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Vaughan Williams,  Hugh the Drover : York Opera, Theatre Royal, York, UK   9.10.2007 (JL)

Vaughan Williams'  two act Hugh the Drover (1914) is not an opera that is in the professional repertoire, not even in that of English National Opera - a major bone of contention for  Vaughan Williams devotees. But it can be said to be in the repertoire of York Opera, the group of amateurs that mounted this performance because they did it twelve years ago.  It is not a work that you would expect to pack a provincial theatre five days in a row but on the night I attended I could hardly spot an empty seat which suggests to me that there must have been  many people in the audience who  had made  a pilgrimage from afar to catch this rare event.  It was a first for me and for all I know may be a last opportunity which I regret. Others may not.

There are two problem areas.  First, the opera has structural and dramatic weaknesses that Vaughan Williams recognised from the first performance and as a result he continued working on revisions right into his considerable old age. Some of the problems derive from Harold Child's libretto. Second, there are a number of more subjective issues which will make the opera difficult for many to swallow in this day and age. These are to do with the whole anachronistic, folksy, English village atmosphere with jolly choruses that go “fa la la" and "tally ho boys” and, to cap it all, a scene with morris dancers. Morris dancing nowadays is the popular butt of many jokes that famous English comedians cannot resist - Benny Hill and Harry Enfield come immediately to mind - so there's no wonder that I heard a few sniggers as the dancers came clumping on. Although a comedy, I do not think this is the effect Vaughan Williams had in mind.

Hugh the Drover is  fundamentally a love story (with the unfortunate subtitle of Love in the Stocks) and Vaughan Williams writes some superb music for the scenes between Hugh and Mary that musically does not seem to belong to the rest of the  work (I did say these were subjective issues).  As well as that, the opera does not appear to belong to its own age, not in European terms at any rate. Written between 1910 and 1914, this was a time when Strauss’s  Salome, written  five years previously, was ravaging its notorious and popular way around the continent and the same composer's Elektra had just  hit the scene. Couple that with Stravinsky's rocking of the musical world with The Rite of Spring  then many a European might be forgiven for thinking that Vaughan Williams  was living on another musical planet.

The consequence of all these issues is that it can take a bit of effort to attend to the work's intrinsic worth but if that can be done then there are rewards to be had.

York Opera must be congratulated on both performing the opera at all and on mounting a committed performance that was probably as convincing as can be. Scenery, lighting and costumes were fine, stage direction, particularly of the crowd scenes, was excellent, and the chorus simultaneously sang and acted with conviction. Stage bustle was well handled and I particularly liked the nine children who injected some real physical oomph onto the proceedings. As for the chorus members, soprano tone was a little thin and as so often with amateur groups, there was little power to be heard from the tenor department.  However, they were battling against a common drawback in theatres of this traditional design – a very dead acoustic.  The amateur singers in the sub-principal roles had a hard time from this and none of their voices carried well to where I was sitting in the dress circle.   The only person who conquered the acoustic was Diane Peacock as Mary, one of the two trained professionals in the lead roles.

Vaughan Williams’ starting point for this stage enterprise was to write a ballad opera and one that contained a “prize fight”. The boxing match climaxes Act I and turns from a money bet into a fight for Mary’s hand.  This scene is not supposed to be comedic but a serious piece of dramatic action. Yet the composer’s setting of it is beyond my comprehension.  The build up with a sort of accompanied recitative is well done and there are dramatic breaks between rounds, but each time Hugh and John the Butcher start to fight Vaughan Williams launches into rollicking folk dance music.  It is no wonder that this sort of thing bedevils the opera because as can be seen from Vaughan Williams’ letters to his librettist (published by his widow Ursula in her biography)  he is so keen to incorporate real folk tunes, as well as his own pastiche, that he often starts with the music in his head followed by a search for a dramatic situation in which to incorporate it. Probably no opera could survive this kind of genesis.

There are glories though. Some of the real folk tunes, as well as the pastiche, are beautiful, but above all, the non-folky music written for three main scenarios between Hugh and Mary is inspired. There is real passion here that betrays Vaughan Williams’ considerable admiration for Puccini. The two leads carried the scenes with conviction and in the last one at the end of the opera Diane Peacock really took off and had my spine tingling. Then what happens? I am afraid so: the chorus comes straight in, interrupting the magic with some jolly folksy stuff that practically wrecks the scene. I thought it a stroke of mind boggling misconception. Nevertheless, I will always seek out a performance of this opera just to hear those love scenes again. It is in these that Vaughan Williams incorporates  some wonderful string writing and it was unfortunate that the otherwise excellent orchestra had such limited string resources,  only eight  violins and three  cellos. Coupled with the acoustic, these lovely passages could never be heard to  full effect.

As often with opera sung in English, words are not always easy to understand, even with good diction.  In some passages I was hardly getting any of it.  It was thus unfortunate that there was no synopsis in the programme. What words I did hear were not promising on the versification front. When Mary comes to rescue Hugh from the stocks, I heard her sing:

With this stubborn key
I will set my lover free

The star of the show I thought was conductor Alasdair Jamieson whose pacing was immaculate, keeping things moving but bringing out the beauties. He, together with Diane Peacock and stage director Clive Marshall were the people who carried the day.

John Leeman

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