in Berlin. Son of the conductor Walter Goehr. Was brought to England as a baby and educated. Studied composition at Royal Manchester College of Music with Richard Hall, and in 1954 was awarded a French Government Scholarship and student at the Paris Conservatoire with Olivier Messiaen and Yvonne Loriod. For some years taught at Morley College and now works part time at the B.B.C., and its chairman of the Society for the Promotion of New Music. Principal works include: Sonata for Piano, The Deluge; Cantata after Leonardo da Vinci; Suters Gold; Cantata on a text by Eisenstein; Violin Concerto; and Little Symphony.

Michael Tippett

was born in 1905, and at the age of 18 entered the Royal College of Music where he studied composition with Charles Wood and R. O. Morris, and conducting with Sir Adrian Boult and Sir Malcolm Sargent. In the early ‘forties he was the Musical Director of Morley College and was closely associated with Walter Goehr, who have many first performances of his music from this period. Works from this period were: Concerto for Double String Orchestra; an Oratorio; A Child of Our Time; and the First Symphony. In 1953 Covent Garden gave the first performance of his first opera, A Midsummer Marriage. In 1953 his second opera, King Priam, was given its first performance in Coventry, late at Covent Garden. This Piano Sonata to be played tonight was written shortly after “King Priam” and was given its first performance by Margaret Kitchin.

Hugh Wood

was born near Wigan in Lancashire in 1932. He started to study music when he was 22; academic work with Dr. Lloyd Webber and later with Anthony Milner; composition with Iain Hamilton and then with Mátyás Seiber. His compositions include: a set of variations for viola and piano; instrumental songs to texts by Christopher Logue; a trio for flute, viola and piano; quartets, the second of which was commissioned by the B.B.C. for the 1962 Cheltenham Festival. Several of these pieces have been broadcast. He has taught at Morley College for five years and also, latterly, at the Royal Academy of Music. He is married to the pianist Susan McGaw.

[p. 8/9]

Richard Adeney

wad born in London in 1920. He studied music at Dartington Hall and the Royal College of Music. He is now the principal flute of the London Philharmonic Orchestra and English Chamber Orchestra. Hs is unmarried and keenly interested in photography.

Lucy Berthoud

was born in Hertfordshire in 1942. Three years later she went to live in New York and there, at the age of 11, started to learn the flute with Ruth Freeman of the Julliard School of Music. When she was 17 she came to England and studied at the Royal Academy of Music with Derek Honner; in 1963-64 she went to Paris to study with Fernand Caratgé

John Carewe

was born in 1934 and studied with Roger Desormiere, Walter Goehr and Olivier Messiaen. For several years assisted John Pritchard with the Musica Viva Concerts in Liverpool, and has appeared as conductor with principal orchestras in this country. Is particularly interested in performance of new music and has given many first performances of works by young English composers.

Lamar Crowson

was born in American but completed his musical training with Arthur Benjamin at the Royal College of Music, with he is now professor of the piano. Among the many awards he has won are the Chappell Gold Medal, the Harriet Cohen International Medal and two first prizes for chamber music at the Munich International Competition. His is will known for his solo and chamber music productions.

Barbara Elsie

was born in Yorkshire in 1938 and at the age of 16 won a three-year Scholarship to the Guildhall School of Music in London. Her teacher was Winifred Radford, with whom she still works. Her oratorio repertoire is extensive and she performs regularly with principal choral societies in Great Britain. Since her first important engagement at York Minister in 1959 she has broadcast a cantata for her, and consequently she was invited to take part in the first performance of his opera “English Eccentrics,” which had u

Osian Ellis

was born in Flintshire. He started to play the harp at the age of 10 and at 17 he won scholarships which took him to the Royal Academy of Music, where he is now a professor. He has brought the harp into great prominence with his concert appearances, recitals and broadcasts, and he has taken part in most of the major European festivals. His performance of Ravel’s Introduction and Allegro with the Melos Ensemble was awarded a Premier Prix in 1962 by the French Society of Authors and Editors of Music. Ossian Ellis is an authority on Welsh Folk Music.

Emanuel Hurwitz

was born and educated in England. At the age of 14 he won the Bronislaw-Hubermann Scholarship for the Royal Academy of Music which was adjudicated by Hubermann in person. In 1939 he became the youngest member of the London Philharmonic Orchestra; he has played solos and obligatos with his orchestras and has always been singled out by the critics for his excellent performances. Since the war he has been leader of the Jacques Orchestra and is now leader of the English Chamber Orchestra. In 1954 he formed a string ensemble which has gained considerable success playing music of the seventeenth-eighteenth centuries. He has been a member of the Melos Ensemble since 1955.

[p 10/11]

Margaret Kitchin

was born in Switzerland and studied with Jacqueline Blancard. She has played all over Europe, giving recitals and as a soloist with all the leading orchestras, playing classical and many modern works in which she specialises. She has given many first performance of modern works, including the Piano Sonata by Alexander Goehr, and work by Ian Hamilton, Peter Maxwell Davies, Peter Racine Fricker, etc.

Susan McGaw

studied at the Royal Academy of Music where she son the Liszt Scholarship and many other prizes. On leaving she won a Caird Scholarship and one from the French Government, and studied in Paris for two years with Yvonne Lefébure Since returning she has played regularly in London and the provinces. She is a frequent broadcaster. He husband is Hugh Wood. They have a son and daughter.

Gervase de Peyer

was a scholar at the Royal College of Music and completed his studying under Frederick Thurston in 1958. He has played for many of the London symphony and chamber orchestras and is at present principal clarinet in the London Symphony Orchestra. He is well known as a soloist and has performed with nearly all the major orchestras in the country under many well known conductors. He has also appeared at many festivals, including Edinburgh and Holland. He has made records for Decca, H.M.V., l’Oiseau Lyre and Parlophone.

Neill Sanders

was born in London in 1923, son of violinist, and has a brother who plays the flute. He won an open scholarship to the Royal College of Music in 1939, after which he did a season with the Scottish Orchestra before becoming principal horn with the L.S.O. He spent seven years with Denniss Brian in the Philharmonia Orchestra and is at present co-principal in the B.B.C. Symphony Orchestra.

Michael Thomas

is at present recording concerts and making permanent recordings of music of keyboard instruments of exceptional historical importance on the continent and in England and Ireland. During the past few years he has recorded recitals on most of the famous old harpsichords, organs and clavichords. He is a person who has made the most thorough study of the technique, phrasing and ornamentation of old music and has, through his long experience and experiments with old instruments, learned how these techniques may best be applied to the old instruments that were used in historical times.

Terence Weil

studied at the Royal Academy of Music, where he won numerous prizes for Chamber Music including the Sir Edward Cooper prize. He was a member of the Hurwitz String Quartet until it disbanded in 1951. He has been principal ‘cello of many chamber orchestras but is at present free-lancing. He is a founder member of the Melos Ensemble.

[p 12]

[advertisement, Universal Edition, for the path to the new music by Anton Webern]

[p 13]

Sunday 16th August

5.0 p.m. Lecture

in the Assembly Room

8.30 p.m. Concert

in the Assembly Room

[p 14/15]

Music in Our Time

Lecture 5.0 p.m.

ALEXANDER GOEHR will lecture on certain aspects of contemporary music with particular reference to works being performed in the evening concert.

Concert 8.30 p.m.

Introduced by MICHAEL TIPPETT

A concert of contemporary English Music

Promoted by: Institute of Contemporary Arts.

Society for the Promotion of New Music

Barbara Elsie            Soprano

Margaret Kitchin            Pianoforte

Peter Maxwell Davies            Pianoforte

Richard Adeney            Flute

Gervase de Peyer            Clarinet

Neill Sanders            Horn

Osian Ellis            Harp

Emmanuel Hurwitz            Violin

Terence Weil            ‘Cello

John Carewe            Conductor

Three Piano Pieces, op.5            Hugh Wood

These pieces were written for my wife to play, the first for a Wigmore Hall recital in January 1961, and the whole set for a midday recital at the 1963 Cheltenham Festival. the first, Lento, consists of a long tune with rises to a climax, after which some introductory material is heard again. The second, Energico, is the longest of the three, a rondo with episodes and an introduction; the first episode features constant trills, the second is lyrical, in a slower tempo. The main theme appears in a different register each time. The third piece, Calmo, is very short, reminiscent in its materials, valedictory in its nature.

[p 16]

Monody for Corpis Christi Harrison Birtwistle

[lyrics reproduced in original]

The first movement is a simple arch whose main member is the vocal line (to which all other parts are embellishments and from which they may be said to stem). Its rise and descent are emphasized by the gradual addition of instruments from the beginning and their subtraction towards the end, and by the gradually increasing complexity of the instrumental episodes separating the couplets.

This movement leads without a break into an instrumental fantasia Quasi fanfara in contrasting sections, at first very short and static, then longer and more flowing, the whole serving as a transition between the different levels of tension of the two movements for voice.

The third movement follows without interruption and again the overall form is very simple. Each stanza grows in intensity towards its end; in between the two there is a brief instrumental episode ending with a flute cadenza.

Sonata for Piano Anthony Gilbert

This sonata was written in 1961-62 and was first performed by Margaret Kitchin at the S.P.N.M. Cheltenham Festival concert in 1962. There are three movements:

1. Vivace. The overall shape is that of classical sonata form with two contrasting subject-groups, a bipartite section of development in which each group is treated in accordance with its individual character, and an elliptical reprise and coda.

2. Cantilena is a simple, song-type movement in three sections of continuous variation. The middle section, characterized by a pedal, forms a central point of repose for the whole sonata, while the third part recalls the other two and has the function of a coda.

[p 17]

3. Scherzo. This opens with two contrasting motifs and the first part of the movement is concerned with their development and gradual integration. As they become more completely combined the section reaches a climax which triggers off Trio 1, a set of short variations on a rhythmic motif. After a short link using first-section material there follows Trio 2, which is free and rhapsodic in character, and has echoes of the first and second movements. The final section is a telescoped and varied version of the first.

Sonata No.2 for Piano Michael Tippett

This Sonata was written early in 1962 and first performed by Margaret Kitchin at the

Edinburgh Festival of that year. It is in one continuous movement.

Composed very shortly after the completion of “King Priam,” the sonata derives form from the dramatic structure of at opera, and some of its materials from the orchestral piano part. It constitutes a complete departure from normal sonata procedure in that there is virtually no development; the sonata grows by statement – the constant addition of new material and by variation and repetition of material previously given. Constant use is made of new materials and by variation and repetition of material previously given. Constant use is made of contrasts: contrasts of texture, contrasts of tempi and timbres and contrasts between static and dynamic. Towards the end the phrases and motifs get shorter and tension grows until the final page, which is a coda concerned with the elimination of the principal motifs.

INTERVAL (25 minutes)

Five Little Pieces Peter Maxwell Davies

(first performance)

The five little piano pieces were composed between 1960 and 1962.

Suite, op. 11            Alexander Goehr

This work was commissioned by the Aldeburgh Festival Committee for the Melos Ensemble who gave its first performance in June, 1961. The object was to produce a piece of light, serenade-like character with an important part for flute and harp. There are five movements.

The first is a quick movement in three main sections. The first and second of these alternate two sharply distinguished types of material in continually varied forms; the third in contrast is a flowing section for solo flute with string accompaniment. There are two repeats: the first section is played again immediately, and the second again after the third.

The second movement is an Intermezzo for harp in improvisatory style. The structural principle is the note-by-note changing of two superimposed chords by pedal shifts.

The third movement is a Scherzo. This is very lightly scored, being almost all in one part over a pedal. Of its two main motifs, the first on the ‘cello is recognisable as the clarinet motif from the first movement in equal notes. Its “head” is used throughout the movement as a sort of punctuation mark dividing sections. The Trio comes right at the end and is for the three stringed instruments only; finally there is an eight-bar coda on scherzo material.

The fourth movement is an Arietta for solo flute, backed by a horn pedal of three notes, with brief answering figures on viola, ‘cello and harp.

The finale is a true Quodlibet in which short blocks of material from all the previous movements are juxtaposed mosaic-wise. There are two cadenzas: one for flute on Scherzo material, and one for harp on Trio material. The whole is held together by a horn-call which recurs like a rondo-theme, and whose origins are revealed to the sharp ear on its final appearance.

[p 18]

[Advertisement for UE composers Harrison Birtwistle and Hugh Wood]

[p 19]

Monday, 17th August

5.0 p.m. RECITAL

in the Old Kitchen

8.30 p.m. CONCERT

in the Assembly Room

[p 20/21]

Early Organ Music            Recital 5.0 p.m.

Peter Maxwell Davies will introduce and play early music on a newly restored Snitzler organ. Works by: Dunstable, Taverner, Byrd, Tomkins, Gabrielli, Scheidt, Zipoli etc.

The Organ

The organ belongs to Peter Maxwell Davies and was made by Snitzler in 1768.

Snitzler’s soundboards have little pallets directly under the keys which are operated by a pin on the underside of the key, thus giving an extremely light and responsive touch. The disadvantage of this method is that the wind channels are small, so that it is only possible to play three or four rows of pipes at once.

This organ originally possessed an ordinary stopped Diapason 8’, and open Diapason 8’ which contrasted with it, a Dulciana with tongues and beards, and a very small scale, also 8’, and small Dulciana Principle: the effect was rather soft and lacked virility. The pipes were therefore transposed to give a stopped Diapason and Principle, and the Dulcianas became the 12th and 15th. In this way the incisive Snitzler tone was immediately regained.

Chamber Concert            8.30 p.m.

Melos Ensemble

Lamar Crowson            Piano

Gervase de Peyer            Clarinet

Emmanuel Hurwitz            Violin

Neill Sanders            Horn

Terence Weil            ‘Cello

Pianoforte Trio in F sharp minor Haydn

Haydn’s Piano Trios belong rather to his piano music than to that for string ensemble. The keyboard plays a dominant part in all of them and the use of the violin, and particularly the ‘cello, is held by some authorities to be optional. The first editions describe them as “Sonatas pour le piano-forte avec accompagnement de violon et violoncello,” and the violin rarely goes above 2nd position, the ‘cello merely duplicating the bass of the piano.

This interesting work is one of a group of three composed in or before 1795 and dedicated to his English friend, Mrs. Schroeter.

There are three movements, the first of which, a sonata allegro, is notable for its wealth but as it reaches the dominant cadence it acquires a minor flavour, providing an excuse to plunge straight into A for the middle section. The procedure in reverse brings back the tonic towards the end.

The Finale is a Minuet in F-sharp minor of great beauty, with a trio consisting of the same material transplanted to the tonic major. Without going beyond the canons of Haydn’s normal minuet procedure, it provided a most satisfactory ending to the work.

[p 22]

Six Little Piano Pieces, op. 19            Schoenberg

Light, tender

Slow.

Very slow.

Quick, but light.

Somewhat quick.

Very slow.

The first five of these pieces were written on 19th February, 1911; the sixth was written in June, just four weeks after the death of Mahler, to whom it constitutes a kind of epitaph.

Around this time perhaps more than at any other period Schoenberg was preoccupied with problems of form – particularly of finding more appropriate vessels for his rapidly evolving atonality. There is no doubt that he was struck by the aphoristic manner of Webern’s op. 6, and particularly of the violin pieces op. 7, to the extent of being impelled to see what possibilities the very short form held for himself.

In addition, in these little pieces we find him for the first time calling into question the traditional relationship between melody and accompaniment, and investigating the possibility of more interesting functions for the latter. So, for example, in Nos. 1, 2 and 4 it becomes merely an extension or feature of the melody, serving to heighten its expressiveness in various ways, and No. 6, the strangest piece of all, is concerned with the almost elimination of both elements.

Seven Sketches, op. 9            Bartok

These piano pieces were composed between 1908-10, and are, in a way, a diary of Bartók’s development as a composer in these years. The first ones reflect his early preoccupation with western mannerisms – particularly impressionism; the later ones show his growing interest in the folk-idioms of his own land.

1. Portrait of a Young Girl: to wit, Marta Ziegler, its dedicatee, whom he married in 1909. A short piece in ternary form, betraying the influence of, surprisingly enough, Busoni in its harmonic style and its treatment of material.

2. A Swing. Two motifs are used in alternation: the first a rocking, polytonal figure, the second a bagpipe tune in not quite a whole tone scale.

3. is dedicated to Mr. and Mrs. Z. Kodály. The lack of title emphasizes Bartòk’s abandonment of impressionism; the piece is simply a rhapsodic melody unfolded in rubato-parlando style over an accompaniment of major tenths.

4. is another rhapsodic piece. After an 11-bar introduction a Hungarian-style melody is presented in varied forms over a florid accompaniment.

5. A Rumanian Folk Melody, and 6., a dance in the Valachian manner, are still closer to popular sources, and foreshadow the Bartók of Mikrokosmos.

7. In this piece, perhaps the most interesting of all the Sketches, brief modal phrases succeed one another with striking juxtapositions of tonality; there is a gradual metamorphosis to irregular rhythms and whole-tone scales, and in the long code to note-clusters.

Première Rhapsodie for clarinet and piano            Debussy

This piece was written in 1910 as a test piece for clarinet competitions at the Conservatoire at which it was Debussy’s duty to adjudicate. It was subsequently orchestrated (the style of the accompaniment seems to indicate that this was his intention all along) and in this form is said to have been regarded by Debussy as one of the most pleasing pieces he had written.

It is freely constructed (as befits a Rhapsody) from static blocks of contrasting material in three main categories: slow and dreamy, poco mosso and scherzando, sharply juxtaposed or joined by brief linking passages.

Four Pieces for clarinet and piano, op.5             Berg

These pieces were written in the summer of 1913, and are dedicated to Schoenberg’s “Society for Private Performances,” under whose auspices they were first played more than six years later. Their epigrammatic style is an untypical of Berg as Schoenberg’s op. 19, their obvious model, is of him.

1. The clarinet’s opening six-note figure is a skilful simultaneous exposition of all the motivic elements of the piece, which in any case all spring from the single governing principle of intervallic expansion. Its form is very simple – the piano and clarinet move in opposite directions to the central climax which is held for two bard and then quickly falls away to a code of static harmonies.

2. This utilizes the same motivic elements as No. 1 in a pianissimo conflict between two kinds of ostinato accompaniment in the piano and a simple melodic line in the clarinet. The climax is expressed without rising above p, simply being the point at which the conflict resolves in favour of one of the ostinati.

3. Another very quiet piece, falling into four sharply contrasted sections, the first two quick and nervous, the third slow and flowing and the fourth an elliptical reprise and headlong code to be played as quickly and quietly as possible.

4. This piece takes farther the idea inherent in No. 3. The contrasted sections, each characterized by a different ostinato, are again present (though the speeds are the reverse of those in No. 3); likewise the sonata-like reprise before the code. Now, however, in spite of the ostinato, the piece is not static: it is aimed at the explosive climax which ends the first part of the code. The coda proper is simply three bars of echo.

INTERVAL (25 minutes)

[p 24]

Fantasia in C minor, K475            Mozart

This piece, written in 1875 for his gifted pupil Thérèse von Trattner, is one of four Fantasias for the piano composed in Mozart’s later years. It was customary for him to precede performances of his sonatas with an improvised introduction in the same key; the present Fantasia, published by Mozart as a prelude to the Sonata K457, may be taken as a fairly close indication of the nature of these improvisations.

It is made up of five contrasted open-ended sections: the first Adagio, the second a D major episode in the same tempo, the third a stormy Allegro in two halves, linked by a brief cadenza to the fourth, Andantino in B-flat; the fifth is another stormy Allegro. The whole is rounded off by a recapitulation and code on first-section material.

The organization of keys is interesting. The first, third and fifth sections are unstable and constantly modulating, any affirmations of the home (or any) key being rigorously avoided. The second and fourth are anchor sections firmly in keys two removes [sic] from home on the dominant and the subdominant sides respectively – so that the acute ear may sense an implied tonic midway between. However, not until the final section is the home key reached and established.

Trio for Piano, Violin and Horn, op.40            Brahms

This is one of a group of works composed after Brahms’ resignation in 1864 as Director of the Vienna Choral Society. It is a very much a horn trio; the horn part is as it were the backbone of the work, and the character of all the melodic material is determined by its appropriateness to that instrument.

The first movement is an Andante of unusual design, with boldly planned key relationships. There are two balancing sections, each in two contrasting parts, organised as follows: Andante in E-flat (2/4 time); poco più animato in C minor and G minor (9/8); Andante in E-flat; poco più animato in E-flat minor and B-flat minor, leading to a final Andante in G-flat which modulates back to the home key at the final climax.

The Scherzo begins with a long (12-bar) upbeat to the principal motif, whose four bars of 2/4 rhythm in 3 contrast strikingly with the overall 3/4 pulse.  The whole of the first section is built up from the material of these first 16 bars – a secondary motif given out by the horn on the next page plays little part in the growth of the movement. The Trio in the subdominant minor is less exuberant and decisive in character; the melody owes its outline to the “upbeat” motif of the previous section. After 76 bars uninterrupted by any form of full cadence the Scherzo is given de capo.

In the third movement, Adagio mesto in E-flat minor, there are four sections whose exact symmetry and the economy of whose material are belied by the flowing, almost rhapsodic manner in which the music unfolds.

The Finale is a lively movement in sonata form, through whose many modulations the horn is handled with such adroitness that accidentals seldom appear in the part.

[p 25]

Tuesday, 18th August

5.0 p.m. Lecture

in the Assembly Room

8.30 p.m. Concert

in the Assembly Room

[p 26/27]

Quartet for the End of Time            Lecture 5.0 p.m.

Olivier Messiaen, the Man and His Music

given by Hugh Wood

Concert 8.30 p.m.

Members of the Melos Ensemble

Emmanuel Hurwitz            Violin [viola]

Gervase de Peyer            Clarinet

Terence Weil            Violoncello

Lamar Crowson            Pianoforte

Clarinet Trio in E flat K498            Mozart

Andante;

Menuetto;

Rondo – Allegretto

The year 1786 was a trying one for Mozart. He was heavily in debt, his newly completed Marriage of Figaro had been withdrawn after only nine performances, and he had lost his third son. Nevertheless in the space of only six months he managed to turn out eight masterpieces, of which this Trio is one. It was written for his friends Francisca Jacquin and Anton Stadler with Mozart himself playing the viola part.

The unusual choice of instruments gives a mellow, closely-knit ensemble capable of considerable expressive power, and it was no doubt with this possibility in mind that Mozart made the first movement an andante rather than an allegro, almost – but not quite – discarding the sonata in favour of the song-form. The movement grows continuously from the motif in the first bar, and very little other material is introduced,

The second movement is a vigorous Minuet with a Trio effectively contrasting the timbres of the clarinet and viola in dialogue.

The theme of the final Rondo springs from a fragment of the “2nd subject” in the first movement. Little important music is given to the viola in the first section, in order to heighten the effect of its striking C-minor entry in the second episode. Save for a few bars of A-flat melody in the central part, its rôle is secondary until nearly the end, during a final brilliant reworking of the Rondo theme.

[p 28]

Four Impromptus, op. 142            Schubert

This is the style under which, mainly for commercial reasons. Schubert published the first of four piano sonatas written during the last 10 months of his life. And although undeniably a sonata of sorts, there is a certain looseness about its construction which suits its new name better.

For instance, in the first movement, Allegro moderato, there is an F-minor first subject and an A-major second subject, but where we might expect a development there is a longish passage of new material which moves into all sorts of interesting keys but does not grow. This innovation is taken a step further when the passage is reintroduced in the recapitulation, and at last Schubert’s scheme – a simple binary form – becomes apparent.

The second movement, Allegretto, is a Sarabande and trio going hand in hand with the first movement in key and character.

The third, Andante, is a set of variations on a tune from Rosamunde.

The finale, Allegro Scherzando, is in clearly defined ABA form, but the manner of organising the material in the outer sections gives it certain Rondo characteristics. It is perhaps the most imaginative of the movement. Cross-rhythms abound, the harmonic structure is striking, and the lead back from the central to the final section is magical.

INTERVAL (25 minutes)

Quatuor pour la fin du temps Olivier Messiaen

“And I saw another might angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud, and a rainbow was on his head, and his face was as the sun, and his feet were as pillars of fire… and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot upon the earth… and standing upon the sea and upon the earth, lifted up his head to heaven; and he swore by him that liveth for ever… that time shall be no longer; but in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he shall begin to sound the trumpet, the mystery of God shall be finished…” (Apocalypse of St. Jonn, Chapter X).

Conceived and written during my captivity, the Quatuor pour la fin du temps was first performed in Stalag Villa on 15th January, 1941, by Jean le Boulaire (violin), Henri Akoka (clarinet), Etienne Pasquier (‘cello) and myself on the piano. It was directly inspired by the above quotation from the Apocalypse. Its musical language is essentially immaterial, spiritual, catholic. Modes which, melodically and harmonically, realize a kind of tonal ubiquity, being the listener nearer to eternity in space or the infinite. Special rhythms, not bound by regular metre, powerful serve to put the temporal at a distance. (All this is but mere tentative stammering if one thinks of the overwhelming grandeur of its subject).

This “Quartet” is in eight movements. Why so? Seven is the perfect number, the six days of creation sanctified by the divine Sabbath; the seven of rest extends into eternity and becomes the eight of undecaying light, of unalterable peace.

1. “Liturgy of Crystal.” Between three and four in the morning, the birds awaken: a blackbird or solo nightingale improvises, surrounded by a fine sprinkling of sound, a halo of trills lost high in the treetops. Transfer this to the religious place, and you have the harmonious silence of heaven.

2. “Vocalise, for the Angel who announces the end of Time.” The first and third parts (very short) evoke the power of this mighty angel arrayed in cloud with a rainbow upon his head, who places one foot upon the sea and the other foot upon the land. The “middle section” depicts the impalpable harmonic of heaven. Gentle cascades of orange-blue chords on the piano surround with their distant carillon quasi-plainchant recitatives on violin and ‘cello.

3. “Abyss of the birds.” Clarinet solo. The abyss is Time, with its sadness, its wearinesses. The birds are the opposite of Time; they are our desire for light, stars, rainbows and paeans of jubilation.

4. “Interlude.” A Scherzo, more extrovert in character than the previous movement, but linked with them, nevertheless, by a number of melodic “reminders.”

5. “Praise to the Eternity of Jesus.” Jesus is considered here as the Word. A long ‘cello phrase, infinitely slow, magnifies with love and reverence the eternity of this might and gently Word, “whose years shall never be exhausted.” Majestically the melody spreads out, into the tender and sovereign distance. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.”

6. “Dance of fury for the seven trumpets.” Rhythmically, this is the most characteristic piece of the set. The four instruments playing in unison take on the sound of gongs and trumpets (the first six trumpets of the apocalypse following by various catastrophes, the trumpet of the seventh angel announcing the consummation of the mystery of God. Use is made of added values, augmented or diminished rhythms, and non-retrogradable rhythms. Stone music, formidable granitic sound; the irresistible movement of steel, enormous blocks of purple fury, glacial drunkenness. Listen above all to the terrible fortissimo augmentation of the theme with its notes all changed in register which comes towards the end of the piece.

7. “A confusion of rainbows, for the Angel who announced the end of Time.” Certain passages for the second movement return here. The almighty Angel appears, and so, particularly, does the rainbow which he wears (the rainbow, symbol of peach, goodness, and of all vibration in light and sound). In my dreams I hear and see groups of chords and melodies, known colours and shapes; then after this transitory phase I move into the unreal and experience with ecstasy a whirling and mingling together of superhuman sounds and chords. These fiery swords, these torrents of blue-orange lava, these sudden starts: these are confusions, these are rainbows.

8. “Praise to the Immortality of Jesus.” A broad violin solo, acting as pendant  to the ‘cello solo of the 5th movement. Why this second praise? It is addressed more particularly to the second aspect of Jesus, to Jesus the Man, to the Word made flesh, returning immortal to give us His life. It is all love. Its slow climb to the heights is the ascension of man towards his God, of the child of God towards its Father, of the beatified creatures towards Paradise.

– And I say again what I said above: “all thus us but mere tentative stammering if one thinks of the overwhelming grandeur of its subject.’

(Notes translated from score by Anthony Gilbert)

[p 30]

At the age of 56, Olivier Messiaen is almost certainly the most distinguished composer working in Europe today. He was born in 1908 at Avignon, song of a Shakespearean scholar and a poetess. He entered the Paris Conservatoire when he was only 11, and there studied the organ under Marcel Dupré, theory under Maurice Emmanuel and composition under Paul Dukas. At 18 he won the first prize for counterpoint and fugue, and he went on to win first prizes for piano accompaniment, organ playing, improvisation, music history and composition. His first mature work was, like so much of his later output, for the organ: Le Banquet Céleste, written in 1928. The Eight Preludes for piano followed in 1929: it was on the recommendation of Dukas that they were published. In 1931 he was appointed organist at the Great Organ of Holy Trinity, Paris. Other works of these years include Les Offrandes oubliées, L’Ancension, the Theme and Variations for Violin and Piano, and the Nativité du Seigneur cycle for organ. In 1936 he appeared as the leader of a group of young musicians calling themselbes “La Jeune France,” the other being André Jolivet, Daniel Lesur and Yves Baudrier. In this year also he was appointed professor at the Ecole Normale and at the Schola Cantorum. Works 1936-39: Poemes pour Mi, Chants de terre et de ciel, and the Corps glorieué for organ.

Messiaen enlisted at the beginning of the war and was taken prisoner during the fall of France in 1940. It was in a German prison camp in Silesia that he wrote the Quatuor pour la fin du temps (1941). This work was the harbinger of the most prolific period of his career. He was repatriated to occupied France and then wrote the Visions de l’Amen for two pianos, for Trios petites liturgies de la Présence Divine (the first work of his to become widely known after the war), the immense piano work Vignt regards sur l’Enfant Jésus, the similarly large-scale song-cycle Harawi, and then his chef d’oeuvre the Turangalila Symphony. This was written in 1946-48 and has been performed many times all over Europe and in America since its first performance in Boston in 1949. In 1953 and 1954 two performance took place in London, conducted by Walter Goehr. The work has recently been recorded.

On his return to France, Messiaen had been appointed professor of harmony at the Conservatoire, and before the end of the war a lively group of young pupils had gathered themselves round him, including the 19-year-old Pierre Boulez. The title of his appointment was changed in 1947 to that of Professor of Aesthetics, rhythmic studies and of the analysis class; a wider range of pupils now included Karheinz Stockhausen, Jean Barraque, Yannis Xenakis and Gilbert Amy. During the years 1947-53 Messiaen gave classes at various musical centres, including Budapest, Sarrebruck, Tanglewood and Darmstadt. His Quatre Etudes de rhythme for piano was begun on Darmstaft in 1949, and this work has had a great influence on composers of the Darmstadt circle. Other works of this time: Canteyodjaya for piano; the Cinq Rechants for choir; the Messe de la Pentecote for organi; Le Merle Noir for flute and piano; and the Livre d’orgue.

During the last 10 years Messiaen’s name has become well-known all over the world and his importance recognised as one of the sources of new musical thought. Latterly his works are even to be heard in England, where in particular his organ music now received regular performances. A recent group of works springs from the composer’s lifelong preoccupation with bird-song: the Réveil des oiseaux (1953) for piano and orchestra; the Oiseaux exotiques (1956) for piano, wind ensemble and percussion, and the piano work Catalogue d’oiseaux (1959). More recent still is Chronochromie (1960), an important work for large orchestra, and the Haikai for piano and clarinet solo and chamber ensemble (1962).

Hugh Wood

[p 31]

Wednesday, 19th August

5.0 p.m. Recital

in the Old Kitchen

8.30 p.m. Discussion

in the Assemble Room

[p 32/33]

Flute and Harpsichord

Recital 5.0 pm

Lucy Berthoud            Flute

Michael Thomas            Harpsichord

Suite in D Major            Rameau

Sonata in B Minor            J. S. Bach

Ordre in B Minor            Couperin

Sonata No. 6 in E Minor            J. S. Bach

Rameau and Couperin

Couperin (Le Grand), 1668-1733. His music for clavecin was called “Ordres,” another name for suite. They were published between 1713-30 with varying numbers of movements, some with 10 or 15 and the longest 23. He was a master of a musical miniature and pieces include portrait studies and nature sketches, e.g. Les Tricoteuses and Les Petits Moulins a Vent.

Rameau, 1683-1764. He was the most prominent figure of his day in French opera but won fame in all musical arts including writing for the clavecin in which he followed Couperin. Picturesque titles of his music for harpsichord include La Poule and Les Tourbillons.            G.S.S.

Flute Sonatas J.S. Bach

Bach wrote six flute sonatas, the first three have a fully written up part for the right hand of the harpsichord and can, therefore, be regarded as trio sonatas with the harpsichord playing the solo melodic part as well as the base. No. 1 in B minor has a long first movement marked andante in which the flute and the harpsichord alternate in a long melodic line and, of course, often play the two subjects against each other. Indeed both subjects are played together in the very first line. The faster semiquaver subject can really be regarded as two parts in quavers, as is so common in much of Bach’s music, which looks like a single part. It contains no harmony but tonic and dominant till the third bar. The harmony changes abruptly when a chromatic movement is introduced. This is, of course, developed in the course of the movement. The middle section of the movement is a much lighter subject in quick moving triplets. This is perhaps the longest and one of the most beautiful movements in all the Bach sonatas. The 2nd movement, a largo, is really a development form the siciliano but considerable complications and additions have arisen in the rhythm by the second bar. The 3rd movement is a short movement marked presto and starts with a canon with the harpsichord following the flute nine bars later. This time there is a chromatic climbing movement. The movement is in the form of a fughetta without cadence to the end. The last movement is a jig but of the highly developed type and note suitable for dancing in so far as the first beat of the three semiquavers instead of being an articulated down beat is actually a sustained syncopation in the very first bar. Again this contains a canon but it is at the unison pitch instead of at the 5th, the harpsichord entering in the fourth bar. Bach’s flute sonata No. 6 begins with an adagio but which is a completely expressive work and it would be difficult to say that it was closely related to any of the dance movement but bears more resemblance to a slow movement by Quantz. The 2nd movement is allegro in straight-forward binary form and in the Italian style. The 3rd movement is again a siciliano. The 4th movement is allegro again in binary form.

[p 34/35]

The Harpsichord

While engaged in restoring harpsichords, Michael Thomas became interested in two types of this instrument, which seemed to him to be particularly fine: one being the Italian and the other the French type.

After much experimenting independent of any specific model, Michael Thomas constructed this instrument in which he has sought to incorporate the best qualities of each type.

He uses the light construction and small bridge found in the Italian model, thus giving it simultaneously a deep hollow resonance and an enormous harmonic range; and by bending the wood of the curved side only as far as it will naturally and easily go, he has obtained the depth of tone of the French instrument. A clear attack on each note is achieved by the use of quills for plucking the harpsichord.

Opera Today            Discussion 8.30 p.m.

Alexander Goehr, Peter Maxwell Davies, Michael Tippett

Chairman: Harrison Birtwistle

Opera Today

Michael Tippett’s activities in the operatic field are already well known to all. His two works for the stage, dating from 1952 and 1961 respectively, for which in both cases he was his own librettist, are among the most striking and original contributions to opera this century.

Peter Maxwell Davies has for the past two years been working on his first opera, based on the life of John Taverner, and now nearing completion.

Alexandr Goehr began, and abandoned, his first opera some years ago. Its subject was the Women of Troy, and a fragment survives in the orchestral work Hecuba’s Lament. His activities in recent months as musical director of various stage productions at the Mermaid Theatre have resulted in his increasing absorption with music on the stage, and he has recently been commissioned to write an opera on the play Arden of Feversham.

[p 36]

[advertisement for Schott’s composers: Banks, Blomdahl, Davies, Franciax, Fricker, Gilbert, Goehr, Hamilton, Hartman, Henze, Hindemith, Huber, Nono, Orff, Rainier, Schoenberg, Schuller, Searle, Seiber, Stravinsky and Tippett.]

[p 37]

Thursday, 20th August

5.0 p.m. Recital

in the Assembly Room

8.30 p.m. Lecture

in the Assembly Room

[p 38/39]

Matinee for Erik Satie            Recital 5.0 p.m.

Susan McGaw            Piano

Four songs without words Mendlessohn

F sharp minor op. 19, no. 5

B minor op.67, no. 5

F minor op. 62, no. 3

A minor op. 38, no. 5

1st Gymnopedies Satie

3rd Gnossiemme Satie

Vieux sequins et Vielles Cuirasses Satie

Passion [Prussian?] Sonata no. 6, A major [H.29?]           C. P. E. Bach

Allegro

Adagio

Allegro

Pieces friod 1st set            Satie

Airs a faire fuire Satie

Three songs without words Mendelssohn

G major op. 62, no. 1

D major op. 85, no. 4

A major op. 102, no. 5

Erik Satie: 1866-1925

The amount of discussion of a non-musical nature aroused by Satie’s eccentricities led people for many years almost to forget he was a musician; now, with the arrival of new eccentrics on the musical scene, most people have even forgotten Satie the lunatic. Even when, at the age of 54, he suddenly found himself hailed as leader of the Parisian avant-garde, it was less as a musician than as High Priest of a new aesthetic cult devised by Cocteau that he was worshipped, and rarely at any period since his death have any but a dwindling number of devotees taken the trouble to disregard the funny words and listen simply to his music.

This is a pity, because although undeniably a most interesting character in many ways, it is in the light of his contribution as a composer pure and simple that he new deserves to be considered.

Maybe he never produced a large-scale masterpiece, and maybe his influence is not as profound or as far-reaching as other influences this century; nevertheless, musically he is a true original, and the best of his work has a timeless quality that puts it in another category altogether from all the bizarrerie.

His was a fairly prolific composer, the bulk of his output being for the piano, either solo or duet, and this portion of his work contains his best and most characteristic pieces. Few of them are long; most are in groups, generally of three; and quite often, like the Gymnopédies and the Sarabandes, they are just three ways of looking at the same idea.

He had a way of anticipating points of technique in other composers by some 15 or 20 years. In his earlier piano pieces are to be found harmonic innovations used much later by Debussy and Ravel; slightly later pieces gave Stravinsky his mechanical accompaniment figures, and in later ones still, in particular the “3 Valses du Précieux Dégoûté” and the 20 “Sports et Divertissements,” his masterpiece, we find utilizes Messiaen’s techniques of incantatory repetition and the systematic juxtaposition of brief unrelated phrases.

The groups of pieces we are to hear this afternoon are among his best-known and least-known works. The Gymnopédies were published in 1887 and quickly achieved popularity; Vieux Séquins et Vielles Cuirasses (1914) belongs to a period of advanced buffoonery through which Satie went during the years following his celebrated return to the Schola Cantorum

[p 40/41]

Lecture 8.30 p.m.

Musical Characterization in Mozart Opera

with particular reference to Don Giovanni

Stephen Pruslin, Princeton University

Friday, 21st August

8.30 p.m. Concert

at Old Wardour Castle

Saturday, 22nd August

8.30 p.m. Concert

at Donhead St. Andrew Parish Church

[p 42/43]

Concert 8.30

Nocturnal

A concert in the open air* of English and Italian echo-music from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries for brass and voices.

Given by: Gabrieli Ensemble and Choir conducted by Peter Maxwell Davies, Alexander Goehr.

Music by: Maschera, Isaac, A. and G. Gabrieli, Locke, etc.

* Under cover if wet

Concert 8.30 p.m.

Participants Concert

A concert given by the participants of the summer school

Conductors: John Carewe, Michael Tippett

Morgengesang C. P. E. Bach

Symphony Haydn

Sequentia Sanctia Evangeli Secundam Lucan [sic, Sequentia Sancti Evangelii Secundum Lucam], in illo Tempore XXII 14-20 Peter Maxwell Davies

(first performance written for the summer school)

Fantasias Gibbons

For these concerts a more comprehensive programme will be available on the day.

This stage of trust typically arises in response to previously published work, either in the form of other studies made by the researcher that establish a reputation, or in direct response to the research at hand, in the form of a post-publication revisiting.

There is also another, potentially less positive, side to this situation, since Northcott’s first words (that gaps as exposed in the blog can be filled) shapes the information that he gives. In this regard I am fortunate that Northcott had kept a diary for the duration of the WCSSs and that the interview followed his entries alongside the concert programmes. This focussed the interview as an interaction designed to give me as complete a picture as possible of the events as they unfolded. I am also grateful for the generous time that Northcott devoted to the discussion, which meant that a whole range of subjects could be covered, in some cases for multiple times (each with new information and ideas). In any case, the shaping of new information due to past research is one of the primary ideas charted by the methodology of this blog.

Northcott’s diary is clearly an excellent resource, which enabled him to provide unprecedented detail of the WCSSs. It is a document of which I have no copy:

In 1905 Cézanne wrote a letter to Emile Bernard in which he commented that ‘time and reflection […] modify little by little our vision, and at last comprehension comes to us.’ This quote comes from the article ‘Making Space: The Purpose and Place of Practice-led Research’, written by Graeme Sullivan (2008). It’s a nice idea, and also one that belongs to an earlier era, when stating the concept that ‘comprehension could be attained’ was still possible. In this postmodern time such utopias seem naïve, yet the notion that action and reflection are bound in an iterative cycle of alteration and modification is one that this talk will explore.

This is right and proper, since it relates to a topic that happened ‘before my time’ (the mid-1960s) in a country from which I was once geographically disconnected (in Wiltshire). The way in which I am going about uncovering its contours is one that relies on recognizing the iterative nature of research, the way that this process impels further inquiry, and the reflective scepticism that it engenders.

To Cézanne’s ‘little-by-little’ modification I will add precarious moments of clarity, confusion and boredom that also shape the research process, enabling and disabling potential outcomes in future writing. I will discuss this in terms of categories and tags when I explain my working with a blog.

My research into the Wardour Castle Summer Schools seeks to clarify the events in terms of who was there, what went on, what its impact was and how it has been documented. It also seeks to track the process of research and to be attentive to the choices made in documentation. In bringing these forces together, my research adopts forms that complicate, confuse, blur and reconfigure research and publication. My methodologies above all emphasise the little-by-little modification of my vision of these events, to understand better how there were comprehended, as well as my own comprehension of them. It’s research that is led by my practice of composing a new idea of the Wardour Castle Summer Schools.

Earlier I mentioned Cézanne, before immediately moving away from it, critiquing Cézanne’s comments and opening up space for positioning my research in relation to the research-led and practice-led methodologies that provided the impetus for the book in which Cézanne is quoted. My research responds to the literature of this debate, as well as forging idiosyncratic methodologies that suit my topic. If my reference to Cézanne is unconvincing, it’s because I am skeptical, but such a problem need not be debilitating, since it enables new thoughts: a modification of vision. In this specific case, I know that finishing reading the book will prompt some major changes in my methodology and critical stance. With major changes looming it’s important that I clarify where I am now, so I know what’s changed. More generally, this is research in progress, unstable, subject to contradiction and alteration. It’s also research that is flexible, prone to following fashions that indicate the possibility of shared understanding. Responding to last week’s seminar, I want to re-begin this seminar with a quote from Jorge Luis Borges:

On Exactitude in Science

In that Empire, the Art of Cartography attained such Perfection that the map of a single Province occupied the entirety of a City, and the map of the Empire, the entirety of a Province. In time, those Unconscionable Maps no longer satisfied, and the Cartographers Guilds struck a Map of the Empire whose size was that of the Empire, and which coincided point for point with it. The following Generations, who were not so fond of the Study of Cartography as their Forebears had been, saw that that vast Map was Useless, and not without some Pitilessness was it, that they delivered it up to the Inclemencies of Sun and Winters. In the Deserts of the West, still today, there are Tattered Ruins of that Map, inhabited by Animals and Beggars; in all the Land there is no other Relic of the Disciplines of Geography.

Suarez Miranda,Viajes de varones prudentes, Libro IV,Cap. XLV, Lerida, 1658 (Borges, 1999)

Predating last week’s seminar by a week I wrote:

In mapping the ‘lieux de memoire’ of these events, my map-making needs to embrace modernism’s lessons and to inhabit the tattered ruins of previous maps, by which I mean to be creative in the patchiness of memory rather than to focus on finding the edges of its tatters as a precursor to sewing it together.

I then discussed the work of Otto von Busch, a Swedish fashion theorist with a speciality in hacking fashion.

Before this is dismissed as too tangential from my research it is worth considering a juxtaposition. Firstly, Otto von Busch, again.

Compare that with the following quote from Graeme Sullivan, writing about Cézanne:

A […] lesson to be taken from artistic and scientific investigations of a century ago is the realisation of the necessity of communicating across fields of inquiry. [….] Coming to understand the interconnections among visual forms, patterns of inquiry and different perspectives offers the possibility of  making intuitive and intellectual leaps towards the creation of new knowledge. (Sullivan 2009, 43)

The link between these two theorists is a meta-methodological one. If you look up ‘metamethod’ in the 2009 book Fieldwork Is Not What It Used To Be: Learning Anthropology’s Method in a Time of Transition, one is directed to the index entry on ‘craft culture’. At the risk of stammering, the meta-metamethodological content of this book sews together the tatters of map anew to connect method and craft with conceptions about both method and craft.

(As an aside, Steven Connor’s work on stammering and Alvin Lucier is fascinating. http://www.stevenconnor.com/phonophobia/ See too Borges on Funes ‘a certain stammering greatness’ for his mind is ‘folded in on itself’ (Connor))

The point is that Fieldwork Is Not What It Used To Be is a book that reflects a postmodern way of working, where hierarchies can be connected in new ways to destabilize old ideas. In this case there is a new connection between metamethodology and professional craft, that is, the practice of undertaking fieldwork, which is as practical as anthropology gets. The map has been connected in new ways, no longer reliant on linear connections represented by ratios of scale.

If this is post-Borges in its conception of mapping, then it’s interesting to consider the recent story about the fictitious town Argleton, reported widely in the press this week. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/nov/03/google> Borges’ fictions seem alive and well.

There is another reason that I refer to Fieldwork Is Not What It Used To Be, since it is a text written by professors and their best former students who worked together at Rice University. The book is motivated by a shift in what students wanted from the 1980s, where theory was taught prior to practice, to today, when most graduate students within universities already have experience working with NGOs and other places where they are practising fieldwork (17). Rather than simply reworking new syllabuses, the book seeks to engage in new ways of thinking, lead by the young practitioners in the discipline. This may go some way to explaining the particular methods I have chosen for my research. It also recalls Neil Heyde’s comments in the first of this year’s seminar’s about this as a forum for working through new problems.

If my talk still seems to tangential, then it’s time to tell you more about the Wardour Castle Summer Schools, and the ways in which some tangents become centres.

Taking place in 1964 and 1965 these events brought together a wide range of composers who later formed the core and the tangent of British music making. Darmstadt and Dartington brought leading composers and performers in contact with those less experienced, in lectures and concerts. Wardour Castle fostered a culture of discussion among the UK’s young practitioners.

You can find this text on my blog, and if you have anything to add, do use the comment option.

Forgetting:

Recently the New Scientist reviewed two books. One on remembering everything, one on the virtue of forgetting. Yadin Dudai on remembering:

The scheme seems ingeniously simple and technically feasible. To overcome oblivion, say the authors, all you need are sensitive miniature sensors and several terabytes of storage, which are already or soon-to-be affordable. You can then record every minute of your life using video, audio, location and physiological signals, culminating in the commitment of this endless stream of information to your personal MyLifeBits account in your pocket and/or in cyberspace. Proper software will permit you to retrieve the information years later, and it will even pass by default to your progeny for eternity, with the hope that they will pay attention to it.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427311.700-memory-and-forgetting-in-the-digital-age.html

Part of Microsoft’s research project includes new work on ways of annotating, hyperlinking, and full-text transcription of a life’s experience. http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/mylifebits/

Yadin Dudai’s critique utilizes the lastest scientific research on brain function:

as cognitive psychology and neuroscience demonstrate again and again, two individuals sensing the same input, or the same individual sensing the same input at different times, may understand very different things. So registering bits of episodes is unlikely to really preserve these episodes. [….] Most importantly, though, the authors, consumed by their hunt for every last bit of information (and even offering practical advice on how to make an extra buck in the process), forget forgetting.

Dudai then continues, stating that ‘for the human condition, forgetting is at least as important as remembering – sometimes more so.’ He then gives two examples, one a real mnemonist, Solomon Shereshevsky, and other ‘Funes the Memorious’, the subject of Borges’s fictional story from the 1940s. Funes’ reconstruction of an entire day takes an entire day. Borges:

‘To think is to ignore (or forget) differences, to generalize, to abstract.’ (Borges 1999, 137)

To an extent about which I cannot be precise, loss of memory of details and the unmemorability of the events are entangled.

My methodology extends from this position, and seeks not to try to record everything, nor to gather all the facts. When Michael Hall told me that he wouldn’t let me listen to his recordings made with composers I was glad. Some of those composers are now dead. So too was David Lumsdaine when we first met:

I first met David Lumsdaine in November 2003. I had travelled from my home in Sydney’s South to Cremorne, on the Lower North Shore, hoping to interview him. Before I asked any questions, he explained to me that he was a ghost, for, as a composer, he had died years before. He then described something of the trauma of this death. The conversation continued until he was assured that I understood that any answers he gave to my questions were as reliable as those divined by a spirit‐medium. When it seemed that this was understood, he allowed me to turn on my microphone, and the interview commenced.

The recording of that conversation, like subsequent discussions I have had with Lumsdaine, occupy a ground between the supposed voices of the dead captured on tape, and insightful thoughts by a commentator intimately familiar with the music. (Hooper, 2008)

My methodology is grounded on the importance of disciplined creativity in the face of forgetting, of sewing the tatters of the past together into new forms. In so doing I am aiming to generalize and to abstract. To a large extent, that is why the focus of this talk is not on the events of the 1964 and 1965 Wardour Castle Summer Schools, which I have published online to be viewed by all those with an interest.

When documenting, it’s important for me to forget, but also to record decisions that lead to forgetting, since they are the records that enable me to join together different levels of abstraction and to hone a methodology that engages with the disciplines of musicology, anthropology, design and fashion.

Busch, Otto von (2009), talk at the RSA http://www.thersa.org/events/audio-and-past-events/2009/hacking-design–folly,-theft-or-a-new-democratic-dawn

Borges, Jorge Luis (1999) Collected Fictions trans. Andrew Hurley (Penguin).

Fieldwork is nor what it used to be

Hooper, Michael (2008) The Music of David Lumsdaine 1966-1980 (PhD thesis).

Mayer-Schönberger, Viktor (2009) Delete: The virtue of forgetting in the digital age (Princeton University Press).

Sullivan, Graeme (2009) ‘Making Space: The Purpose and Place of Practice-led Research), Practice-led Research: Research-led Practice in the Creative Arts, H. Smith and R. T. Dean (eds) (Edinburgh University Press).

The comments are those by Hugh Wood. As further composers are interviewed their comments will be added alongside those by Wood.

[5]

WARDOUR CASTLE SUMMER CONCERTS

President: MICHAEL TIPPETT

FaldDirector: HARRISON BIRTWISTLE

[7]

Sunday, 15 August at 8 p.m.

BETHANY BEARDSLEE, soprano

EMMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

STEPHEN PRUSLIN, pianoforte

I. Five Songs . . Schubert

Ganymed (Goethe)

Auflösung (Mayrhofer)

Nachtviolen (Mayrhofer)

Auf dem Wasser zu singen (Stoliberg)

An Sylvia (Shakespeare)

[…]

[8]

II. Chansons de Bilitis (Pierre Louys) . . Debussy

[…]

III. Sonata No. 13 in B-flat major for piano and violin, K. 454 . . Mozart

[…]

[9]

INTERVAL – 25 MINUTES

(During the interval you are invited to view the exhibition of painting and sculpture, which is in the centre of the castle. The bar is also open.

__________

IV. Two Songs . . Schoenberg

Ich darf nicht dankend (Stefan George)

In diesen Wintertagen (G. Henckel)

Three Songs, opus 25 (Hildegard Jone) . . Webern

Wie bin ich froh

Des Herzens Purpurvogel

Sterne, Ihr silbernen Bienen

[…]

[10]

V. Philomel for soprano, recorded soprano, and synthesized sound . . Milton Babbitt

[…]

[11]

Monday, 16 August at 8 p.m.

BETHANY BEARDSLEE, soprano

Melos Ensemble

EMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

CECIL ARONOWITZ, viola

TERENCE WEIL, cello

COLIN CHAMBERS, flute and piccolo

GERVASE DE PEYER, clarinet

ALAN HACKER, bass clarinet

ERIC ROSEBERRY, piano

EDWARD DOWNES, director

I. Trio No. 1 in B-flat major for pianoforte, violin, and violoncello, opus 99 . . Schubert

[…]

INTERVAL – 25 MINUTES

[…]

[12]

II. Pierrot Lunaire, opus 21 . . Schoenberg

[…]

[16]

Tuesday, 17 August at 5 p.m.

RECITAL

by LEONARD STEIN, piano

BAGATELLES . . Beethoven

THREE PIANO PIECES . . Alexander Goehr

PRELUDE FOR PIANO AND TAPE . . Subotnick

(short pause)

COCKTAIL MUSIC . . Salvatore Martirano

PIANO PIECES OP. 23 . . Schoenberg

[17]

Wednesday, 18 August at 8 p.m.

Melos Ensemble:

EMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

KAY HURWITZ, viola

LEONARD FRIEDMAN, violin

CECIL ARONOWITZ, viola

TERENCE WEIL, cello

WILLIAM BENNETT, flute

ALAN HACKER, bass clarinet

ERIC ROSENBERRY, piano

STEPHEN PRUSLIN, piano

BARBARA ELSY, Soprano

PAULINE STEVENS, contralto

IAN PARTRIDGE, tenor

GEOFFREY SHAW, bass

ALEXANDER GOEHR, director

I. Busoni – Canonic Variations and Fugue for pianoforte on the theme of King Frederick the Great from Bach’s Musical Offering.

followed by

II. Bach – Six Part Ricercar from the Musical Offering.

[…]

The six-part ricercar, which follows the Busoni work, will be performed in an instrumental arrangement by Alexander Goehr.

[18]

III. Mozart: Quartet for flute, violin, viola, and violoncello in D major, K. 285

[…]

IV. Cantata on texts by Edward Benlowes . . Robin Holloway

First performance written for Summer School

[…]

[19]

[…]

V. “Cryes of London” . . Orlando Gibbons

[…]

VI. “Fourteen Ways of Describing Rain” . . Hanns Eisler

Thursday, 19 August at 5 p.m.

BARBARA ELSY, Soprano

PAULINE STEVENS, contralto

IAN PARTRIDGE, tenor

GEOFFREY SHAW, bass

TRISTRAM FRY, percussion

AQUIL ALTERA . . Jacops [sic] da Bologna

IN TUA MEMONIA [sic]  . . Arnold de Nantins [sic Lantins]

WESTRON WYNDE . . Anon

_________

WESTERN WIND MASS . . John Tavener [sic]

[…]

Pause

VENI SANCTE SPIRITAS [sic] . . Robert Sherlan [sic] Johnson

(First performance written for Summer School)

LITTLE CANTATA OF PROVERBS (Blake) . . Alexander Goehr [John Alldis launched the John Alldis Choir with its premiere in 1962 1]

_________

SIBYLLA DELPHIA [sic]

LA NUIET [sic] FROIDE ET SOMBRE

FUYONS TOUS

BONJOUR MON COER

ICH WEISS MICH [sic] EIN MADLEIN [sic] . . Orlando di lassus [sic]

[21]

Friday, 20 August at 8 p.m.

EMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

LEONARD FRIEDMAN, violin

CECIL ARONOWITZ, viola

TERENCE WEIL, cello

WILLIAM BENNETT, flute

PETER GRAEME, oboe

WILLIAM WATERHOUSE, bassoon

NEIL SANDERS, horn

HILLARY WILSON, harp

BARBARA ELSY, soprano

PAULINE STEVENS, contralto

IAN PARTRIDGE, tenor

GEOFFREY SHAW, bass

MEMBERS OF THE SUMMER SCHOOL

LAWRENCE FOSTER, director

PETER MAXWELL DAVIES, director

I. Canon for Syntagma Musicum (1619) . . Michael Praetorius

[…]

_________

II. Dunstable:

voices and instruments: Sanctus and Agnus Dei

organ: Sub tuam protectionem

voices and instruments: Motet, “Veni Sancte Spiritus – Veni Creator”

[…]

[22]

III. (a) Plainsong, Gloria Tibi Trinitas

(b) Benedictus, from “Gloria Tibit Trinitas” Mass . . John Taverner

(c) In Nomine . . John Taverner

(d) In Nomine . . Thomas Tallis

(e) Gloria Tibi Trinitas . . John Blitheman

(f) Two “In Nomines” . . Peter Maxwell Davies

Commissioned by Melos Ensemble for Summer School

(g) Fantasia (In Nomine) . . Henry Purcell

[…]

The two new “In Nomines” use the plainsong, and the instrumental versions of the Tallis and Blitheman are by Maxwell Davies.

TRAGOEDIA . . Harrison Birtwistle

First performance, commissioned by the Melos Ensemble for the Summer School

[…]

[23]

INTERVAL – 25 MINUTES

[…]

V. Motet – Ecce Manus Tradentis . . Peter Maxwell Davies

[…]

[24]

Saturday, 21 August at 5 p.m.

RECITAL

ROGER SMALLEY, piano

BRIAN DENNIS, baritone

WILLIAM YORK, clarinet

JOHN WHITE, tenor horn

TWO PIECES from AMORES for prepared piano . . John Cage

LAST PIECES . . Morton Feldman

FEBRUARY PIECES I, II, III . . Cornelius Cardew

NEUMES RHYTHMIQUES

ILE DE FEU I . . Messiaen

_________

Pause

_________

PIANO PIECES . . Karlheinz Stockhausen

TWO POEMS of D. H. LAWRENCE

for baritone, clarinet, tenor horn, piano (1st performance) . . Roger Smalley

_________

These concerts are given with the support of the Arts Council of Great Britain

A letter from the WCSS treasurer, H. O. Young to the Arts Council clarified the programme with information about a participant’s concert:

The sixth concert was on Saturday and describted as the ‘Participants Concrt [sic]‘. It was made up of the following items:-

Bach    Double Concerto for 2 violins in D minor. Leonard Freedman and Emmanuel Hurwitz.

Bach    Cantata conducted by John Alldis and sung by participants.  Solo parts by Barbara Elsy, Pauline Stevens, Geffrey Shaw and Ian Partridge.

March ‘Verdi’ from Macbeth played by Participants and conducted by John Alldis.

The concert was well attended and included in the average attendances as stated. (ACGB/51/1265)

[Wood on John Alldis:]

Music for a film scene [sic] Schoenberg

Canzona II David Ellis

Movement Neville Gambier

Castle Music Anthony Gilbert

Little Music for Strings Michael Tippett

Serenade Op.11 Brahms

This is a fascinating programme, and it includes works by Ellis and Gilbert no longer in their catalogue. Hopefully my meeting with Anthony Gilbert will clear up whether or not this took place, and if it did, its date, location and performers. I still have little idea who Neville Gambier was.

The following clip is Wood’s reaction to this concert, making clear his memory of its occurrence, and on the difficulty of clarifying the details of the programme.

Further to this post, this list of works is part of the participants’ concert given on the final evening. For more details see this post.

1964:

Roger Smalley, John Bulley (sp?), Bill Hopkins, Robin Holloway, David Ellis, David Bedford, Edward Cowie, Brian Ferneyhough?.

1965:

Bayan Northcott, Stephen Arnold, William Coates, Brian Ferneyhough.

Wardour Castle Summer Concerts

16-22 August, 1964

President: MICHAEL TIPPETT

Musical Director: HARRISON BIRTWISTLE

These concerts run concurrently with the Wardour Castle Summer School.

Sunday 16 August

8.30 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room

MUSIC IN OUR TIME

Introduced by Michael Tippett

A concert of contemporary English Music.

Promoted by: Institute for the Promotion of New Music

Morag Noble – Soprano

Margaret Kitchin – Pianoforte

Peter Maxwell Davies – Pianoforte

Melos Ensemble

Three Pieces for Piano – Hugh Wood

Suite for String Trio (first performance) – Neville Gambier

Piano Sonata – Anthony Gilbert

Second Piano Sonata – Michael Tippett

Monody for Corpus Christi – Harrison Birtwistle

Five Little Pieces (first performance) – Peter Maxwell Davies

Suite Op.11 – Alexander Goehr

Monday 17 August

8.30 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room

Chamber Concert

Melos Ensemble

Pianoforte Trio, F sharp minor – Haydn

Six Little Pieces – Bartok

Seven Sketches – Debussy

Première Rhapsody – Debussy

Vier Stüke – Berg

Fantasia in C Minor, K. 475 – Mozart

Horn Trio on E flat, Op.40 – Brahms

Tuesday 18 August

5.0 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room.

Lecture: Oliver Messiaen, The Man and His Music

Given by Hugh Wood

Wednesday 19 August

8.30 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room.

Discussion: Opera Today

Alexander Goehr, Peter Maxwell Davies, Michael Tippett.

Chairman: Harrison Birtwistle

5.0 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Rooms.

A Matinee for Erik Satie

Given by Susan McGaw – pianoforte

Gymnopédies – Satie

Sonatas – C. P. E. Bach

Vieux sequins et Vieilles Cuirasses – Satie

Songs without Words – Mendelssohn

Jack-in-the-Box – Satie

Friday 21 August

8.30 pm Old Wardour Castle

Nocturnal.

A concert in the open air* of English and Italian echo-music from the 16th and 17th centuries for brass and voices

Given by: Gabrieli Ensemble and Choir conducted by Peter Maxwell Davies, Alexander Goehr.

Music by Maschera, Isaac, A and G. Gabrielli

* under cover if wet

Wood’s files included a document which gives the details of this concert:

Canzon Cornetto a 4 Scheidt

Quam Pulchra Es Dunstable

Courant Dolorosa a 4 Scheidt

Paduan a 4 Scheidt

Cor Mio, mentre vi miro Monteverdi

Air, Corante, Allemande, Corante, Saraband Cocke

INTERVAL

Sonata, Hora decima No. 6 Johannes Pezel

Sonata, Hora decima No. 39 Pezel

Adieu, Adieu, my heart’s lust Cornish

Fair Phyllis I saw Farmer

Draw on, sweet night Wilbye

April is in my mistress’s face Morley

Canzon Primi Toni a 8 Morley

Canzon Septimi Toni a 8 G. Gabrielli

Looking more closely at the flyer for 1965 reveals several differences to the concert programme. On the 31 August 1965, H.O. Young, treasurer of the WCSSs, wrote to the Arts Council with the certified accounts of the 1965 WCSS. Harry Robinson replied, in part, saying:

Were any concert programmes issued? If so, I should be grateful to have copies as the only items of printed material on our file are two leaflets (a single foolscap and a quarto sized folder).

The quarto sized folder is given in this post. The flyer is for the 1964 event, given here. H.O. Young immediately replied (7 September) with the concert programme on which I have been basing my understanding of what was performed in 1965, and which I posted here. The entire text of his letter is:

Dear Mr Robinson,

In reply to your letter of the 6th instant. I am sorry to have caused some confusion by basing the statement on six concerts instead of five as originally submitted in May.

I enclose two copies of the Concert programmes from whcih you will see that concerts were given each day with the exception of Monday, when then concert as advertised was given on Tuesday.

The sixth concert was on Saturday and describted as the ‘Participants Concrt [sic]‘. It was made up of the following items:-

Bach    Double Concerto for 2 violins in D minor. Leonard Freedman and Emmanuel Hurwitz.

Bach    Cantata conducted by John Aldis and sung by participants. Solo parts by Barbara Elsy, Pauline Stevens, Geffrey Shaw and Ian Partridge.

March ‘Verdi’ from Macbeth played by Participants and conducted by John Aldis.

The concert was well attended and included in the average attendances as stated. (ACGB/51/1265)

Based on this letter, it is reasonable to assume that the concert programme is more accurate than the flyer. Of course, this is not entirely certain, though it is the basis of the WCSS’s claim on their Arts Council guarantee, and the letter from Young seeks to clarify differences between the concert programme and the actual concerts.

Sunday 15 August

Schoenberg’s Two Songs and Webern’s Three Songs were not advertised but were performed.

Tuesday 17 August

Boulez’s Sonata No. 3 was not performed, though it was in the flyer

Schoenberg’s Piano Pieces op.23 was performerd

Martirano’s Coctail Music was performed.

Thursday 19 August

The flyer give a general overview:

‘Concert of old and new music for voices in consort, clarinet and percussion; including first performances of  work by Robert Sherlaw Johnson, Ring a Dumb Carillon by Harrison Birtwistle, and consort music by Lassus, Le June, Ravel, Debussy, Tippett, etc.’

This programme was substantially reworked. The only piece common to both the flyer and the programme is by Robert Sherlaw Johnson.

Saturday 21 August

Michael Hall suggests that Stockhausens Klavierstük IX was performed in place of the flyer’s V, VII and VIII.

Feldman’s Last pieces were performed.

So too were Messiaen’s Neumes Rhythmiques and Ile de Feu I

The participant’s concert was given on the flyer as:

Alexander Goehr Little Music for Strings

Stravinsky Octet

Hugh Wood New Work for chorus and instruments

David Bedford Dreams of the Seven Lost Stars (first performance written for the Summer School)

Handel Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne

This is very different to the programme given by Young, above.

In the two WCSSs no Boulez were performed. The only Webern performed were the songs, and these were placed alongside Schoenberg’s songs. One senses a move away from the repertoire core to Darmstadt and towards ‘traditional’ music making.

These discrepancies are typical of the difficulties in articulating the WCSSs. It is extremely difficult to work out what music was actually performed. The Arts Council’s archive is valuable for the documentation it contains, written at the time, which lends weight to some evidence (the concert programme) over other (the flyers).

Hugh Wood’s new work listen in the flyer for the participant’s concert did, according to Wood take place, though with a professional choir and not the participant’s choir. It remains unclear when this happened. Wood on the piece:

(LS100044; from 47′48″)

At the outset I asked if it would be alright to record, and Wood agreed.

Late in the conversation I mentioned that there were ethical issues with me making a recording. His response was ‘oh that’s nice of you to say’. Then the following took place:

(LS100045; from 35’55″)

The conversation continued, now focusing on the necessity of filtering material according to the way in which it’s portrayed by the first-hand observer. Wood suggests that there exists an ethical dimension in publishing first-hand accounts that is based on the ability of the observer to communicate the observed events with interest (this is aside from issues of accuracy). This is an aspect of my research that will become more important in future posts, as the volume of information increases and the redundancy in its factual content increases similarly. In this blog I have already made choices based on which source is the most enjoyable to read, rather that which came first, or which communicates details of the WCSSs most rigorously. Wood’s example in explaining his point is here included for its humour, rather than for it’s direct applicability to the WCSSs or for its brevity:

(LS100045; from 37’24″)

Wood continued, abstracting his point to the idea of a ‘story-teller’:

(LS100045; from 39’53″)

Thinking of my blog and what materials from the interview I would be able to use, I then asked Wood about audio excerpts from the interview:

(LS100045; from 41’08″)

At this point things are more tricky. The above excerpt has a cut in the middle. At the outset of the interview Wood had said that I had to ‘observe off the record’ comments, and the cut in the above clip is Wood’s example to me of one such comment. This clip is especially useful for the way in which Wood goes over his memory of the interview, recalling moments of significance for explaining to me the line between material that is acceptable for publication, and that which is not.

Later in the interview, Wood commented on our meeting with some ideas about memory:

(LS100045; from 55’07″)

This connects to the earlier post about the patchiness of memory as a positive force for forming new fabrics. I mean here to emphasise the contemporary importance of this research, since my motivation for its undertaking is to details these events in order for me to more deeply engage with the musical practices of today.

From a methodological approach, this is the second post articulating various ethics of recording and publishing interviews. This blog is seeking to find methodologies appropriate to the subject at hand, to design new ways of working that deal with issues of this research. It is also a site of generating new issues for the research to explore. At a different scale, rather than maintaining consistent approaches to, for example, the ethics of recording, this blog is a site for the continual transformation of my ideas about these matters. At this moment the publication of interviews is a topic of considerable instability: Michael Hall’s interview will remain not for publication; Hugh Wood’s interview will be drawn upon frequently to illustrate his perspective on the events.

And this further relates to the stabilizing of some aspects of these posts: the want to make visible the work of research (see this post); my desire to be as open as possible about difficulties encountered, as a way of making these into positive aspects of the research; the need to reconceive the division between research and publication, encouraged by the medium of the blog.

Meeting Hugh Wood again reminded me of the temporal dislocation of the WCSSs and the project of this research. The final, unresolvable issue here is that I am seeking to compose an account of the WCSSs by composing posts composed of materials found and generated, from archival work and interviews. The resulting composition is not one that Hugh Wood is likely to experience, since he has not internet access.

Wardour Castle Summer Concerts

16-22 August, 1964

President: MICHAEL TIPPETT

Musical Director: HARRISON BIRTWISTLE

These concerts run concurrently with the Wardour Castle Summer School.

Sunday 16 August

5.0 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room

Lecture: MUSIC IN OUR TIME

Given by Alexander Goehr

8.30 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room

MUSIC IN OUR TIME

Introduced by Michael Tippett

A concert of contemporary English Music.

Promoted by: Institute for the Promotion of New Music

Morag Noble – Soprano

Margaret Kitchin – Pianoforte

Peter Maxwell Davies – Pianoforte

Melos Ensemble

Three Pieces for Piano – Hugh Wood

Suite for String Trio (first performance) – Neville Gambier

Piano Sonata – Anthony Gilbert

Second Piano Sonata – Michael Tippett

Monody for Corpus Christi – Harrison Birtwistle

Five Little Pieces (first performance) – Peter Maxwell Davies

Suite Op.11 – Alexander Goehr

Mondat 17 August

5.0 pm The Old Kitchen, Wardour Castle

Recital: Early organ Music

Given on a newly-restored baroque organ by Peter Maxwell Davies

Music by: Dunstable, Taverner, Byrd, Tomkins, Gabrielli, Scheidt, Zipoli, etc.

8.30 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room

Chamber Concert

Melos Ensemble

Pianoforte Trio, F sharp minor – Haydn

Six Little Pieces – Bartok

Seven Sketches – Debussy

Première Rhapsody – Debussy

Vier Stüke – Berg

Fantasia in C Minor, K. 475 – Mozart

Horn Trio on E flat, Op.40 – Brahms

Tuesday 18 August

5.0 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room.

Lecture: Oliver Messiaen, The Man and His Music

Given by Hugh Wood

8.30 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room

Quartet for the End of Time

Members of the Melos Ensemble

Emmanuel Hurwitz – violin, viola

Gervase de Peyer – clarinet

Terrence Weil – Violoncello

Lamar Crowson – pianoforte

Clarinet Trio in E flat, K.498 – Mozart

Impromptus, Op. 142 – Schubert

Quatuor Pour la Fin du Temps – Oliver Messiaen

Wednesday 19 August

5.0 pm The Old Kitchen, Wardour Castle

Flute and Harpsichord

Lucy Berthoud – flute

Michael Thomas – harpsichord

Sonata No. 1 in B minor – Bach

Ordre B Minor – Couperin

Sonata No. 6 in E minor – Bach

8.30 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Room.

Discussion: Opera Today

Alexander Goehr, Peter Maxwell Davies, Michael Tippett.

Chairman: Harrison Birtwistle

Thursday 20 August

5.0 pm Wardour Castle Assembly Rooms.

A Matinee for Erik Satie

Given by Susan McGaw – pianoforte

Gymnopédies – Satie

Sonatas – C. P. E. Bach

Vieux sequins et Vieilles Cuirasses – Satie

Songs without Words – Mendelssohn

Jack-in-the-Box – Satie

8.30 pm Assemble Room Wardour Castle

Lecture: Musical Characterization in Mozart Opera.

Given by Stephen Pruslin, Princeton University.

Friday 21 August

8.30 pm Old Wardour Castle

Nocturnal.

A concert in the open air* of English and Italian echo-music from the 16th and 17th centuries for brass and voices

Given by: Gabrieli Ensemble and Choir conducted by Peter Maxwell Davies, Alexander Goehr.

Music by Maschera, Isaac, A and G. Gabrieli

* under cover if wet

Saturday 22 August

8.30 pm Donhead St. Andrew Parish Church

Participants Concert

A concert given by the participants of the summer school.

Conductors: John Carewe, Michael Tippett.

Morgengesand – C. P. E. Bach

Symphony – Haydn

Sequentia Sanctia Evangeli [sic]– Peter Maxwell Davies

Secundam Lucan, in illo Tempore XXII 14-20 (first performance written for the summer school)

Fantasias – Gibbons

[…]

Cover Design by Antony Denning.

Hall also gave me the programme for the concerts that took place in 1964, which I very much needed. I had the 1965 booklet from the ACE archives, which Hall hadn’t seen, and the 1964 information is less complete, taking the form of a flyer rather than the concert programme.

There is a wealth of information from this meeting that will take significant time to digest. Perhaps most immediately striking was Hall’s suggestion that the WCSSs were very much concerned with the tradition of music making, and thus a long way from the ideology of Darmstadt or Dartington. Where these events presented information in the form of ‘lectures’ by ‘experts’, the WCSSs were conceived as fora for discussion and the music that was played reflected these aims.

A new category for this post: interviews, under the parent category of methodology.

Before seeing Hall I had decided not to go with release forms, but instead to ask him about my use of the recording, and to record a conversation about my use of the interview. Towards the latter part of the discussion the following took place:

My notes, made immediately after the meeting went like this:

When I asked M Hall about the recording his face expressed a look of dismay. Why would I ask this? Partly this seems a generational thing. On the phone he offered little information. When I arrived [at his invitation] he was warm and very candid. This process of coming to meet face-to-face seems important. Introducing paperwork of ‘the ethics’ of the recording introducing an external third party (by implication) about which nothing can be ventured. His gestures and manner communicated to me the importance of the relationship [between two people in discussion]. He said it was good I was to write about the events, and to make use of [then gestures to the recorder]. Both on the phone and when I arrived he ensured that I had a recorder [which was placed on the table between us]. The problem with forms is that if signed, so what? If not signed, is that a refusal to agree? or a distaste for forms?

This is a situation about which I am uncomfortable. Partly this is due to my lack of ability to discuss these ethics in an academic manner. It reminds me of my first meeting with David Lumsdaine. When I first phone him to arrange a meeting I asked him if I could record the meeting and he refused. When it came to the meeting I attended with a mircophone and minidisk and asked again. His response: ‘of course, we have met now’.

There are parts of my discussion with Michael Hall that I would not play in the presence of others. As I left I said that I would make good use of the recording and write about the summer schools.

What this project is not seeking is a complete understanding of anything. And the decisions I am making at each step are designed to take this claim seriously. So, I did not buy a video recorder for these interviews. Partly this is pragmatic, since it’s easier to edit audio, which also takes up less memory (and therefore is cheaper). Video recorders are also expensive for the quality of their audio capture, and I want to make other compromises. Partly this is also ethical, since I don’t like being videod but will happily have my voice recorded. Although youtube makes dissemination of video easy, I find myself frequently listening to material even when there is a video component, either because I am doing other work, because I am frustrated by the camera-work, or because I am walking around London whilst listening.

London seems to be little obsessed with hi-fi and shops selling such equipment are few and far between (small recommendation for Bartlett’s in Islington as one of the few that’s also very good). I can’t shake entirely the ‘fidelity’ issue, even though I am unsure of what being ‘loyal’ means. So, I bought an Olympus LS-10. It sounds good, it well built, doesn’t have too many flaws, is flexible and small. I can put it on the table press record and forget about it, leaving me room (pardon the pun) to think about the conversation at hand.

This post is partly prompted by How Modernity Forgets and a podcast of Thinking Allowed. When listening (as I do when I  am out walking each morning**) I was struck by the association of forgetting and ‘place’, and reminded that when I contact Hugh Wood to arrange an interview, that I asked if I could speak with him about the Wardour Castle Summer Schools. He responded that yes, it would be good to talk about ‘Cranborne Chase’. Where I had emphasised the event, he emphasises the place. The following brief comment Wood made was about the Manchester three being ‘together’, presumably meant geographically rather than aesthetically.

Before seeing Hugh Wood I am meeting Michael Hall, who holds interviews with several composers who were at the events, including the organizers. He also has an interview with Nicholas Maw about the WCSS, which he characterised to me as especially useful because Maw had a fine memory for what went on. The interview is currently inaccessible (in that it’s unpublished) and Maw is now dead. It will be interesting to meet Hall, since he has been planning a book on the WCSSs for some time, and has collected materials from many sources (including Hugh Wood, who couldn’t remember where his programmes had gone, only that someone who interviewed him had them… I reminded him of Michael Hall).

In November I am meeting Anthony Gilbert, who suggested (very kindly) being interviewed together with David Lumsdaine (‘we met at the WCSS’ – Gilbert (phone conversation October 2009)). I asked Lumsdaine is this would be ok, and he agreed – ‘I might remember more’. Throughout my PhD, writing about Lumsdiane’s music, he reminded me of his ‘failing memory’, which is something for which I am most grateful (in both senses). Speaking with Erika Fox yesterday (22 October 2009), she commented that some research can be disseminated incomplete, ‘with a name on it’ for future researchers to cite. The implication was that this was ‘factual research’, which further implies that there is another space for creative interpretation of that material (in her comment, factual research was contrasted with creative composition). I am inclined to agree, since presumably that’s the purpose of this blog, which obviously comes with a request that it be cited by others who use it’s contents, but with no close guarding of copyright.

In mapping the ‘lieux de memoire’ of these events, my map making needs to embrace modernism’s lessons and to inhabit the tattered ruins of previous maps, by which I mean to be creative in the patchiness of memory rather than to focus on finding the edges of its tatters as a precursor to sewing it together. At the same time, I am reminded of Otto von Busch’s http://www.selfpassage.org/: I will to sow the edges together, to follow the trends of high-fasion and hack my documentation into new and exciting forms, forms that carry meaning through their connections to contemporary imagery and which transmogrify current practices into new versions for new fields and usages, and in doing so to ‘learn a new craft’. I am further reminded in listening to the podcast of his talk (what happening before such mnemonics? We took notes I guess…) at the RSA that it makes much less sense without the images he showed. Its also a very different experience to being there with the RSA’s varied audience and without the contrast of von Busch’s eccentrically dressed, pleasantly anti-earnest and self-effacing manner in contrast with the four suited men on the discussion panel. The panel included Colin McDowell who, given his happy declarations of an aversion to computers, updates his blog more frequently than I do.

______

** A postscript added after returning from a walk:

The first link is significant here, linking walking to design, architecture are fashioning. The latter link is important both for its potential to enliven the purpose of this blog, and as a justification for quoting from the podcast of David Malouf and Glenn Murcott’s discusion. The whole can be found here:

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/bydesign/stories/2009/2709419.htm

From Young to H. Robinson:

Dear Mr Robinson

In reply to your letter of the 6th instant. I am sorry to have caused some confusion by basing the statement on six concerts instead of the five as originally submitted in May.

In enclose two copies of the Concert programmes from which you will see that concerts were given each day with the exception of Monday, when the concert as advertised was given on Tuesday.

The sixth concert was on Saturday and described as the the ‘Participations Concrt’ [sic]. It was made up of the following items:

Bach: Double Concerto for 2 vioins in D minor. Leonard Freeman and Emanuel Hurwitz.

Bach: Cantata conducted by John Aldis and sung by participants. Solo parts by Barbara Elsy, Pauline Stevens, Geffrey Shaw and Ian Partridge.

March ‘Verdi’ from Macbeth played by Participants and conducted by Alan Hacker.

David Bedford: Dream of the Seven Lost Stars written for the Summer School and conducted by John Aldis.

The concert was well attended and included in the average attendances as stated. (V&A ACGB/51/1265)

A minute was then written from Harry Robinson to Eric Thompson:

Wardour Castle Summer School

You will remember that our grant to the S.P.N.M. included £300 for this Summer School and we understood from Wardour Castle that £150 would be devoted to five public concerts and the other half to non-public “participants” concerts.

In claiming our guarantee they have included a sixth concert which they sat was a “participants” concert (presumable the only one of its kind which was given). This would of course not be open to the public. They also say they they are using £250 of S.P.N.M. money for these concerts. Even so, there will still be a big outstanding deficit and in the circumstances there seems no point in asking the Council to vary the terms of its offer to cover six concerts instead of give. Instead I think our Finance Department would agree to assess the deficit at five-sixths of the figure shown, and still pay the full amount of our £350 guarantee.

You will see that in the printed programme just supplied on demand, the sixth concert on Saturday evening, 26th August, is not shown (but they gave the programme in the letter received today); on the other hand there are two tea-time recitals, on 17th and 21st August, not supported by us which, nevertheless, appear over the general acknowledgement of our support given at the end of the programme. All very unsatisfactory. (V&A ACGB/51/1265)

No matter 5 or 6 concerts the level of deficit is easy larger than the guarantee, and one wonders why the fuss (which goes back and forth several times). There is, however, a culture within the bureaucracy that guarantees an equitable accountability. The Arts Council does not want to be credited for support not given, which leaves open the space for others to be credited for that support.

The following are excerpts from the 1965 Certified Statement of Accounts, held at the V&A (ACGB/51/1265)

It is curious that no payment was made for music hire… It is also interesting to see the insistence with which the Arts Council corrects the accounts to conform to their commitment to guarantee 5 concerts and not six. There seems to have been a close eye kept on ensuring that the support the arts council gave was transparent and not confused with overall support for the summer school. One thinks of how rarely the arts council is credited as such in today’s concert programmes, where, instead, an arts council logo appears alongside other supporters. The full amount of the guarantee was paid, since the reduced deficit was still more than double the guarantee.

________________________

A

£350 Guarantee for series of 5 concerts

Number in the audience: [red hand in margin] (45+105 students free*)

150 average per concert (6 in all) including 100 students.

Capacity of the Hall (i) Seats:

160/180

(ii) £

124- 10- 6

B

Artists and other taking part

Melos Ensemble            600- : – :

Bethany Beardslee            100- : – :

Edward Downes            100- : – :

Leonard Stein                        40- : – :

Eric Roseberry            40- : – :

Alan Hacker                        40- : – :

John Aldis                        30- : – :

Stephen Pruslin            25- : – :

Roger Smalley                        10- : – :

Additional Players            100- : – :

C Receipts

Single Tickets:

25@5/-                        6- 5- :

55@7/6                        20- 12- 6

186@10/6                        97- 13- :

[total, written in red ink]            124 10- 6

Sale of Programmes:

199@1/- & 2/6d            18- 11- 6

Payments:

Totally Fees and Payments to Artists Etc (as above):            1.085- : – :

Hall:

No Charge made

Piano:             Hire            15- 15- : [this is unclear and these figures could apply to moving/tuning]

Moving:            24- : – :

Tuning:

Printing:            Tickets:                                    7- 10- :

Programmes:                                    136- 19- :

Publicity:            Leaflets:            43- 11- :

Posters                        10- 5- :

Postage and Telephone:            16- 6- 2

Hire of Music:

A Grants Paid, Donations, and any other income – with details

Contribution from Summer School. (6 concerts at £50 each):            300- :- :

[in red ink] 300 [|] 124- 10- 6- [|] Total “[??] income” 424- 10- 6

Total Receipts:            503-2- :

[in green] less £57- 18- 6 = 445- 3- 6

[in green] DEF: 714- 2- 8

F Balance Deficit

836- 4- 2

[in red ink] SPNM to make a grant of £250 [pencil in the margins] ???

Total            £1. 339- 6- 2

[in green] less £180 = 1,159- 6- 2

E

Balance Surplus:            £1. 339- 6- 2

[in green] These accounts are for six concerts instead of five (see correspondence) and figures for five events are given in green. H.R.

G

31st August 1965

One of my research questions considers ways in which these summer schools were funded, and how this reflects prestige, as well as indicating the priorities of the events. Here is the budget for the 1965 events.

____________________________

[in purple:] RECD 19 May 1965

Wardour Castle Summer School 1965

Concert Proposals and Estimates [in red type] 5 concrets in Cranborne Chase School [|] 15,16; 18,19,20 Aug.1965

Concert 1. Sunday, 15th August at 8.00

Schubert            Trio in B flat

Schoenberg            Pierrot Lunaire

Bethany Beardslee, soprano Melos Ensemble, Edward Downes, conductor

Bethany Beardslee            £52. 10. 0

Melos Ensemble            180. 0. 0.

Edward Downes            47. 5. 0

Publicity, etc.            10. 10. 0

Hire of Piano            5. 5. 0

[total]                        £295. 10. 0

Receipts:            50 tickets @ 10/-                        £25. 0. 0

From Summer School                        50. 0. 0

[total]                                                                        £75. 0. 0

Concert 2. Monday, 16th August at 8.00 [hand written in black ink:] (given Tues. 17th)

Handel            Cantata

Schubert/Wolf            Songs

Purchell [sic]            Chaconne for 2 vlns, and Continuo

Webern            Songs

Milton Babbitt            Philomel (with synthesizer)

Bethany Beardslee, sop. Stephen Pruslin, pno. Leonard Friedman, vln

Members of Melos Ensemble

Artists fees            £150. 0. 0

Hire and installation

of elect. equipment            35. 0. 0

Hire of Harpsichord            10. 0. 0

[total]                                    £195. 0. 0

Receipts:            50 tickets @ 10/-                        £25. 0. 0

From Summer School                        50. 0. 0

[total]                                                                        £75. 0. 0

Wardour Castle Summer School [page] 2

Concert 3; Wednesday, 18th August, at 8.00

Bach            Ricercari [sic] from Musical Offering

Webern            6 Songs, Op. 14

Robin Holloway            New Work

Hanns Eisler            14 Ways of Describing Rain

Alexander Goehr            New Work

Gibbons            London Street Cries

Four Singers in Consort. Bethany Beardslee, Melod Ensemble directed by Alexander Goehr

4 Singers                        £63. 0. 0

Members of

Melos Ensemble            150. 0. 0

Soloist                                    26. 5. 0

[total]                                    £239. 5. 0

Receipts:            50 tickets @ 10/-                        £25. 0. 0

From Summer School                        50. 0. 0

From SPNM                                    50. 0. 0

[total]                                                                        £125. 0. 0

Concert 4. Thursday, 19th August, at 5.00

Mixed programme of old and new music including new work by Robert Sherlaw Johnson

Four Singers in Consort and percussion

4 Singers                        £42. 0. 0

R. Sherlaw Johnson            15 15. 0

Percussion                        10. 10. 0

Transoport of

instruments                        10. 0. 0

[total]                                    £77.15. 0

Receipts:            Sale of Tickets                                    £5. 0. 0 [in red pen] ?05/-? or 2/0?

From Summer School                        25. 0. 0

From SPNM                                    25. 0. 0

[total]                                                                        £55. 0. 0

Wardour Castle Summer School [page] 3

Concert 5. Friday, 20th August, at 8.00

Peter Maxwell Davies            Motet, for voices & instruments [in red pen] “Ecce Manus Tradentis”

In Nomine I-III

Harrison Birtwistle            New Work

Alexander Goehr            New Work

Also music by Praetorius, Dunstable, newly instrumented by P. Maxwell Davies.

Consort, Melos Ensemble (enlarged), directed by P. Maxwell Davies

4 Singers                        £42. 0. 0

Melos, with

added players                        300. 0 0

Hire of organ

and harpsichord            15. 0. 0

Publicity, etc.                        10. 0. 0

[total]                                    £367. 0. 0

Receipts:            Sale of tickets                                    £25. 0. 0 [in red ink] ?50 [|] ?@10/-

From Summer School                        50. 0. 0

From SPNM                                    75. 0. 0

[Total]                                                                        £150 . 0. 0

[The following in red type]

SUMMARY for the five Concerts: (Ticket income includes contribution from the school for ?approx.100 students)

INCOME                        EXPENDITURE

15 Aug.            75                                    295 10 0

16 Aug.            75                                    195 0 0

18 Aug.            75                                    239 5 0

19 Aug.            30                                    77 15 0

20 Aug.            75                                    367 0 0

Tickets total            330                                    1,174 10 0

From SPNM for

last 3 concerts            150

DEFICIT            694 10 0

[total]                        1,174 10 0

1965-66: Allocation:

For Submission to the 187th Meeting of the Council’s Executive Committee to be held on Wed. 30th June 1965.

WARDOUR CASTLE SUMMER SCHOOL (1st application)

5 concerts between 15th and 20th August, 1965

in Cranborne Chase School, Wardour Castle, Tisbury, Wilts.

[blue pen] G’tee £350

RECEIVED MUSIC DEPARTMENT            19/5/65            HR

RECOMMENDED MUSIC DIRECTOR            16/6/65            SS, for J.D.

APPROVED ACCOUNTANT                        16/6/65            [??]

APPROVED FINANCE OFFICER                        15.7.65            [??]

Note: The Council’s geant [sic] to SPNM for 1965-6 includes £300 [this figure circled and in the margin written: 1.300?[|] 2.400?] for concerts at the Wardour Castle Summer School”. £150 of this goes to workshop concerts, and [in red hand:] (?250) [typed:] £150 to the last three of this series of five public concerts. HR

____________________________

12th Meeting of the British Selection of International Society for Contemporary Music

10 June 1974, proposal for 1974/75

Cornelius Cardew

It was noted that the proposed discussions were likely to be largely political and that the three organisations involved should be advised to insist on at least some minimum performance of music. (ACB/51/272)

I wonder what the response was?

Opening a file from the Arts Council. If I show you more I could be sued! (Very boring contents though...)

And so, following my methodology, two questions immediately arise: does the lack of comments about this research result from a reluctance to comment, or from the fact that few have looked at the research? Does the medium of the blog compromise the possibility for enabling comment because of a slow acceptance of the blog as a viable form of publishing ideas?

Aside from the specifics problems of the posting of comments, using this medium continues to: make visible the work of research; define the objects of the research’s inquiry. ‘[T]he book in the era of the internet will look and act differently from the book of the era of the book.’ (see here)

PS. It’s been five years since I first declined the suggestion that I should begin a blog, and over that five years it has become a medium thoroughly compatible with, if not representative of, the kinds of ways of connecting people that have widespread acceptance. Of course, this acceptance has little penetrated academic institutions, but then, this research is unfunded. I have Chris Anderson ringing in my ears (how could I not at the moment?!?!) – perhaps this is my ‘myspace’?: if so then it is time for a renewal in funding for ‘quality’, if you heard this podcast, (get a proxy to read the book), as I’d quite like it to be my ‘day job’.

PPS. It’s interesting to note that Harvard’s library catalogue, which is as contemporary as any I know and is based on making connections between resources as easy to access as possible, isn’t linking to the free version of Anderson’s book.

I haven’t included the programme notes, and no author is given for most of these. A playlist of those works here that are also available on spotify can be found here: WCSS. It’s a collaborative playlist so if you find a work that I haven’t listed you can add it. You can also delete tracks and add new ones (perhaps you don’t like my choice of performers?). The recording of Birtwistle’s Tragoedia is by the Melos Ensemble with Lawrence Foster conducting.

(ACGB/51/265; see 1)

[5]

WARDOUR CASTLE SUMMER CONCERTS

President: MICHAEL TIPPETT

Director: HARRISON BIRTWISTLE

[7]

Sunday, 15 August at 8 p.m.

BETHANY BEARDSLEE, soprano

EMMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

STEPHEN PRUSLIN, pianoforte

I. Five Songs . . Schubert

Ganymed (Goethe)

Auflösung (Mayrhofer)

Nachtviolen (Mayrhofer)

Auf dem Wasser zu singen (Stoliberg)

An Sylvia (Shakespeare)

[…]

[8]

II. Chansons de Bilitis (Pierre Louys) . . Debussy

[…]

III. Sonata No. 13 in B-flat major for piano and violin, K. 454 . . Mozart

[…]

[9]

INTERVAL – 25 MINUTES

(During the interval you are invited to view the exhibition of painting and sculpture, which is in the centre of the castle. The bar is also open.

__________

IV. Two Songs . . Schoenberg

Ich darf nicht dankend (Stefan George)

In diesen Wintertagen (G. Henckel)

Three Songs, opus 25 (Hildegard Jone) . . Webern

Wie bin ich froh

Des Herzens Purpurvogel

Sterne, Ihr silbernen Bienen

[…]

[10]

V. Philomel for soprano, recorded soprano, and synthesized sound . . Milton Babbitt

[…]

[11]

Monday, 16 August at 8 p.m.

BETHANY BEARDSLEE, soprano

Melos Ensemble

EMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

CECIL ARONOWITZ, viola

TERENCE WEIL, cello

COLIN CHAMBERS, flute and piccolo

GERVASE DE PEYER, clarinet

ALAN HACKER, bass clarinet

ERIC ROSEBERRY, piano

EDWARD DOWNES, director

I. Trio No. 1 in B-flat major for pianoforte, violin, and violoncello, opus 99 . . Schubert

[…]

INTERVAL – 25 MINUTES

[…]

[12]

II. Pierrot Lunaire, opus 21 . . Schoenberg

[…]

[16]

Tuesday, 17 August at 5 p.m.

RECITAL

by LEONARD STEIN, piano

BAGATELLES . . Beethoven

THREE PIANO PIECES . . Alexander Goehr

PRELUDE FOR PIANO AND TAPE . . Subotnick

(short pause)

COCKTAIL MUSIC . . Salvatore Martirano

PIANO PIECES OP. 23 . . Schoenberg

[17]

Wednesday, 18 August at 8 p.m.

Melos Ensemble:

EMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

KAY HURWITZ, viola

LEONARD FRIEDMAN, violin

CECIL ARONOWITZ, viola

TERENCE WEIL, cello

WILLIAM BENNETT, flute

ALAN HACKER, bass clarinet

ERIC ROSENBERRY, piano

STEPHEN PRUSLIN, piano

BARBARA ELSY, Soprano

PAULINE STEVENS, contralto

IAN PARTRIDGE, tenor

GEOFFREY SHAW, bass

ALEXANDER GOEHR, director

I. Busoni – Canonic Variations and Fugue for pianoforte on the theme of King Frederick the Great from Bach’s Musical Offering.

followed by

II. Bach – Six Part Ricercar from the Musical Offering.

[…]

The six-part ricercar, which follows the Busoni work, will be performed in an instrumental arrangement by Alexander Goehr.

[18]

III. Mozart: Quartet for flute, violin, viola, and violoncello in D major, K. 285

[…]

IV. Cantata on texts by Edward Benlowes . . Robin Holloway

First performance written for Summer School

[…]

[19]

[…]

V. “Cryes of London” . . Orlando Gibbons

[…]

VI. “Fourteen Ways of Describing Rain” . . Hanns Eisler

[20]

Thursday, 19 August at 5 p.m.

BARBARA ELSY, Soprano

PAULINE STEVENS, contralto

IAN PARTRIDGE, tenor

GEOFFREY SHAW, bass

TRISTRAM FRY, percussion

AQUIL ALTERA . . Jacops [sic] da Bologna

IN TUA MEMONIA [sic]  . . Arnold de Nantins [sic Lantins]

WESTRON WYNDE . . Anon

_________

WESTERN WIND MASS . . John Tavener [sic]

[…]

Pause

VENI SANCTE SPIRITAS [sic] . . Robert Sherlan [sic] Johnson

(First performance written for Summer School)

LITTLE CANTATA OF PROVERBS (Blake) . . Alexander Goehr [John Alldis launched the John Alldis Choir with its premiere in 1962 1]

_________

SIBYLLA DELPHIA [sic]

LA NUIET [sic] FROIDE ET SOMBRE

FUYONS TOUS

BONJOUR MON COER

ICH WEISS MICH [sic] EIN MADLEIN [sic] . . Orlando di lassus [sic]

[21]

Friday, 20 August at 8 p.m.

EMANUEL HURWITZ, violin

LEONARD FRIEDMAN, violin

CECIL ARONOWITZ, viola

TERENCE WEIL, cello

WILLIAM BENNETT, flute

PETER GRAEME, oboe

WILLIAM WATERHOUSE, bassoon

NEIL SANDERS, horn

HILLARY WILSON, harp

BARBARA ELSY, soprano

PAULINE STEVENS, contralto

IAN PARTRIDGE, tenor

GEOFFREY SHAW, bass

MEMBERS OF THE SUMMER SCHOOL

LAWRENCE FOSTER, director

PETER MAXWELL DAVIES, director

I. Canon for Syntagma Musicum (1619) . . Michael Praetorius

[…]

_________

II. Dunstable:

voices and instruments: Sanctus and Agnus Dei

organ: Sub tuam protectionem

voices and instruments: Motet, “Veni Sancte Spiritus – Veni Creator”

[…]

[22]

III. (a) Plainsong, Gloria Tibi Trinitas

(b) Benedictus, from “Gloria Tibit Trinitas” Mass . . John Taverner

(c) In Nomine . . John Taverner

(d) In Nomine . . Thomas Tallis

(e) Gloria Tibi Trinitas . . John Blitheman

(f) Two “In Nomines” . . Peter Maxwell Davies

Commissioned by Melos Ensemble for Summer School

(g) Fantasia (In Nomine) . . Henry Purcell

[…]

The two new “In Nomines” use the plainsong, and the instrumental versions of the Tallis and Blitheman are by Maxwell Davies.

TRAGOEDIA . . Harrison Birtwistle

First performance, commissioned by the Melos Ensemble for the Summer School

[…]

[23]

INTERVAL – 25 MINUTES

[…]

V. Motet – Ecce Manus Tradentis . . Peter Maxwell Davies

[…]

[24]

Saturday, 21 August at 5 p.m.

RECITAL

ROGER SMALLEY, piano

BRIAN DENNIS, baritone

WILLIAM YORK, clarinet

JOHN WHITE, tenor horn

TWO PIECES from AMORES for prepared piano . . John Cage

LAST PIECES . . Morton Feldman

FEBRUARY PIECES I, II, III . . Cornelius Cardew

NEUMES RHYTHMIQUES

ILE DE FEU I . . Messiaen

_________

Pause

_________

PIANO PIECES . . Karlheinz Stockhausen

TWO POEMS of D. H. LAWRENCE

for baritone, clarinet, tenor horn, piano (1st performance) . . Roger Smalley

_________

These concerts are given with the support of the Arts Council of Great Britain

A letter from the WCSS treasurer, H. O. Young to the Arts Council clarified the programme with information about a participant’s concert:

The sixth concert was on Saturday and describted as the ‘Participants Concrt [sic]‘. It was made up of the following items:-

Bach    Double Concerto for 2 violins in D minor. Leonard Freedman and Emmanuel Hurwitz.

Bach    Cantata conducted by John Aldis and sung by participants.  Solo parts by Barbara Elsy, Pauline Stevens, Geffrey Shaw and Ian Partridge.

March ‘Verdi’ from Macbeth played by Participants and conducted by John Aldis.

The concert was well attended and included in the average attendances as stated. (ACGB/51/1265)

Wardour Castle Concert

For the past two years a week’s unique kind of summer school for composers and other interested in their problems has been held at Wardour Castle in Wiltshire. In the evenings doors are open to the general public for concerts cleverly juxtaposing old and new music, some of it brand new, such as on Friday when the Melos Ensemble introduces works which they themselves had commissioned from the school’s director, Harrison Birtwistle, and Peter Maxwell Davies.

Birtwistle’s “Tragoedia” was immediate enough in impact to earn cheers. Even though inspiration comes from the structural elements of Greek theatre rather than from any specific story, the music is highly charged with drama: the ancient formal symmetry that this composer values so much is brilliantly enhanced by vivid and daring contrasts of tone colour drawn from a chamber ensemble of strings and wind. We look forward to hearing the work again with the big central “Episodia” and concluding “Exodus” with which Birtwistle is planning to complete it.

Peter Maxwell Davies’s motet, “Ecce Manus Tradentis”, likewise has roots in antiquity, but in the church rather than in the theatre. It is introduced by authentic plainsong (this composer’s deepest inspiration fount) and remains reflective rather than dramatic account of the Betrayal – perhaps emotion is even a shade too consistently recollected in esoteric tranquility for this particular drama. Contrapuntal cunning counts for more than colour per se (in spite of those unexpected handbells added to harp and wind in support of the vocal consort); even so, memory is haunted by a desolate and beautiful duo for flute and harp leading to the words “Domine, tecum paratus”. Maxwell Davies was also represented by two instrumental settings of “In Nomine” (from a larger projected set) throwing subtle and sensitive new light on the plainsong, “Gloria Tibi Trinitias”; placed in the context of similar variations on this theme by Taverner, Tallis, Blitheman, and Purcell, this new music seemed not at all anachronistic, but like a river widening its course on the way to the sea.

Church music by Dunstable involving the plainsong of Sarum near by added to the pleasure of this perceptively planned and executed programme.

Times, Monday August 23 1965, 15

[Edit, 8 January 2010, Birtwistle indicated to me that the changes to Tragoedia were minor:

(ACGB/51/265; see 1)

The items of expenditure are fairly unremarkable:

However, it also gives the names of the employed tutors all of whom were offered £50 and all of whom waived their fees to balance the accounts.

Tutors

• Maxwell Davies P.
• Birtwistle H.
• Carewe J.
• Goehr A.
• Wood H.
• Friedman –
• Thomas M.

The income was:

Deficiency: £250-5-3

do [income] as increased by tutors fees waived. 350-:-:   600-5-3

[Total] 2.438-8-5

Several aspects of this document are important. Firstly, it indicates that 10 people were partially supported by the SPNM with the WCSS bearing the remaining cost. It would be useful to know who these people were. It may be that these are people who the tutors wanted to attend enough to have found them funding. Secondly, the figures indicate that 116 people attended. Thirdly, Edward Venn quotes Hugh Wood as saying that Anthony Gilbert taught in the 1964, yet his name isn’t listed here as one of the tutors. (Venn, Edward (2008) The Music of Hugh Wood (Aldershot: Ashgate) 69.) Michael Tippett’s name is similarly absent. As are Lamar Crawson, Emmanuel Hurwitz, Gervase de Peyer and John Telford.

The software in which this post is written makes authoring metadata a central part of the writing process, which is not something that I have before considered (having for the most part avoided IAML paper on this topic). Choices about what tags and categories are most appropriate to use have raised questions about the objects of research at the moment of writing [insert IAML tag]. As my experience in working in this medium increases I am finding more and more that the questions I am formulating relate to choices about tags and categories. Both forms of metadata are necessary to enable me and other readers to navigate posts of the blog, and also to facilitate links with other blogs on wordpress.

For example, when writing the tags for the post ‘Advertisement for the 1965 WCSS‘ I first listed all the people mentioned. For some this was straightforward (Birtwistle, for example), for others this was less certain, such as for Michael Thomas. Where Birtwislte’s surname is distinctive enough that it is instantly recognizable, and anyone searching for him using his surname will most likely find content related exclusively to him, it is much less likely that a search for ‘Thomas’ will yield results for Michael Thomas, and then it will be unlikely to return Michael Thomas the harpsichordist.

A further challenge is posed by Tallis. Tallis’ name has come up frequently in my research of the WCSSs, most often in connection with his ‘Motet in forty parts’. In tagging the works mentioned on this blog I was faced with the question: how do I identify this work? On one hand I am trying to preserve the terminology of the sources, so as not to elide potentially useful observations, and at the same time I am anxious that someone trying to find information about Tallis’ piece will come across my posts.

My methodology includes Faubion’s call that research is concerned with ‘problematizing inquiry and conceptualizing its objects’. The medium in which this research is taking place, with its immediate emphasis on writing metadata, suggests that an avenue of inquiry might meaningfully pursue the position of Tallis’ work within the position of the UK’s concert life. A quick search revealed this NMC note, which clarifies things significantly. Anthony Burton: ‘In short, Tippett had arrived on the British musical scene – a process in which no small part had been played by the recordings on this disc [which includes Spem in alium]‘. 1

It is exciting to be researching in a new medium (for me) that so immediately throws up questions to pursue and which can potentially connect with others. It’s also immediately rewarding to find others arriving at this blog by way of my tags. With wordpress giving this information as part of the blog’s statistics there is an immediate incentive to carefully consider each post’s metadata.

Having decided some categories that seemed useful for the blog, this post suggests a new one is needed. How many new ones are usefully added? Still, not much danger that the scale of this map will become 1:1.

[1]

THE WARDOUR CASTLE SUMMER SCHOOL OF MUSIC

14th–22nd AUGUST, 1965

President:

MICHAEL TIPPETT

Musical Directors:

HARRISON BIRTWISTLE

PETER MAXWELL DAVIES

ALEXANDER GOEHR

[2]

The Wardour Castle Summer School of Music was founded last year by Harrison Birtwistle, Alexander Goehr and Peter Maxwell Davies with ‘the purpose of bringin together professional and amateur composers and performers to study, as well as pre-classical, classical and romantic works, those twentieth century classics which have been neglected in this country. Also to study works by as many as possible of the composers who are present at the course.

Wardour Castle, Tisbury, Wiltshire, is an elegant 18th century house, designed for the Arundell family by the architect, James Paine and is now the home of Cranborne Chase School. It is 17 miles from Salisbury and 7 miles from Shaftesbury. Trains from London (Waterloo) to Tisbury take about 2 ½ hours.

Facilities include small dormitories, hard tennis courts, swimming pool and extensive private grounds.

Concerts, open to the public, but free to all students, will be given during the course by the Melos Ensemble and other artists. These will include the first performances of works by Birtwistle, Goehr and Maxwell Davies commissioned for the occasion by the Melos Ensemble. The concerts will also include The Musical Offering by J. S. Bach and a performance with Bethany Beardslee, of “Pierrot Lumaire” by Schoeberg. The Summer School is also commissioning other works for these concerts by composers who will be present at the course.

The Composition Class is being organised by Peter Maxwell Davies and will centre round the study of Mahler’s 3rd Symphony, Bach’s Two and Three-Part Inventions and “Pierrot Lunaire” by Schoenberg. (It will be an advantage for members to possess scores for these works). There will also be classes for the performance of works by composers attending the course. Composers interested in this must write to the Director, via the Hon. Secretary.

String Classes. It is hoped that these will be of special interest, for as well as classes for quartets, trios etc. there will be a string orchestra, with each section let by a member of the teaching faculty. Works to be studies include classical and pre-classical works, and “Little Music” which has been written specially by Alexander Goehr.

The Choir and Orchestra will perform works written for the course by Hugh Wood and David Bedford. They will also do a Bach Cantata, and the Motet in forty parts by Tallis. This will be conducted by Michael Tippett.

[3]

FACULTY

Private Lessons may be arranged with any of the above faculty, fees on application to the Hon. Sec.

The fee per member for the whole course will be 14 guineas. A reduction will be made for non-residents. A deposit of 3 guineas, non-returnable in case of withdrawal, will be required on registration, the balance of the fee being payable before the 1st August. Entries will close on 1st August, or earlier if all places are booked. Intending members are asked therefore to register as soon as possible.

Registration forms may be obtained from:–

Mrs. Mackintosh (Hon. Sec.),

Etchilhampton House,

Wilts.

(ACGB/51/1265; see 1)

• 15th to 23rd August, 1964 (ACGB/51/1265)
• 14th to 22nd August, 1965 (ACGB/51/1265)

15TH TO 23RD AUGUST, 1964

PRESIDENT: MICHAEL TIPPETT

MUSICAL DIRECTOR: HARRISON BIRTWISTLE

The Wardour Summer School of Music is essentially a new venture, which will take place in the elegant Wardour Castle, built for the Arundell family in the latter half of the eighteenth century by James Paine.

It is the realisation of an idea formed by a distinguished group of young composers known as the “Manchester School”, to provide a complete and contrasted course covering particular aspects of music from many ages,  including works by Byrd, Gabrielli, C. P. E. Bach, Mozart, Michael Tippett, Peter Maxwell Davies etc. There will be concerts by the Melos Ensemble, which will include along with classical works, the “Quatuor pour la Fin du Temps,” by Oliver [sic] Messiaen. There will also be a special concert sponsored by The Society for the Promotion of New Music.

Despite the functional necessity of having basic categorisation of various aspects of the School, it is hoped to provide a definite unity between, Composers and Performer, Amateurs and Professionals; in an active friendly and musical atmosphere.

Wardour Castle is situated off Salisbury Plain, in beautiful unspoiled countryside three miles from Tisbury Station, which in turn is fifteen miles from Salisbury–two and a half hours by train (Waterloo). By car it is about three miles off the A30, between Salisbury and Shaftesbury.

The Castle today is the home of Cranborne Chase School, and was completely restored in 1960.

Facilities include, small dormitories, elegant dining hall, hard tennis courts, swimming pool and extensive private grounds.

The fee per member for the whole course (inclusive), will be 14 guineas, a reduction will be made for non-residents. A deposit of 3 guineas, non-returnable in case of withdrawal, will be required on registration, the balance of the fee being payable before the 1st of August. Intending members are asked to register as soon as possible. Registration forms may be obtained from:

The Secretary,

The Lodge,

Motcombe Park,

Shaftesbury,

Dorset.

Faculty:

Alexander Goehr will rehearse the combined choir and orchestra and take classes in analysis and composition; he will also lecture on Twentieth-Century Music.

Peter Maxwell Davies will rehearse the choir in works including Byrd–4-part mass, and a new piece specially written by him, for the Summer School. He will lecture on Early Music.

Harrison Birtwistle will rehearse the orchestra and larger instrumental groups.

John Telford will rehearse chamber music for instrumentalists of limited experience and moderate ability.

Lamar Crowson–piano classes.

Gervase de Peyer–clarinet classes.

Emmanuel Hurwitz–chamber music.

Members involved in specialised seminars will be invited to prepare a specific piece, or in the case of chamber music, part; details of which will be supplied at a later date.

Composition Seminar. Member of this class will be invited to compose and rehearse a short, original composition, which will be discussed during the lessons and will also be performed in an informal concert. Information regarding instrumentation will be supplied on request.

Private Lessons may be arranged with any of the above faculty, fees on application to the secretary.

(ACGB/51/1265; see 1)

It is worth emphasising the point made in the flyer, that: ‘it is hoped to provide a definite unity between, Composers and Performer, Amateurs and Professionals’.

‘In addition to these activities, a contribution of £250 was also made towards first performances of new works by young composers at the Wardour Castle Summer School of Music.’ (ACGB/51/265, ACGB/50/1310; see 1)

The Arts Council’s annual report included the following about the SPNM:

‘The Society for the Promotion of New Music continued to present concerts both in London and in provincial university towns. In collaboration with the music section of the Institute of Contemporary Arts, the S.P.N.M. presented a concert at the Summer School of Music held at Wardour Castle.’ (ACGB/51/265; see 1)

The Institute of Contemporary Arts’ (ICA) report to the Arts council did not include mention of the WCSS, preferring to report on it’s ‘main’ activity:

‘The main presentation by the Institute of Contemporary Arts Music Section last year was the London Days of Contemporary Musich [sic] which took place in London from the 2nd to the 5th December, 1965. This festival was based on the music of Karlheinz Stockhausen and opened at the I.C.A. Gallery with a General Forum with Karlheinz Stockhausen and Mr. Howard Hartog in the chair. On 3rd December, a chamber music concert was given by the Melos Ensemble under the direction of the young American conductor, Lawrence Foster [who was 24 at the time] and included works by Peter Maxwell Davies, Isang Yun, Harrison Birtwistle, Webern and Berg. [….]’ (ACGB/51/265; see 1))

There is clearly some difference here in the perceived prestige of the WCSS. For the SPNM it was an event of note, as it was for the Arts Council, whilst it isn’t mentioned by the ICA. A visit to the SPNM archives will be invaluable in clarifying this point.

Elsewhere in the Art Council archives is raised the question of the efficacy (or perhaps more accurately clarity) of SPNM giving money to the WCSS alongside a contribution from the Arts Council, creating what is in effect double support from the Arts Council (since the SPNM was Arts Council funded). Certainly the annual report emphasizes the ‘collaborative’ aspect of the SPNM’s support of the WCSS, and the way in which this strengthened its ties with the ICA. The extent of influence that these ties enabled is unclear. The Annual Report juxtaposed the SPNM’s support of the WCSS with the comment that:

‘The I.C.A. (music section) also mounted three concerts in London the third of which contained four works (by Gordon Crosse, Robert Sherlaw Johnson, Neville Gambier and Harrison Birtwistle) each of which has been specially written for the concert, during which it received its first performance’. (ACGB/51/265; see 1)

All this needs to be understood in the light of Alexander Goehr as chair of the SPNM in the years leading up to the WCSSs and the person requesting funding for the 1965 WCSS from the Arts Council.

Secondly, from Christopher Kelty’s collaborative article, ‘Collaboration, Coordination, and Composition: Fieldwork after the Internet’ (click for the full text of this chapter):

We say ‘composition’ here because it is more inclusive than ‘writing’ (paintings, musical works, and software all need to be composed, as poetry and novels do). Writing implies the textual and narrative organization of language – still a difficult enough problem of composition, and still the gold standard; but it leaves out the composition of images and sounds, or especially how other kinds of objects are composed as part of the ethnographic project: documents, statistics, forms, legal documents, unpublished works, audio transcripts, blog-entries, and so on. (Kelty, Christopher (2009), ‘Collaboration, Coordination, and Composition: Fieldwork after the Internet’ Fieldwork is not what it used to be: Learning Anthropology’s Method in a Time of Transition (Ithica: Cornell University Press), 186.)

The creative aspect of the process research that this notion of ‘composition’ opens up connects richly to the design-studio-based work in some architectural practices. Kelty is clear about the innovative aspect of this conception of research:

[…] experimenting with new modes of composition that can give specialist and generalist colleagues alike quick synoptic overviews [such as facilitated by the tags on this post] of research materials and problems and trajectories without sacrificing the scholarly detail and individual virtuosity that has come to be valued in the discipline. […] composition is a practice that crosses between writing understood as an artful craft and research understood as conceptual innovation. (187)

This is the innovation consanguineous with Patrick Schumacher’s assertion that ‘styles are design research paradigms.’ The details of this are lucidly explained by Schumacher (who runs Zaha Hadid’s studio) in his Parametricist Manifesto, which is found here: