RECORDING NEGLECTED BRITISH MUSIC by Robert Stevenson
It’s strange how things work out. When I was in my last year
at university, I had an important decision to make. A career
in management consultancy beckoned but I also vaguely wondered
about the much less secure option of attempting to make it as
a concert pianist. I had some talent as a pianist but was largely
self-taught, so a career in music was never going to be a realistic
option and I opted for consultancy. Subsequently, I managed
to continue to give concerts and even made private recordings
of these. I always dreamed of making a commercial recording
but I never thought there was any likelihood of it happening
– let alone being invited to write an article for the BMS.
More recently, when I set up my own contracting consultancy
in 2003, I discovered that I now had much more flexibility to
indulge my musical interests. An egotistical urge to stretch
my talents and see if I actually could get a record company
to take me seriously finally bore fruit in late 2008 with a
disc (for Dutton’s Epoch label) of neglected English violin
sonatas by Holbrooke, Rootham and Walford Davies - with my friend,
the violinist, Jacqueline Roche. Review
On the strength of favourable critical reviews to this I am
proposing to make another, this time for Naxos, of Holbrooke’s
remaining violin sonatas plus his horn trio.
Rob Barnett has kindly invited me to share my experiences of
“the trials, tribulations and practicalities - as well as revelations
and rewards of recording British music that has fallen into
neglect”.
With the grand total of just one commercial CD to my name, I
wonder whether my limited experiences will actually be of interest.
On reflection, though, I do have a considerable focus on exploring
unusual music – and the process of making a recording does provide
a story of sorts. Of course, for neglected music (of any nationality)
to be explored, there are two bands of explorers – those actually
unearthing and recording the music and those who are, thereby,
given the opportunity to listen to and assess it. I have usually
been one of the latter but I can now claim to be one of the
former. With the perspective this brings I can, perhaps, indicate
the sheer effort that has to be expended to unearth unusual
British music – and the luck that has to be involved. So here
goes.
Background – the digital age
Of course, part of the luck is in being around at the right
historical time. Changes in the listening market have been linked
to changes in the infrastructure of the music industry over
the last thirty years or so, and such changes were essential
for somebody like me (and lots of professional musicians) to
be able to make commercial recordings more easily – particularly
of unusual music.
The dawn of the digital age created opportunities for all kinds
of music in various ways:
-
Once new manufacturing facilities were available, CDs were
much easier to produce than LPs and unit costs were much lower.
-
Digital recording became easier than analogue recording as
it became easier to copy master source material faithfully
and make unobtrusive edits.
-
The arrival of the Internet made it possible to listen to,
buy and download music – thereby encouraging a potential world-wide
audience to ignore national barriers.
-
At the same time both markets and talents were being stimulated.
Music schools in both the West and the Far East were pumping
out high-quality classically-trained performers who needed
to showcase their talents.
In the relatively poorly supported classical music world, constant
pressure to cut costs could be absorbed instead of resulting in
the market being abandoned. In particular, various aspects of
the old record company business model could be turned on their
heads. There was less need to sign up masses of promising artists
on spec. Instead, they could be encouraged to make their own recordings
(at their own cost) and submit these to the record companies to
market them - subject to achieving the required (performance and
recording) quality standards, of course. More use could be made
of live concert recordings – with limited digital patching to
cover up the occasional error.
Moreover, given that marketeers recognised that classical music
listening was (to a large extent) the active preserve of an educated
and affluent segment of the market, the time was now right to
exploit this segment commercially. In the UK, this realisation
was marked by the appearance of ClassicFM, eighteen years ago
– and there were other parallel operations elsewhere. This opened
up classical music radio listening in the UK alone from the perceived
elitism of the quarter of a million strong Radio 3 audience 20
years ago to about 6 million now. This is all making it possible
to explore the classical music repertoire much faster than before
and to judge unusual and neglected repertoire much more objectively
- from a position of familiarity with the best (and some of the
worst). So how is British music faring in this environment? The
answer is much like the curate’s egg - well in parts.
Background - a good time for British music?
The old perception that British classical music was of limited
appeal because it somehow “doesn’t travel” probably has to be
revised. Whilst it remains true that you don’t tend to hear much
British music on the continent and in European concert halls (with
the possible exceptions of Holst and Elgar) this has almost certainly
nothing to do with any shortcomings of the music – at least that
of the front rank of British composers. The real problems include
innate local conservatism (e.g. in Vienna, where the VPO doggedly
sticks to the local classics, hardly ever playing Sibelius – let
alone anything British) and the fact that Brits tend to be outward-facing
and, typically, reticent about promoting their own music. So British
music remains unfamiliar and foreign performers exploring it for
the first few times can sometimes miss essential features of the
necessary performing style. A few years ago I heard Vladimir Ashkenazy
at the Festival Hall, conducting the Philharmonia, in a magnificent
performance of Shostakovich’s 10
th Symphony - but he
started the concert with, of all things, Bax’s Tintagel and, in
my opinion, this completely eluded him. On the other hand, I have
heard this same conductor giving a very moving performance of
Vaughan Williams’ fifth symphony with, of all orchestras, the
Shanghai Philharmonic! So it can be done.
Some British music is doing very well. Whatever feelings some
of us may have about the insidious “dumbing down” effects of a
commercial station (even on Radio 3) it is undeniable that ClassicFM
is giving a much wider range of listeners in the UK access to
classical music - albeit mostly in short chunks. Although popular
pieces are inevitably going to be played to death, some of them
are British and I mumble thanks through gritted teeth when I hear
what was once a favourite of mine, “The Lark Ascending”, for what
seems like the twentieth time in a week - because I know there
will be some Delius or even Bax before too long.
But what of the music of all those other British composers? Why,
for example, is Moeran’s glorious symphony so rarely played? Surely
it is the equal of Sibelius’s 5
th? The answer is that
few listeners know it yet because it still isn’t played often
enough - but ClassicFM will probably get round to playing it all
too frequently given time. The same should apply to William Alwyn’s
3
rd and – possibly – to the other Alwyn symphonies.
At least all of the above have been recorded. For that which hasn’t
yet been recorded the outlook remains more questionable. Much
may depend on the quality evident in just the first few bars for
anybody even to bother with it.
At the risk of stating the obvious, what constitutes “quality”
in musical terms probably has a lot to do with how the music seizes
the listener’s interest, ingratiates itself, and sticks in the
memory (for the right reasons). This doesn’t preclude eclecticism
but blandness really won’t do. The composer will individually
benefit if his or her style has a recognisably distinct “voice”
in his own lifetime. I suppose the difference between the great
and the also-ran composer is the extent to which his or her music
ticks all these boxes consistently. The music of several British
composers simply doesn’t and, for this reason, their output will
always struggle to achieve an audience – and/or to keep it. In
the field of neglected music you have to kiss an awful lot more
musical frogs to find the handsome princes and, whilst marketeers
may be prepared to experiment a bit to see if they can manipulate
the market (the music of Henryk Gorecki and Gavin Bryars comes
to mind!) commercial radio stations are generally less keen to
force their listeners to kiss frogs. The trick is to offer the
neglected music which ticks the most boxes – but unearthing it
is much easier said than done.
A first commercial recording project
I could go on about the background but the important point is
that all the initial factors mentioned above made it possible
for somebody like me to make a commercial recording and to offer
(a carefully selected sample of) unusual repertoire to a worldwide
specialist audience prepared to listen to it – something that
would have been far less possible only 20-30 years ago.
So what were the trails, tribulations, etc. for me? I suppose
I should attempt to distinguish three themes:
-
The revelations, rewards, etc. of exploring unusual and neglected
music (with the focus on British music, of course)
-
The trials, tribulations, etc. of making recordings – i.e.
issues common to the recording of any classical music
-
The peculiar difficulties of the process for an amateur musician.
In fact, in reviewing my own experience, I have found it difficult
to disentangle these themes - so I shall simply relate how I went
about getting a recording made, delivered and publicised in the
hope that any points of potential interest to a BMS audience will
emerge.
The essential starting points
Apart from having some obvious musical ability and the aforesaid
egotistical urge to leave something of it to posterity, it is
essential for those aiming to make a commercial recording to have
the following:
-
Sufficient recorded performances of their efforts, at concert
standard, to be able to demonstrate the capability to get
there and not waste everybody’s time. Obviously, it is helpful
to select examples of these performances to make up a “demo”
disc to offer to recording companies. I had masses of these,
made over 30 years and digitally edited – including concertos,
chamber music, solo recitals and lieder accompaniment. Jacqui
had had her own (rather more select) demo disc produced to
professional standards.
-
A network of musical contacts of various kinds including:
up and coming professional musicians (like Jacqui) who deserve
greater exposure; the odd recording engineer/producer and,
to explore unusual music, it also helps to know the experts
in their fields who can help to find the music and/or provide
useful background information.
-
Sufficient financial resources – preferably in the form of
a handy sponsor. However, several years of working as a contracting
management consultant had provided modest financial resources
for my enterprise and I calculated that I could afford a couple
of thousand pounds.
-
A degree of good luck.
Based on my financial resources, my musical contacts and my demo
discs I (naively) thought that I was well positioned. This turned
out to be partially true but I was to find actually achieving
my goal from this starting point would involve a range of other
factors and require real determination.
Finding suitable repertoire
Assuming that a record company might consider me, an initial issue
was what repertoire to offer. As an amateur, I felt a bit exposed
offering any kind of solo piano music. There might be more safety
in numbers (and, possibly, more likelihood of achieving a suitably
polished performance if I were working in the company of one or
more professional musicians) so I aimed for chamber music. I had
recently met Jacqui, whose performances had greatly impressed
me, so I raised the idea of recording some violin sonatas with
her. Recent offers from other sources for her to make some recordings
had come to nothing so my timing was good and she was amenable
to the idea of recording for the sake of gaining some useful market
exposure. As relative unknowns making a first foray into the market,
we agreed that it would probably be foolhardy to offer mainstream
repertoire, where the competition would inevitably be fierce,
so neglected repertoire seemed the way to go. Better to be large
fish in a small pond. More to the point, if we wanted to be noticed,
reviews were essential and the best way of ensuring that we received
some (although this was not guaranteed) was to go for obscure
repertoire.
Jacqui was friendly with the composer Howard Blake (of “The Snowman”
fame) and he had composed a violin sonata which was in need of
a recording. Blake’s teacher had been Howard Ferguson, whose excellent
– and unjustifiably rarely recorded - second violin sonata I had
already played. (Heifetz, no less, had recorded the first.) This
suggested a possible programme coupling the two Ferguson violin
sonatas with Blake’s and I attempted to sell this idea to several
record companies. My efforts fell on stony ground for reasons
which I still don’t understand. Maybe part of the problem was
that the two Ferguson sonatas had already been recorded. (Naxos,
who originally turned the idea down, ostensibly on commercial
grounds, subsequently recorded Blake’s sonata - with the composer
and Madeleine Mitchell performing. Perhaps they already had this
in mind.)
I subsequently happened on one of Rob Barnett’s record reviews
- in which he commented that somebody really ought to explore
the violin sonatas of Rootham and Holbrooke. I had an old tape
recording of a BBC concert broadcast of the Holbrooke 3
rd
sonata (Op.83 – the “Orientale”) which sounded very interesting
so, deciding to trust Rob’s judgement, I began to contact record
companies to see if a recital based on these two sonatas would
be acceptable. It was. Lewis Foreman at Dutton expressed interest
and, in response to my queries about how best to fill the remainder
of the recital, suggested that I might like to have a look in
Westminster Library where he knew there was a copy of Walford
Davies’s second sonata (Op. 7). This also looked interesting –
and the Holbrooke was there as well, so we were now beginning
to make progress with a recital plan. The music of the Rootham
had been published but appeared to be out of print so I spent
several hours at the British Library and managed to find the music
and order some (expensive) photo copies. Anyway, this sonata looked
highly interesting – if something of a technical challenge. We
now had all the music – or so I thought. Surely three violin sonatas
would be enough?
Landing a recording contract
Next, I had to organise a recording contract and I sent Dutton
a demo disc of examples of our (separate) performances. Lewis
Foreman was very helpful but very busy so his response to this
took a while. Fortunately, our demo performances were suitably
convincing. The basis of the resulting contract was that Jacqui
and I would provide a recording of the three sonatas proposed
and, if this was up to scratch, Dutton would market it. We would
start to get paid royalties if it sold more than 3,000 copies.
I later learned that, although it didn’t seem like it at the time,
this was actually quite a generous offer. Most other companies
don’t protect the artists in this way. In the unlikely event that
a recording became very popular for some reason, the artists would
normally receive no corresponding payment (like Sibelius with
his Valse Triste or Bruch and his first Violin Concerto). This,
of course, is how the new business model works. Unless you are
a very well-known artist you typically get marketing exposure
as a return for your efforts - but nothing else. Fortunately,
we were not in it for the money – although some financial return
would have been a bonus.
Organising a producer
For all my concerts I had made recordings on high-quality cassette
recorders (or, more recently, hard disc recorder) using some microphones
that had been highly regarded back in the 1970s. Editing had been
done using a second generation “digital studio”. The results were
very listenable but not quite up to modern hi-fi standards and
the edits were often discernable. For our efforts to result in
acceptable recording quality I was going to have to engage the
services of a (digital) recording producer and an editor. Fortunately,
I had happened on the name of Michael Ponder, who had provided
his services to several of the record companies I contacted, including
Dutton. Michael kindly agreed to do the job and I breathed a sigh
of relief. I was confident that we could achieve the required
performance standard but Michael would also be in a particularly
good position to judge what would be acceptable to Dutton - and
make sure we achieved it.
Finding a recording venue
I then had to find a venue for the recording - preferably one
that already had a decent concert grand piano (it being prohibitively
expensive to hire one separately). This was difficult. The requirement
ruled out many of the churches I had been considering – as did
the closeness of these venues to the main flight path into Heathrow
and the preferred routes of a lot of noisy emergency service vehicles.
Michael suggested the Potton Hall, a converted barn deep in the
wilds of Suffolk – a location that would add to the costs of three
days of recording sessions the costs of accommodation and meals
for three people. The costs of piano tuning and page turning had
to be added to that as well, of course. It was a good suggestion
but my original budget now had to be more than doubled. On the
other hand the best alternatives were likely to cost at least
as much, one way or the other, so I decided on the Potton Hall
and booked three days there, for six months hence.
Practise sessions and rehearsals
It is surprising how quickly time flies when you commit yourself
in this way. I had plenty of contract consultancy work so could
only devote my evenings and weekends to practice. There was little
or no chance to rehearse with Jacqui, who had a lot of performing
engagements abroad – when she would be away for weeks at a time,
with only a day or two back in the UK before disappearing again.
I was never really taught how best to practise and my preferred
(amateur) rehearsing approach, of building up to a concerto performance
gradually, had been honed with evening class orchestras which,
typically, gave me the luxury of a whole (school) term with regular
practice sessions to get to grips with playing a solo part and
attempting not to part company with the (frequently ghastly) noises
around me. This was good training in some respects but not for
working with a professional, who expected to be able to put together
a performance much closer to the event. Eventually, with six weeks
to go, Jacqui took pity on me and made herself available for a
series of intensive rehearsals.
It soon became evident to me that, for a venture like this, I
could not rely on practising just on my own (Bechstein) upright
piano. I needed to be able to prepare for the likely more solid
touch of the Steinway concert grand in the Potton Hall, so it
became necessary to hire additional rehearsal venues with Steinways
- pushing the costs up further.
Ideally, you need plenty of time to “bed the music down” on the
basis of concert performances. Putting on concerts is a time and
money-consuming process at the best of times, involving finding
a suitable venue and an audience for whatever you want to perform.
Making suitable arrangements and promoting even one concert of
unusual repertoire, in the limited time we had available, was
impossible so, sadly, there was no opportunity to perform any
of the works in public before making the recordings. We also thought
long and hard about asking for tips from some of Jacqui’s many
famous musician friends – but there was no time for that either.
The music itself
And what of the music? Well, as a reference, I am pretty familiar
with the difficulties of playing sonatas like the Franck, Debussy
and the later Brahms. These difficulties were definitely of a
lower order than those of the sonatas we had programmed – which
were more like, say, those of Szymanowski. There had to be reasons
for the neglect of the chosen music and my initial cursory examination
of the scores had suggested some of these. Closer attention and
long hours of practice exposed the remainder. A particular problem
we had was lack of familiarity with the composer’s sound world.
The time signatures alone looked somewhat intimidating – especially
to an amateur. All three sonatas made extensive use of five beats
in a bar and the Walford Davies alternated bars of three beats
and four beats, giving the effect of seven or eleven beats, depending
on how the bars were arranged. Of course, this is part of what
makes the works unusually interesting to listen to – but it probably
limits performances to those who have really committed to such
repertoire. With six weeks to go I thought I was coping well with
all three works – until I recorded my efforts in rehearsal and
it became obvious just how much more attention would be needed
for the performances to be listenable.
The Holbrooke third sonata is a single movement work - relatively
short at thirteen minutes or so and a product of what might be
thought of as the composer’s “late” period. Its name (“Orientale”)
could just be a Holbrooke afterthought rather than pertaining
to a specific tune or sound world. Whilst there are various phrases
with an eastern inflection, it is difficult to bring these out
in a way that actually sounds oriental without over-emphasis.
When I listen to the strange opening page of the score I am most
strongly reminded of the sound of native American (“Red Indian”)
music. I subsequently made this point in the CD sleeve notes,
although one reviewer (an American, I think) criticised me for
a lack of perception and commented on the piece as “a real find
– deliciously chromatic and laced with touches of Debussy” (!)
These touches were not evident to me, so I should be interested
to know what impressions the piece gives other listeners. At any
rate, whatever it sounds like, some of its varying length phrases,
unexpected accents and changing time signatures make it difficult
to commit to memory sufficiently to allow attention to be focused
other than on the score. This becomes a problem when you really
need to watch your hands. Moreover, Holbrooke’s works typically
make subtle changes where phrases are repeated in recapitulation.
Hardly anything unusual in that, you might think, but Holbrooke’s
recapitulation changes are rarely - if ever - intuitive and my
hands always seem to prefer to follow the course of the phrase’s
earlier appearance. (Perhaps it’s a sign of age.) Anyway, this
sonata is definitely testing – and not just for the pianist.
The four-movement Walford Davies second sonata was, superficially,
much more influenced by Brahms. The violin part was frequently
extremely demanding - with a lot of difficult (and rather impractical)
double, treble and quadruple stopping - suggesting that Sir Henry
had no access to a handy Joachim. I don’t know whether he was
well-known as a pianist but I imagine he must have been pretty
good if he could get round his own piano part comfortably. However
much I practised them the piano parts of the first and last movements
did not fall under the fingers easily for me and the final bars
of the short second movement contained a passage that was almost
unplayable, possibly because the composer had made a minor mistake
with the notation (with what looked like an unnecessary doubling
of the speed). During the studio recording I probably had thirty
attempts at this before finally getting an acceptable take. I
often wonder if Michael was quietly despairing of turning my sow’s
ear into a silk purse. He was, however, remarkably patient!
Rootham’s sonata is a lovely piece, whose style is reminiscent
of Vaughan Williams. It was probably the simplest of the three
in purely technical terms, although it required careful attention
to frequent changes of dynamics and some subtle key changes. Unfortunately,
whilst listening to the second iteration of digital editing of
the initial takes, some weeks after the recording, I was to discover
that I had somehow misread the key signature of a twelve bar passage.
Although the misreading sounded perfectly convincing as music
it was not what the composer had written. Correcting the error
– just a few seconds of music - necessitated having to re-learn
the passage and make (expensive) arrangements to take Jacqui all
the way out to darkest Suffolk again when Michael Ponder was next
recording at the Hall. In the end it took less than ten minutes
actually to record the correction. I suppose I could have acquiesced
and kept quiet but I would never have forgiven myself for issuing
a first recording of the work with an error of that nature.
In summary, I will simply say that we were extremely lucky to
find three sonatas that probably owed their neglect to difficulties
of performance that, in turn, made them sufficiently interesting
to justify unearthing them. Sadly, during our rehearsal sessions,
I neglected to establish the sonatas’ overall duration. Had I
done so I would probably have realised the need for more material.
The recording sessions
I won’t go into much further detail about the recording sessions.
Let it suffice to say that established professional musicians
would, typically, record subtly different takes of each movement
and pore over the takes to select their favourite interpretation
– possibly allowing a little digital patching for slight imperfections.
To accommodate my limitations the approach for our debut recording
had to be different. For the most part we had only one interpretation
prepared and we stuck to that – it was more a question of getting
the notes correct. This took so long that there was hardly any
opportunity to review the takes at the time.
As I recall, Michael said that the standard approach to recording
chamber music was to divide movements into sections of two to
three pages, record each several times, then select the best/most
compatible takes and edit them together. Perhaps he was being
both kind and practical. At any rate, lack of deep familiarity
with the sound world of the music (and lack of as much rehearsal
as we would have needed to be confident in concert performance)
meant that we had to be reliant on this method. Fortunately, our
preparations had been thorough enough for our speeds to remain
consistent between takes, so patching was rarely a problem. I
thank providence that I was not born during the era of 78s. With
this repertoire I would have needed a great deal more rehearsal
time to consider recording any of it in single takes.
Post-recording work
After the recording sessions were complete, Michael took his notes
and his DAT cassettes, selected the best takes and sent the tapes
and instructions to a (sub-contracted) digital editor, Richard
Scott, who did a splendid job of linking all the takes seamlessly
and doing a few initial patches. It was then down to us to identify
where further patches would be necessary. Needless to say, my
efforts required quite a lot of detailed patching – whereas Jacqui’s
performances required relatively little. There were three iterations
of listening and identifying the further patches needed before
we were both satisfied that we had versions of the works that
made acceptable listening. Fortunately, by this stage, the results
were also acceptable to Dutton and Lewis Foreman almost persuaded
me not to bother with further improvements. I did request one
or two more and I am glad of that. Even now there are still a
few moments on the recordings that I wish I has been able to modify
slightly – although this may be a result of having listened to
them so often (fortunately, other people rarely seem to notice
anything wanting).
On the other hand, I understand that recording producers have
quite a problem with the tendency of many musicians never to be
satisfied with the quality of what should otherwise be regarded
as a perfectly acceptable edited version. In fact, I gather that
I am far from being a real offender in terms of the number of
patches required. I have heard of one very famous violinist –
who shall have to remain nameless - demanding up to twenty edits
within a single bar! I take comfort from that.
We now had just over 50 minutes of obscure music ready to be issued
to a waiting public. However, Dutton have a policy of offering
well-filled CDs – usually of at least an hour’s duration. We needed
another ten minutes of music to satisfy this. At this stage, neither
Jacqui nor I could face the prospect of finding, learning and
recording more pieces so, initially with somewhat heavy hearts,
we accepted Dutton’s offered compromise, which made use of a recording
of Arthur Benjamin’s ‘Cello Sonatina (by Justin Rose and Sophia
Rahman) which had been slightly too long to be included on their
original CD of Benjamin’s chamber music. In fact, this lovely
performance made a very acceptable fill-up. The disc was no longer
wholly ours – but at least it could now be scheduled for release
later in the year and, crucially, in time for Christmas.
Marketing material
It was then necessary to get CD sleeve notes written and to provide
suitable photos (of both the artists and the composers). I had
done a lot of background research and was able to pull together
some draft notes which Dutton edited down. Dutton’s CD sleeve
house style at the time made use of old railway posters from the
early part of the last century – which obviated any chance of
getting our pictures on the CD cover. This was a pity for Jacqui,
whose photogenic appearance could have boosted sales (but was
not an issue for me).
The process of Marketing now had to begin. Lewis was fairly confident
that the repertoire we had chosen would get reviewed but, to facilitate
this, it was essential for Dutton to send out review copies of
the CD to all the relevant magazines, papers and organisations
who might take an interest. I sent a large number of supporting
e-mails out, with photos of Jacqui, in the hope that some of the
magazines would recognise suitable material for their “up and
coming artists” pages. I suspect that all my efforts were slightly
too late. In spite of the excellence of the photos, the only one
that was published accompanied Rob’s review on Music Web International
(MWI) where it can still be found, MWI search engine permitting.
The reviews!!
Unfortunately, in spite of a November CD release, it took several
months for all the reviews to come out, which probably largely
negated the value of getting the recording out before Christmas.
By about March of 2009 we had managed to be reviewed in The Gramophone,
BBC Music Magazine, The Strad, Fanfare, The American Record Guide
and The Yorkshire Post, and there were other reviews on the Internet
(including MWI, Records International Review and, eventually,
some by Amazon customers!). Fortunately, and much to my relief,
the reviews were all pretty positive – generally focusing more
on the music than the performances (as one might expect).
This article is partly about the revelations and rewards of recording
unusual and neglected British music. Several months’ hard slog
reduced the impact of my initial impressions on hearing the finished
(first commercially recorded) performances of the violin sonatas,
so that I can hardly describe the experience as revelatory. However,
the music obviously came as something of a revelation to most
of the reviewers:
-
Peter Dickinson’s review in The Gramophone commented: “These
are fascinating by-ways of British music – pieces one never
expected to hear - but with performances like this anything
could happen. Some of them could even enter the mainstream.”
-
Robert Maxham, writing in the American magazine, Fanfare,
commented: “The works’ interest should be able to propel them
not only across the channel but across the ocean as well,
especially in such enthusiastic and opulent performances.
Generally recommended for the accessible repertoire—and, again,
the performances—but recommended with special urgency to Anglophiles
and explorers”.
-
The Yorkshire Post’s reviewer, “DD”, commented: “We are again
indebted to Dutton for introducing us to the delights of early
20th century violin sonatas from Holbrooke, Walford Davies
and Rootham. Conveniently described as coming from the Vaughan
Williams era, they are so tuneful and easily attractive their
neglect is appalling. The young Jacqueline Roche is the highly
persuasive soloist, with sensitive accompaniment from Robert
Stevenson”.
-
An Amazon customer review by “Mythago”, commented: “This CD
containing one of his [Holbrooke’s] sonatas along with a number
of other works is a genuine delight, surprising and familiar
(in a very British way) it both rouses and moves in equal
parts. Roche's violin performance is wonderful, powerful and
evocative, perfectly suited to the Holbrooke sonata in particular.
Highly recommended”.
I was suitably grateful for reviews like this (and for ratings
of four stars for performance and five for recording quality in
the BBC Music Magazine). In spite of the reviews, however, worldwide
sales of the CD have been limited and future sales will be very
slow. If Dutton manage to shift all of the first batch of pressings
they will probably decide not to re-issue for a while – if at
all (so get your orders in now, if you haven’t already done so).
Needless to say, we don’t expect to be earning any royalties so
the rewards will have to remain intangible. Nevertheless, I am
sufficiently enthused to have another go.
The next project
As already mentioned, the next project is for a single composer
disc that will include Holbrooke’s horn trio, Op 28, and the remaining
violin sonatas (Ops 6 and 59). If a fill-up is needed I am considering
a selection from the set of so-called Mezzo-Tints, Op 55 (for
violin and piano) – unfortunately, there is probably not going
to be room for all of the set. The single composer format is more
acceptable to Naxos so (assuming the recordings pass muster) they
will market this offering. With a bit of luck, if the disk is
reasonably successful, the Naxos catalogue will retain it somewhat
longer than others might find possible.
It may be better to travel hopefully than to arrive but, for me,
the first disc’s arrival was rather better than the journey involved
in producing it. Preparing for this second project has been just
as difficult.
Continuing problems
Neglected music needs all the help it can get if it is to be given
a fair chance to justify its existence so, assuming that listeners
are prepared to tolerate my efforts on the piano, I need to engage
the services of really excellent professional musicians. Jacqui
has all sorts of demanding commitments likely to clash with the
recording, including recitals at the Wigmore Hall, the Purcell
Room and the Cheltenham Festival so, with great regret, I have
had to find another violinist. That said, it’s an ill wind… My
list of contacts has come in useful again and I am delighted to
say that Kerenza Peacock, the leader of the Paveo Quartet, has
agreed to make the violin sonata and Mezzo-Tint recordings with
me and Mark Smith, a much-in-demand freelance horn player, will
be joining us for the horn trio.
The familiar issues of finding suitable venues and getting busy
musicians together for practice sessions are, once again, becoming
an issue - not least because a third player makes gatherings even
more difficult to organise (and might make patching the recordings
more complex). Of course, if one is lucky enough actually to find
excellent professional artists who are prepared to commit to making
a recording of rare repertoire, one has to be prepared to work
around their availability. Freelance musicians have to grab work
opportunities so rehearsal plans which have taken months to organise
can be dashed at the last minute. The better the musicians are,
the more likely it is that they will be in demand - so this will
happen frequently and it can be extremely frustrating.
Financing the venture is still a concern. In the present economic
climate contract consultancy work is unusually hard to come by
so I have explored the possibility of sponsorship – and have even
written to the family of Holbrooke’s benefactor, Lord Howard de
Walden, to see if any of their regular donations to good causes
might be channelled our way. No such luck, so covering the costs
will be down to me again unless somebody knows of a kindly sponsor.
This remains a very expensive hobby!
Simply getting hold of the music has involved a lot more effort
this time. Only the horn trio remains available in print – astonishingly
in two different versions, both of which are copies of handwritten
manuscript which is sometimes very difficult to read. The two
violin sonatas went out of print long ago and the British Library
still required copyright waivers because Holbrooke died as recently
as 1958. I tracked down several of Holbrooke’s ex-publishers,
only to find (after much effort) that the composer had eventually
bought back almost all his copyrights. I then had to get in touch
with Jean Holbrooke, the composer’s daughter-in-law, to request
the waiver – which she kindly supplied. Armed with this I could
organise copies of the British Library’s material.
I managed to find and order copies of the violin sonatas without
much difficulty. The music was in large bound volumes, some in
a rather poor state of repair, but the person doing the copying
must have gone to great trouble to reduce some slightly-too-large
pages of music neatly onto A4 sheets (the size I need). I was
impressed with this and, three months later, when I attempted
to organise copies of the Mezzo-Tints (the separate violin and
piano parts of which were inconsistently spread between several
volumes) I requested similar reductions – only to be told that
the Library did not make reductions and never had! I cited my
previous experiences and sought access to higher authorities but
this made no difference. I was eventually forced to specify a
mixture of expensive and unnecessary A3 sized copies, with simple
A4-only copying only where the music was unarguably A4 size. Ensuring
that the information was unambiguously laid out and correctly
priced on the copying order form involved hours of unpleasant
hassle with two difficult and unhelpful Library staff members
(about whom a complaint later became necessary – which, needless
to say, got me nowhere). I had the uncomfortable feeling that
my order would still be compromised and this proved to be the
case. I was eventually provided with copies that
had been
reduced onto A4 paper - but with images of B5 size!! I gather,
from other musicians, that I am not alone in having had problems
like this. Needless to say, I shall go to considerable lengths
to avoid having to rely on this institution again – a pity in
view of my earlier experience.
Fortunately, all my research has turned up some useful discoveries
about the image manipulation capabilities of Microsoft Office
Picture Manager as well as other Internet facilities, including
international access to library catalogues around the world (including
the UK). It is amazing how many other libraries also have quite
a wide selection of Holbrooke’s works. Perhaps his music is better
known than I had thought….
The music
When I first explored it I had some concerns about the music but
they have been swept away as practice has rendered the pieces
listenable. As expected, the early first violin sonata (“Sonatina”)
is typical of early Holbrooke, rather sub-Grieg (and similar to
Grieg in technical difficulty – albeit rather shorter) with some
slightly twee themes that can, nevertheless, be made to sound
reasonably convincing. The piece is not deep or profound but it
is certainly worth an outing.
The Horn Trio is notable for its slow movement, a very beautiful
composition and probably one of Holbrooke’s best. The outer movements
don’t stand out so well and are not as well integrated as in the
counterpart Brahms work, but the last movement is jolly and the
work - as a whole - should be in the standard repertoire. I feel
it is at least as memorable as Lennox Berkeley’s similarly scored
work.
It is not difficult to see why the second violin sonata/concerto
earned its “Grasshopper” tag. Havergal Brian described the first
and last of its three movements as:
“nimble and quick-witted
... of rhythmical capriciousness suggestive of the title; but
the middle movement is a finely sustained elegy in which not only
the soloist but also the orchestra eloquently sing”. The music
provides two alternative versions of the last movement. The sonata
version is fiendishly difficult for the violinist but the concerto
form has a cadenza and other passages of additional hair-raising
violin pyrotechnics (another reason for its neglect?). A difficulty
faces us in terms of the best way to present this material. After
considering the possibility of providing separate (alternative)
tracks for several modified passages, we have decided that the
simplest approach is to present both versions of the movement
– although much of the material is identical.
From my own point of view, the one slight regret I have about
this “sonata” is that it still sounds like a violin concerto solo
with piano accompaniment – rather than being (like the third sonata)
a genuine duet for violin and piano. For all that, the piano part
is a pig to play, so getting it successfully on record will be
something of an achievement in itself.
The possibility of competition
As you may have noticed, there has been a recent surge in releases
of Holbrooke’s works. You will probably be aware that the ‘cello
sonata, which I would have wanted to include – had I a suitable
‘cellist to hand - has just appeared on one of the BMS’s own CDs.
The ‘cello concerto (“The Cambrian”) and fourth symphony, not
to speak of various other orchestral works, have also been released
by Dutton. Much of the piano music is probably off-limits to me
now that is in the process of being explored by the Greek pianist,
Panagiotis Trochopoulos – who might even get round to recording
the Second Piano Concerto (“The Orient”) as well.
On this basis achieving the distinction of making first recordings
of the proposed Holbrooke works just might still be stolen from
us – unless we are quick to get the discs made and released. A
public performance of the Holbrooke horn trio has already appeared
on a set of Canadian DVDs of the 2007 Newport Music Festival,
so we can only claim (I hope) that ours will still be the first
CD recording of this work.
Conclusion
Recording neglected British music can be a very time-consuming,
demanding and expensive process, especially as a hobby for an
amateur. I have, however, enjoyed the end result a lot and I hope
others will as well.
I made the first CD principally to prove that I had the necessary
technique to be taken seriously – in spite of being an amateur.
I shall be making the second for the sake of completeness (recording
all three Holbrooke violin sonatas) and to prove that I can record
for the world’s largest classical music label. I don’t know if
anybody else makes recordings for such reasons but British music
is a worthwhile focus.
If I make a third CD it will be a toss-up between:
-
Taking advantage of any potential availability of members
of the wonderful Paveo Quartet, who might be prepared to join
me to record, for example, a piano quintet or two by Walford
Davies and/or the remaining (unrecorded) Holbrooke piano quartet
or:
-
Convincing somebody to take seriously a grandiose project
to set down my interpretations of what are generally regarded
as some of the peaks of the standard piano repertoire (e.g.
Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit).
Much depends on how much consultancy work I can get to finance
these projects (i.e. how the economy improves) and how masochistic
I feel! Anyway, please watch this space.
Robert Stevenson
