Ralph VAUGHAN WILLIAMS (1872-1958)
A Cotswold Romance (1951) [39:52]
Death of Tintagiles (1913) [14:48]
Rosa Mannion (soprano) (Mary)
Thomas Randle (tenor) (Hugh)
Matthew Brook (baritone) (John the Butcher)
London Philharmonic Choir
London Symphony Orchestra/Richard Hickox
rec. 3-4 October 1997, All Saints Church, Tooting, London, England
Full English text provided
CHANDOS CHAN10728X [54:34]
The new commemorative Hickox Legacy series on Chandos was launched
in June 2012. This leads up to and continues beyond the fifth anniversary
in November 2013 of the untimely death of this much admired conductor. Prolific
in the recording studio, he made an especially large number of recordings
of British music. There are more than 280 recordings made during his long
and fruitful association with Chandos alone. The present re-issue contains
premiere recordings of two of Ralph Vaughan Williams’s lesser known
and rarely performed works.
The two act ballad opera Hugh the Drover known alternatively as Love
in the Stocks (1910-20) uses an original English libretto by Harold Child.
Its first professional staging was in 1924 at His Majesty's Theatre, London.
Its plot often reminded me of Smetana’s folk opera The Bartered Bride.
Hugh is set in the Cotswold village of Cotsall during the Napoleonic
era. Hugh, who obtains horses for the army saves Mary the daughter of the
village constable from an unwanted marriage to John the Butcher whom she does
not love. In the village a prize fight has been organised to settle the dispute
between the two rivals and John is subsequently defeated by Hugh. In an act
of revenge John accuses Hugh of being a French spy and Hugh is put in the
stocks. Mary has stolen the keys from her father and frees Hugh. They hear
John and his associates approaching and Mary and Hugh, who decide they can’t
leave each other, both get into the stocks. A soldier recognizes Hugh as the
man who once saved his life and releases him proclaiming him a loyal British
subject. In a happy ending Hugh and Mary restate their love for each other
and take to the open road.
Evidently the publishers felt that the score was not suited to concert performance.
This was the thinking behind Maurice Jacobson’s collaboration with the
composer. In 1951 they prepared an adaptation of the opera and called it A
Cotswold Romance. It’sa cantata for tenor and soprano
soloists, mixed chorus and orchestra. Lasting almost forty minutes the cantata
is cast in ten sections and works extremely well as a stand-alone work.
Hickox selected three splendid soloists. The opening chorus Men of Cotsall
is a wonderful folk-infused romp through the Cotswold village of Cotsall.
Immediately one notices enthusiastic and well drilled singing from the choir.
As Hugh, the tenor Thomas Randle is highly convincing singing beautifully
in the appealing song Sweet Little Linnet (Hugh’s advice to Mary).
I also admired Randle’s voice in the contemplative Alone and Friendless
and the compellingly sung lusty Romantic ballad Song of the Road for
chorus with a solo part for Hugh. Love at First Sight, the delightful
duet for Mary and Hugh is performed with evident warmth. Setting the scene
for the prize fight I really enjoyed martial strains of The Best Man in
England for chorus and baritone. Here Matthew Brook adeptly conveys the
virile aggression of John the Butcher in the prize fight. With the song Mary
escapes soprano Rosa Mannion is a feisty Mary who has been disowned by
her father. Mannion is delightfully expressive, singing that she stands by
her love for Hugh, with the chorus adding to the near-magical atmosphere.
In the final song Freedom at Last Hugh has been released from the stocks
by the soldiers. It makes for a poignant scene. In the expressive duet O
the sky shall be our roof and my arms your fire Randle and Mannion sing
so affectionately. Once again the entry of the chorus creates a bewitching
effect.
The second work on the disc is the incidental music The Death of Tintagiles.
In 1913 Vaughan Williams wrote a number of incidental scores for the theatre
at Stratford mainly for Shakespearean plays namely: The Merry Wives of
Windsor, King Richard II, King Henry IV - Part 2, Richard
III, and Henry V but not all of it has survived. The Death of
Tintagiles was written to accompany a production of the Belgium playwright
Maurice Maeterlinck’s 1894 play of the same name. The plot of this peculiar
tale concerns the young boy Tintagiles who is the orphaned grandson of an
elderly Queen. Tintagiles is to be the future king of an unnamed Kingdom.
The envious Queen expels Tintagiles to a gloomy and sinister castle where
he endures terrible ordeals. Tintagiles’ two older sisters Ygraine and
Bellangère, together with Aglovale their wise old warrior, try to rescue
him. In the castle Ygraine tries all she can to free Tintagiles but her endeavours
are in vain.
Cast in six episodes the score starts with a Prelude followed by five
short sections with the final one split into two parts. Not surprisingly the
tone in this sombre tale is of a predominantly rather dark and sorrowful hue.
However given the constraints Vaughan Williams has provided imaginative and
characterful music. The most important and longest section is the Prelude.
This consists mainly of dark and sinister writing variegated with short spans
of a folk-music character. Curiously my overall impression was that the writing
felt like a cross between a Hollywood film score and the quiet nobility and
murky atmosphere of the orchestral tone poem In the Fen Country. In
the writing I could easily imagine a tensely disturbing scene of Tintagiles
being taken across the water to the shadowy castle. The mood of heartbreaking
sadness is palpable in the third section Lento - Andante tranquillo - Lento
and in the Finale, Lento the darkly surging writing creates
a strong sense of impending danger and tension. This morphs into heart-breaking
sadness.
Richard Hickox does a marvellous job and creates a fresh and lyrically pastoral
colour to the A Cotswold Romance. The three soloists are well suited
to their roles with tinglingly fresh singing from the London Philharmonic
Choir. In The Death of Tintagiles Hickox lays bare an intense emotional
power that aptly reflects the score’s dark and sinister moods. Recorded
in 1997 at the All Saints Church in Tooting the engineers have produced fine
recorded sound quality.
These two works are certainly amongst the least known of RVW’s large
canon of works. For this re-issue I’m surprised that Chandos has not
tried to increase the appeal by splitting up these two recordings and combining
them with better known works. I enjoyed hearing these scores up to a point
and Hickox certainly does a sterling job but in truth this disc will appeal
mainly to die-hard Vaughan Williams admirers.
Michael Cookson
This disc will appeal mainly to die-hard Vaughan Williams admirers.
see also reviews by Ian Lace (original release) and Rob Barnett