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Proms Chamber Music 7,  Coleridge–Taylor and Vaughan Williams: Mark Padmore (tenor), Nash Ensemble (Richard Hosford (clarinet), Ian Brown (piano), Marianne Thorsen (violin), Malin Broman (violin), Lawrence Power (viola), Tim Hugh) Cadogan Hall, London, 1.9.2008 (BBr)

Samuel Coleridge–Taylor: Clarinet Quintet in F sharp minor, op.10 (1895)
Ralph Vaughan Williams: On Wenlock Edge (1909)


This Proms season has given us some interesting British music, some of which was new to many – Finzi’s Intimations of Immortality, Bax’s In memoriam Patrick Pearse, Nigel Osborne’s Flute Concerto – some were old friends – Butterworth’s Shropshire Lad Rhapsody and Elgar’s 1^st Symphony, there has been lots of Vaughan Williams to commemorate the 50^th anniversary of his death and one work was of the “I know it exists but I’ve never heard it” variety.

Samuel Coleridge–Taylor was Charles Stanford’s favourite pupil, which is saying something considering the number of fledgling composers who passed through his hands. Best known for his choral setting of Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast, the first part of an Hiawatha trilogy, his music is colourful and always entertaining. The Clarinet Quintet is a very early work and it shows the influence of Brahms and Dvorak, but despite this there is a firm hand in control, and one can hear, from time to time, the beginnings of a style. The four movements are clearly defined and are very classical in their layout. I wish that one could claim it as a masterpiece but it doesn’t climb that dizzying height but it is certainly proof positive that England wasn’t really ein Land ohne Musik (a comment coined as late as 1924) during the late Victorian era. Moreover, it is a step or two away from the works of Cipriani Potter (one of England’s most prolific symphonists) and George Macfarren (another symphonist). It’s a fine work and one which, I would have thought, would have clarinetists rushing to perform as it’s grateful to play and delightful to listen to. This lunchtime, the Nash Ensemble played it for all it was worth and gave a fabulously enjoyable performance. Richard Hosford made a memorable soloist and the string players obviously enjoyed every minute of it. I’ve known the piece from an old, and very good, Georgina Dobrée LP for some thrity years but this was the first time I’d ever heard it live – it was worth the wait, but I don’t want to have to wait another 30 years to hear it in the flesh again. Come on clarinetists – it’s well worth the blow.

Vaughan Williams’s Housman cycle On Wenlock Edge is better known in both the concert hall and on recordings, but, for me, the piece has a major failing. It’s too fussy for the simplicity of the poetry – to anyone who knows the great Shropshire Lad cycle by George Butterworth, written only a couple of years after VW’s work, where the music is pared to the bone, and then some, VW seems over the top and heavy handed. The accompaniment also takes things to extremes, so when bells are mentioned we hear bells, the wood’s in trouble and the strings give us storm music.  I’ve often thought that VW cut the football verse in Is my team ploughing because he thought that he might have to let the players have a game. OK, so I’m being a bit too churlish but it’s all so literal and little, I find, is left to the imagination.

Mark Padmore is a fine tenor and he gave an authoritative performance, very ably accompanied by the Nash – especial praise must go to Ian Brown for his wonderful piano playing.

For me, musically, a slightly flawed event, but as to performance a total success.

Bob Briggs


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