The name of Peggy Glanville-Hicks is forever entwined with the
MGM LP label of the 1950s. They recorded the Viola Concerto (Concerto
Romantico) (1955) with Walter Trampler and the Etruscan
Concerto for piano and orchestra (1954). There is also a Concertino
Antico for harp and orchestra (1955) but this was not recorded.
Glanville-Hicks was
born in Melbourne and studied with Vaughan Williams, Boulanger
and Wellesz. There were sojourns in Greece and the USA – Greece
made a deep impression and she returned to live there. She learnt
her theatrical craft - there are four operas and five ballets
- working with Fritz Hart before his departure to Hawaii. She
was married during the 1930s and 1940s to that mystery man of
British music, Stanley Bate but this ended in divorce.
The present disc is
a collection in the third season of ABC's Australian Composer
orchestral series. The Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra tale
centre-stage in this project. There are four works here and
the last of them is a song-cycle with orchestra. The latter
has been licensed from Tall Poppies where it was previously
issued on Tall Poppies
TP112.
The Etruscan Concerto
is a souvenir of her Mediterranean years and of D.H. Lawrence's
Etruscan Places (1933). Its foot-stamping first movement
is flavoured with the carefree dances of Skalkottas
and of The
Isles of Greece by Donald Swann. As with her other concerto
pieces there is just a suggestion of prolixity but there is
much else to compensate. The central movement with its laggardly
winding melodies and incense swirling slowness picks up on the
ancient mysteries of the Etruscan civilisation – a Mediterranean
connection also touched on in her Gymnopedies.
The finale has much in common with the first movement but with
a hint of Hovhaness and RVW. It seems that this concerto has
also been recorded by Keith Jarrett but, sadly, I have not heard
it.
Glanville-Hicks delved
into opera more than once. Her Sappho (1963) succeeded
the opera Nausicaa
(1961). Sappho was written with Callas in mind and to
a commission by San Francisco Opera who then refused to perform
it seemingly because of the predominance of modal tonality (Kurt
Adler). This is the first substantial extract of Sappho to
be recorded in the original scoring. I would like to hear the
whole work. This is a pleasing if low-key soliloquy. It has
a touch of Barber's Antony and Cleopatra but without
that work’s flaming fervour. Deborah Riedel keeps the embers
glowing and flaring.
Tragic Celebration
began life as the
ballet score Jephtha's Daughter in which a rash oath
results in Jephtha having to slay his own daughter. This orchestral
piece has the redolence of Barber's Cave of the Heart with
crackling violence and some tenderness. The piece ends touchingly
with a silvery tintinnabulatory gleam.
Recordings by Gerald
English are as precious as warmth in winter. His voice is not
part of the great homogeneous sea of tenors churned out on a
production line. His voice has poignancy - a penetrating nasal
quality, probing and ecstatic. Glanville-Hicks is well served
by it. I treasure broadcast tapes of Radio 3 broadcasts by him
including a superb account of Finzi's Oh Fair to See and
the songs of Jasper Rooper. He is also well recalled for his
role in Walton's Troilus and Cressida.
Letters from Morocco
were borne out of
composer, Paul Bowles' letters to Glanville-Hicks. These were
part of a forty year correspondence. Islamic muezzin ululation
and spoken words are meshed and interleaved. The setting style
is free-ranging and while tonal is intrepidly engaged with Brittenesque
techniques and wildnesses we may associate with Our Hunting
Fathers. These are wonderfully fragrant yet not fragile
settings. They variously celebrate the remorseless Sahara, music
heard on the warm nights, a hashish almond candy bar, orange
blossom, evening drums and the oasis. The hashish bar song has
a wandering oriental contour redolent of Hovhaness and Cowell.
The seventh of the songs is simply spoken – there is no music.
It’s a brave and successful close and a valorous tribute to
the words of Paul Bowles.
The words for Sappho
and for Moroccan Letters are printed in full in the
booklet.
Rob Barnett
