Ronald STEVENSON (1928-2015)
Piano Music - Volume 4
Christopher Guild (piano)
rec. 2017/19, Turner Sims Concert Hall, Southampton, UK
TOCCATA CLASSICS TOCC0555 [75:17]
Following hot on the heels of volume three of Christopher Guild’s
ongoing wonderful series of Ronald Stevenson’s piano music (TOCC0403),
here we have volume four, a disc inspired by the human voice. As with
the previous volume, a large part of the music presented here takes
the form of arrangements of other composers' works.
The first of these is a suite of four pieces from Ignacy Jan Paderewski’s
opera Manru, his crowning achievement as a composer. The opera
tells the story of the love between a highland girl and a gypsy; this
tragic love story proves the ideal vehicle for Stevenson to arrange
for the piano. The first piece is in two distinct parts: the first,
a pensive gentle theme, tells of Ulana’s mother’s fear for
her daughter if she leaves with the Gypsy Manru; the second section
is a strident march as the Gypsies travel through the village. The second
piece, the Gypsy Song is a slow, lilting piece with added exoticism
which reflects their travels. The third is a tender Lullaby
which is sung to Ulana’s infant while Manru is struggling between
his love for Ulana and his desire to join the Gypsies. The final piece
in the suite is the spritely Cracovienne, a traditional Polish
dance. This is an interesting suite that is treated with respect. The
varied styles are sufficient to hold the listener's interest.
Christopher Guild follows this with the first of the original pieces
composed by Stevenson. This is the Song without words, a miniature
composed as a birthday gift; it is quite charming. Then we hear the
more substantial Nine Haiku which are arrangements of songs
originally composed by Stevenson to English translations of the original
Japanese text. Here Stevenson is clever in the way that he incorporates
the pentatonic or five-note scale and the heptatonic or seven-note scale
into the music. This is in keeping with the traditional verse form of
haiku; five-seven-five is the number of syllables in a haiku. For me
these Nine Haiku are the highpoint of the disc. I particularly
like the way Stevenson implies orientalism without directly copying
it. THe shimmering effects of some of the pieces, especially the Interlude:
The blossoming cherry are quite wonderful.
We then return to an arrangement of another composer’s operatic
aria, this time the Romance from Gustave Charpentier’s opera Louise.
Here Stevenson gives us a charming arrangement of the love duet from
the beginning of Act III. Stevenson dedicated this to Marjorie Spedding,
his wife of over sixty years.
The largest work on this disc is the L’art nouveau du chant
appliqué au piano. The idea itself is copied from ‘L’art
du chant appliqué au piano’ by the piano virtuoso and Liszt acolyte
Sigismond Thalberg. Here Stevenson gives us three volumes of song transcriptions
and arrangements, some twelve pieces in all lasting some forty-one minutes
in total. I particularly liked the arrangements of the two songs by
Samuel Coleridge Taylor and Maud Valérie White - So we’ll
go no more a-roving - all of which have the air of the Victorian
parlour song, something that Stevenson has managed to retain well. If
Stevenson’s arrangement of Foster’s Jeanie with the
light brown hair fails to bring a smile to your face, well then,
you are a harder man than me. All of the pieces in this collection are
enjoyable, if not overly memorable, demonstrating Stevenson’s
obvious skill in adapting other composers’ music to his own needs.
As with the other volumes in this series, Christopher Guild proves an
ideal interpreter of Stevenson’s music. His strongly committed
playing and copious and informative booklet essays are the main selling
points of this series. The recorded sound, as with all Toccata releases,
is excellent. This is a worthy addition to the growing catalogue of
Ronald Stevenson’s music on disc, especially as many of these
pieces are here receiving their première recordings.
Stuart Sillitoe
Previous review: John
France
Contents
Suite from Paderewski’s Manru (1961): 1. Introduction
and Gipsy March [4:22], No.2 Gipsy Song [3:43], No.3 Lullaby [2:56],
No.4 Cracovienne [4:07]
Song without Words (1988) [2:12]
Nine Haiku (1971, arr. 2006): No.1 Dedication [1:06], No.2 The
Fly [0:50], No.3 Gone Away [2:05], No.4 Nocturne [1:29], No.5 Master
and Pupil [0:40], No.6 Spring [1:27], Interlude: The Blossoming Cherry
(Aubade) [2:12], No.7 Curfew [1:23], No.8 Hiroshima [0:43], No.9 Epilogue
[1:58]
Charpentier: Louise – Romance (c.1970) [3:10]
L’Art Nouveau du chant appliqué au piano (1980–88)
Volume One: No.1 Coleridge-Taylor: Elëanore (1980) [3:53], No.2 White:
So We’ll go no more a-roving (1980) [5:52], No.3 Meyerbeer: Romance:
Plus blanche que la plus blanche hermine (Les Huguenots) (1975) [5:42],
No.4 Rachmaninov: In the Silent Night (1982) [3:17]; No.5 Bridge: Go
not, happy day! (1980) [2:00]
Volume Two: No.1 Novello: Fly Home, Little Heart (?1980) [3:03], No.2
Novello: We’ll Gather Lilacs (1980) [4:23], No.3 Coleridge-Taylor:
Demande et Réponse (1981) [1:28], No.4 Romberg: Will you remember? (Maytime)
(1988) [1:15]
Volume Three: No.1 Foster: Jeanie with the light brown hair (1980) [2:44],
No.2 Come where my love lies dreaming (1980) [4:27], No.3 Beautiful
Dreamer (1980) [2:49]
