Tony Palmer’s music-themed
films are for grown-ups. He neither
pulls his punches nor unduly dramatises.
His Walton, Wagner and Sibelius films
are uncompromising, fluently produced
and memorably alluring as an introduction
to the men and to their music.
What are the indelibly
etched images the listener will carry
away from watching this two hour plus
epic about English composer Malcolm
Arnold? Here are mine. Some are inspiring
and some are almost terrifying. There
is the placid and lucid elderly composer
fixing you with an unflinching stare
while a slim cigar dangles from his
hand and telling you that music is:
"art first and foremost ... I write
music I want to hear." He speaks
with clarity, great concentration and
pith and with no sign of mental degradation.
Then towards the end there is the disorganised
rambling of the composer looking deathly
and baring his teeth several times in
shocking flashes of savage fury. One
can see what his daughter means when
she speaks of his towering destructive
rages.
There are other images
of course. There is the kindly conductor
who worked with Jon Lord of Deep Purple
to produce the Concerto for Pop Group
and Orchestra and who refused to allow
some of the orchestra to sneer their
way through the sessions and rehearsals.
Arnold is seen with The Chieftains capering
to the Irish jigs that can also be found
in the last three symphonies. The elderly
composer wanders along a Cornish beach
towards a brass band playing his music
and takes over the direction of the
band - a blessedly Ken Russell moment
- as also is the scene where companion
Anthony Day is seen leading the composer
down the churchyard back to the car.
Arnold’s face is vacant of expression
- bleak and void of understanding.
Mania, suicidal inclination,
depression, the neglect of his music,
vituperative criticism and alcohol all
took their toll. One marriage destroyed,
the alienation of all those around him
including his children, episodes of
incarceration in a mental institution,
electric shock treatment and massive
insulin injections: the man who at one
time produced an incredible stream of
music for films, orchestral concerts,
chamber recitals and solos has lived
a personal hell .... and so on occasion
have those around him.
The Cornish years in
and around North Cornwall at Primrose
Cottage at St Merryn are touchingly
done. Rick Stein reminisces about Arnold
and the children recall swimming and
rock-pools. Arnold wrote his various
Cornish works including the Dances (one
of which is the signature tune of Rick
Stein’s TV programme), along with the
March - The Padstow Lifeboat. My own
childhood recollections of family holidays
at Constantine Bay, of ice cream (with
crystals of ice in it), of peeling skin
(Heaven help us!), of deck chairs and
caravan parks, as well as pouring rain
and the booming Trevose foghorn that
also plays a part in the Padstow Lifeboat
march are bound up with Arnold’s music.
Palmer makes gifted
use of his material inter-cutting scenes
from the feature films that handsomely
fed and clothed Arnold's family. There
are also family snaps, press cuttings
(some scathing in the extreme), home
movies, full-on interviews with family
and friends, scenery shots and orchestral
sessions. The film never drags but develops
a gripping tempo all of its own.
Extracts from the symphonies
and other works were recorded in the
studio. You get to recognise certain
members of the NSO of Ireland including
the conductor, the harpist and the timpanist.
I was a bit disorientated from time
to time when clearly what I was hearing
on the soundtrack was not what Arnold
was conducting - a copyright problem
perhaps in the case of the Jon Lord
‘happening’.
Arnold is in no way
diminished by this candid film. That
I was held transfixed by the slyly graceful
dance in the Arnold Oboe Concerto all
those years ago in the 1970s when I
played to death a tape I had made of
a studio recording off-air is testimony
to Arnold’s genius. I was moved to tears
by hearing the Fifth Symphony in rehearsal
and in full concert back in 1999 where
it was luminously and resoundingly performed
at Stockport Town Hall (Stockport Symphony
Orchestra/David Hoult). My wife can
recognise Arnold instantly on hearing
the Allegretto of the Scottish Dances.
The rum-ti-tum jollity, out-Horovitzing
Horovitz (Joseph, that is!) in the chamber
opera The Song of Simeon is easily recalled.
Idiosyncratically the Eighth Symphony
with its march Sally-Army-out-of-Mahler
is my favourite of the last three symphonies.
The First Symphony is starkly dramatic
- Sibelian in its manner. The tramping
syncopated horns in the finale of the
Fifth Symphony (CBSO/composer on an
EMI Classics cassette) and its Hollywood
sunset decaying into night are part
of my memories of driving my first car
(rusty Austin 1100) around Torquay.
A pity that there is
no mention of his BBC studio conducting
of the symphonies 3 and 4 of fellow
Northamptonian, Edmund Rubbra, during
the 1960s. However we do get to hear
about Arnold from John Amis and we are
assured that Arnold and flautist Adeney
lifted the LPO during the 1940s and
1950s. Arnold played in the LPO for
the premiere of Tippett’s A Child
of Our Time and for the UK premiere
of the Walton violin concerto - that
must have been the one played by Henry
Holst.
Arnold’s astounding
facility for music is illustrated by
two anecdotes. In one he is recalled
as reconstructing a band score with
unerring accuracy from a 78. In another
it is recalled that unlike many composers
Arnold would compose direct into full
score. Even Bax did not do that, preferring
to write into short score and later
expanding the orchestration across a
full canvas.
His championing of
Walton’s film music for The Battle
of Britain is legendary, his friendship
with Walton and various character traits
are recalled by Susanna Walton. The
films were a curse and a blessing. Open-handed
generosity with wads of tenners handed
out to friends was the product of his
cinema commissions. Like Alwyn he wrote
many scores. Mind you his judgement
was not always unerring. We learn that
he turned down commissions for Lawrence
of Arabia, Dr Strangelove and
2001 - A Space Odyssey. His success
in this world offered easy ammunition
for critics already prone to vitriolic
dismissal of concert scores that showed
anything resembling a whistleable tune.
The Arnold film was
shown in two parts on ITV in the UK
and no doubt is already being franchised
to the Arts channels on cable and satellite
worldwide.
While we are not spared
the composer’s tortured mind and experience
neither are we denied the generosity
of soul that beams through the many
thousands of pages of his music. Palmer
has once again done an audaciously honest
job and stayed true to his subject -
a composer whose experience of life
in every aspect is bound up in his music.
Rob Barnett
see also
Review
by Christopher Thomas
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Malcolm
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