My new music

Note for Clarinet Concerto by Joseph Phibbs

I have wanted to write a clarinet concerto for a number of years, and I was therefore delighted when, last year, the young clarinettist Sarah Williamson approached me with the idea of writing her a concerto, my first work in this genre. I had the good fortune of writing Sarah a chamber piece for a recital at Wigmore Hall last year, and knew the facets of her playing well: her technical brilliance, wide stylistic range (effortlessly combining repertoire such as Brahms with Gershwin), and willingness to explore new challenges for the instrument. Sarah has already done much to extend the clarinet repertoire, commissioning new and complex works from composers such as Philip Grange, whose dazzlingly virtuosic concerto I heard Sarah perform under Phillip Scott last year. I felt therefore in the privileged position of feeling able to write exactly what I wished for the instrument.

The clarinet's wide range, agility, and broad dynamic capabilities make it a wonderfully versatile instrument to compose for. Together with these technical strengths I have always been attracted to the sheer sonority of the instrument: its clear tone - rounded and focused, yet never intrusive- and the still, unwavering centre to its sound, lending it a coolness and stability, at times almost like an organ. I am also intrigued by its ability to change musical personality suddenly, lending itself equally well to music which is humourous, flippant, or grotesque in character, as to a particular type of melancholic lyricism, which speaks with a unique poignancy on the clarinet.

In common with some of my recent works, this new concerto could be regarded loosely as a depiction of 'light in sound': the slow passage of light through the course of a day; an evocation of different qualities of light and the speed at which these change; and the atmosphere and mood that certain periods of the day (e.g. dawn) might suggest.

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Treasures from the Sands

Memories of Ernest Bloch commemorating the 50th anniversary of his death

Ernest Bloch was a world-renowned Swiss composer who emigrated to the United States in 1916. In 1941 he settled in Oregon, moving from San Francisco where he had been director of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and continued to be a lecturer in the University of California-Berkeley Department of Music. In 2009, his music is being celebrated marking the 50th year after his death. Robert Weiss met Ernest Bloch at his home at Agate Beach in the 1950s. Now retired, he was attorney to members of Ernest Bloch's family for many years and through that connection became informed on aspects of the composer's life. The narrative related here connects Bloch's polishing of agates found on the Oregon Coast, musical composition and the infinite.

The speck of a figure far down a long, curving stretch of empty Oregon beach grew larger. Very slowly, almost imperceptibly, it lurched closer, sometimes stopping completely as if contemplating an object in the sand, then moving off to one side or back to the other, poking here and there with what appeared to be a long stick. At that distance it was hard to be sure. The figure often retreated and when departure from sight seemed inevitable, at the very last instant of perception when haze and mist were about to erase it from view, it came back to the original course. It appeared to be travelling on a journey of many turnings, all somehow linked and patterned.

The outwardly erratic movements nonetheless formed a graceful and intriguing whole, a passage, surely felt and understood by that speck of a figure, and which, given time, he would complete.

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Inside the Record Business -
3: The Musician and the Microphone

The distinguished pianist Leslie Howard, who has recorded over 130 CDs, describes working in the studio from the viewpoint of the artist.

The first thing you have to remember is that a recording session is not the same as a concert, and the trouble is that, in your expectation when you hear the recording - after the long process of how the record is made - what you want to hear is something which resembles, as closely as you can manage, a true-to-life concert performance. The only difficulty being that in true-to-life concert performances there are occasional blemishes that happen which in a concert do not matter at all, but on a recording they may well become extremely irritating to listen to.

For example, one of the reasons why, for quite a long time, people under-rated the playing of Alfred Cortot was because his recordings were very like his concert performances. If he missed the bass notes in a Chopin Waltz - well, they stayed missed - and he didn't play them again and again until he got them right, he just took the one he thought was the best performance and that was the one which was issued.

When you hear the same performance twice - which is impossible in life, you just cannot do it - in a recording, that's the way it works. When you hear Cortot play that wrong note in the bass again, you have to steel yourself for it. It's not as if he'll get it right the next time. So in order to avoid error, people very frequently produce records that actually come out pretty dead in the water, because they've been so careful.

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What's so great about Dartington.?

Mark Doran

It is 8am. You've been in bed for four hours; and as you hit the snooze button the thought occurs that you would happily give a kidney in return for another 60 minutes of shut-eye. Below your window, a girl hurrying to breakfast takes a deep breath and - with that disconcerting thoughtlessness that seems second-nature to all singers - lets out a sudden fragment of the Symphony of Psalms: "Lau(au)-da(a)-te(e) E-um." .

And for the first time in your life, your reaction is not to groan (or shout) "Who the hell is singing at this time in the morning?". Instead, you find yourself thinking: "You know, detaching the notes in that way really does help define the quavers.".

Only then do you realize: the Dartington magic has changed you. You're no longer the person you were. Or, rather, you've become the person you always have been, but ordinarily can't be. Your bent and battered spirit has uncurled.

It's surely this restorative experience - and everything that goes with it - that gives the Dartington International Summer School its drawing power: people come back, year after year, with their families, with their friends. I'm reliably informed that there are some who even take the same room every time - making use, no doubt, of a 'priority early booking' system that means you can sign up for the next Summer School before you've even left this one.

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Proms Pre-eminent - the 2009 Season

Robert Matthew-Walker and Christopher Follett report on the Royal Albert Hall Orchestral concerts

After the First Night's Palace of Varieties, the 2009 Proms soon changed 360 degrees for a single-work programme on July 20, Mahler's Ninth Symphony, with the London Symphony Orchestra under Bernard Haitink. Much could be said of this performance, yet little need be, for it was simply magnificent throughout. This conductor has always been an outstanding Mahlerian, but in recent years his readings have deepened to the point where he is now one of the greatest living interpreters of the composer's music. As he was also conducting arguably the greatest orchestra in the world at present, the result was astonishingly moving - as any performance of this work should be, but so very rarely is. Haitink's grasp, control and understanding of the totality of this work were enormously impressive, to which must be added praise for David Pyatt, first horn, who played the long and extremely difficult solo in the first movement with pluperfect excellence.

Two nights later brought the return of the BBCSO under Sir Andrew Davis, in a programme marking the 800th anniversary of Cambridge University. The account of Vaughan Williams's The Wasps overture (100 years old this year) was really good, as was that of RVW's Five Mystical Songs for baritone (the excellent Simon Keenlyside), chorus (combined choirs from various Cambridge colleges), organ (Thomas Trotter) and orchestra, the two works by the master enveloped Ryan Wigglesworth's new piece, The Genesis of Secrecy, a BBC commission, but this piece, doubtless well-intentioned, left no lasting impression on this listener. Three wide-ranging choral works - by Stanford (Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis in A, in the almost-never-heard orchestral version), Jonathan Harvey (Come, Holy Ghost) and Judith Weir (Ascending into Heaven - the last two conducted respectively by Andrew Nethsingha and Stephen Cleobury) - opened the second half. Of the recent works, Harvey's beautiful and haunting setting won the day. Saint-Saëns' Third 'Organ' Symphony received a performance of no little stature and subtlety, Thomas Trotter relishing his part with considerable artistry.

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Opera in Provence

A report by Peter Brown

I spent July in Provence, not on the chic Côte d'Azur, with its beaches and bikinis, but in the hinterland, the Vaucluse to be precise, an area of national parks and hilltop villages, roughly half way between Avignon and Aix-en-Provence famous for its lavender fields, rosé wine and of course Peter Mayle who wrote his "Year in Provence" in the village where I stayed. During a brief visit of less than three weeks I sampled wonderful opera in a variety of locations probably unique in the world. Let's start with the biggest, the Chorégies d'Orange, famous worldwide for its concerts and opera under the stars in one of the world's best preserved theatres and a UNESCO heritage site. Around 9000 people sit in the ancient stepped (and steep) arena which benefits  from the original acoustic stage wall and gives superb sound that penetrates with extraordinary clarity to the topmost rows.

Orange thrives on popular operas for its tightly packed audience so it was surprising to come across Orange premières, Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci (August 1st) superbly conducted by the veteran Georges Prêtre.  Singing both Turridu and Canio, Roberto Alagna was on top form, as was the outstanding Korean baritone Seng-Hyoun Ko, another double act as Alfio and Tonio, bringing real menace and occasional comedy to his roles.

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Iain Burnside - All Rounder

in conversation with Brian Hick

At a time when so many musicians are highly specialised it is refreshing to speak to one who can be considered an all-rounder. Though a highly accomplished pianist, in continual demand for his sensitive lieder and song recitals, Iain Burnside is equally well known as a broadcaster and Festival organiser.

I wondered how he managed the demands from such a wide range of possibilities?

'You are right, no two weeks are the same. Take this week as an example - I have four very different events in five days, ranging from concerts to a lecture, and I still have to find time to write my radio show. It tends to mean a lot of early mornings, and late night emails.'

Was this eclecticism planned?

'No it just sort of happened but I'm very happy that it did. I really enjoy multi-tasking and suspect I could get rather tired of simply being a pianist. Not that I would dream of giving up that side of my work. I still consider myself a pianist first and foremost. It is just that all the other things have come along and I've been able to do both.'

Does this leave enough time to practise?

'It is certainly difficult to find the time. The problem is that everything else has a deadline, and most of what I have to do is under great pressure. Practising has to be fitted in around other things, but there I times when I need to just shut myself away, just me and the piano, switch everything else off and concentrate.'

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My Work and Mission - part I

Richard Wagner (Musical Opinion, September 1, 1879)

If we look back into the remote past of our people, we shall see how precisely those Teutonic races which broke away from the soil of their own land, and emigrated beyond its borders into strange countries, were the ones to display most powerfully the incomparable strength and greatness of the Teutonic family, in unexampled conquests, brilliant and daring deeds, and all-important results.

At this day the two great civilised nations of England and France, and (in the three great Latin regions of Europe) the provinces of Normandy, Lombardy and Andalusia, bear names derived from the first German immigrants - the Vandals, Lombards, Normans and Anglo-Saxons. The Anglo-Saxons especially, and beyond all others, succeeded in founding, upon the wonderful Celtic islands which they conquered, a really Germanic civilisation. Even now this civilisation shows itself as the true development of the English people, though the Gallicised Norman nobility have ruled for nearly a thousand years over the Saxon race of England. Certainly it is a true Germanic race that has gone forth from its English home, and, continually recruited by emigrants from the mother country of Germany, is working out the future for America. It shows in this its old habit - it shows itself in its true strength and greatness on a foreign soil, thrown upon its own activity and energy, and compelled to build up a new self-sustaining community. On the other hand, that part of the race which has remained in Germany - that part which bore the special, distinctive name of Germans, and even in the old days stayed quietly at home - has always represented the peculiar type of the German 'Philistine'. He lets himself be hampered and hemmed in on every side; and lives out his long tale of little woes in pettiness and wretchedness, amid continual bickerings with neighbours like himself.

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