The Song of the High Hills
“I tried to express the joy and exhilaration one feels in
the Mountains, and also the loneliness and melancholy of the
high solitudes, and the grandeur of the wide far distances...”
Frederick Delius writing about his The Song of the High Hills.
The 1983 Unicorn-Kanchana (DKP (CD) 9029) release of this sublime
work, arguably Delius’s masterpiece, is one of my most cherished
recordings. It was conducted by Delius’s amanuensis, Eric Fenby
and produced by the late and still lamented Christopher Palmer
(he wrote one of the best and most insightful books on Delius:
Delius - Portrait of a Cosmopolitan, Duckworth, 1976, ISBN
0 7156 1547 5) who also wrote the intelligent booklet notes.
In one particular section, Palmer wrote illuminatingly, “Delius
had no belief in the ‘God’ of popular religious contrivance;
yet he was profoundly religious in the sense that his music
aspires and looks through nature to some immanent spiritual
reality, unseen unknown. In the High Hills the voice
of this spiritual reality is the voice, human voices which singing
to no words, sound paradoxically un-human, an embodiment of
‘man in nature’ as Delius called them.” And this sonority, this
ethereal music, as captured here on this CD, indeed has that
most mystical quality which lifts the spirit and engages the
soul.
This new recording has the benefit of superior sound and the
Chandos team has certainly done Delius proud. The spatial perspectives
so vital in this work, evocations of unfolding vistas as the
ascent proceeds, the flashes of lightning and the sound of thunder
rolling amongst the hills, the birdcalls, Alpine horns, and
the sonic pictures of snowfields and stormy rain clouds – these
are all startling realistic. The ecstatic choir at the work’s
climax certainly has an impact; its layering is very impressive
but I worry that the choir and soloists, Olivia Robinson and
Christopher Bowen, are recorded too closely, risking submerging
that so-important mystical quality. But taken in the context
of the whole of this CD, I can live with this concern and this
notwithstanding I would now place Davis’s reading alongside
that of Eric Fenby.
Appalachia
In his preface to the score of Appalachia Delius wrote:
Appalachia is the old Indian name for North America.
The composition mirrors the moods of tropical nature in the
great swamps bordering on the Mississippi River which is so
intimately associated with the life of the old Negro slave population.
However the inspiration for this work can be traced back to
the time when Delius was in Florida, near the wide St Johns
River, engaged in cultivating oranges although his mind was
on music. He relates that he would sit smoking on sultry nights
listening, and being mightily impressed, with the complex harmonies
of the singing of black farm labourers in the distance. Many
Delians also believe that he fell in love with a black girl
with whom he had a child. The romance came to naught but Delius
never forgot it - Tasmin Little has even suggested that she
was the love of his life. It may well be that some of the emotions
of that time spilled over into this and so many other works
besides those inspired by his time in America. So much of Delius’s
music speaks of the transience and tragedy of life and love.
This sadness is emphasised in the sentiments of the slave song
on which Appalachia is based. These slaves were considered
as being little more than commodities to be bought and sold,
families being cruelly split up in the process and literally
‘sold down the river’. Delius’s music, especially in that concluding
song, is full of pathos and pity for their predicament.
Sir Andrew Davis gives a beautifully-shaped and sensitive reading
of Appalachia. It begins with a gorgeous atmospheric
scene-setting – Delius’s slow introduction – an evocation of
a sultry, hazy dusk. all muted colours. A quickening tempo ushers
in the melody of the slave song first hinted at on strumming
strings imitative of banjos and then in a majestic sweep conjuring
up a vision of the mighty Mississippi. After this comes the
statement of the theme proper first on cor anglais and then
transferred to the minor key for the first variation on horn.
This is followed by nine other variations in a variety of moods
of joy, of reflection and almost unbearable poignancy. There
is a waltz and marches and episodes of exquisite delicacy and
there is some exquisite nature-painting. This leads up to that
magnificent and heart-rending final variation for chorus and
orchestra and baritone Andrew Rupp: strong and reassuring to
his woman – ‘And don’t you be so lonesome love. And don’t you
fret and cry...And you’ll find me ever waiting...’ – as the
boat comes to carry him away down river.
Ian Lace
Olivia Robinson (soprano)†; Christopher Bowen (tenor)†; Andrew Rupp (baritone)*
[64:24] 
