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The Quarterly Newsletter of the Malcolm Arnold Society Issue 102 Autumn 2016

It’s a great pleasure to welcome you to the 11th Malcolm Arnold Festival! Who would have thought it, when that

first Festival, in 2006, was just intended as a one-off to celebrate Malcolm’s 85th birthday! We’ve called it ‘The voice of the people’, which of course sums up Malcolm’s intentions as a composer. He was always determined to write music that could be immediately appreciated by his very considerable following, and although he embraced many 20th cen-tury ‘isms’, his music remains utterly accessible.

We launch, on Saturday 15 October at 11 am at our regular venue, the excep-tional Royal & Derngate in Northampton, with composer and staunch Arnold sup-porter, Nigel Hess, who follows in the footsteps of Hayley Mills, Robert Hardy, Tim Rice, John Wallace and all our other distinguished launchers. The launch concert will include a performance of Song of Simeon – Nicolas Chagrin, who played the very first Simeon in 1960, will be a very special guest – and the world premiere of Malcolm’s unfinished opera Henry Christophe – in fact he only completed 27 pages of orchestral intro-duction with a few bars of singing. We’ll be hearing these pages for the first time ever!

At 12 pm the great John Wallace will be performing the Brass Quintet with the four winners of his Malcolm Arnold Fantasies competition, and each of those winners will be performing their respec-tive Fantasy. John will also be launching his new CD of Malcolm’s brass music. It should be quite an event!

After lunch, Alice Pinto returns to talk about Malcolm’s early music and we will be including yet more world premieres, notably some hitherto unheard songs from his Kensington Gardens collection.

We then make our annual visit to

St Matthew’s for our afternoon Family concert with the Northampton Symphony Orchestra, conducted by John Gibbons. Highlights include the world premiere of a specially commissioned work by Timothy Bowers to sit alongside Malcolm’s Carnival of Animals. Tim has called his piece Carnival of Carnivores and we look forward to both works with tremendous excitement. We’re also including a rare performance of Malcolm’s Machines, and the Grand, Grand Overture, which will include one of the original vacuum clean-ers. And we’ll be hearing some music by our special guest, Nigel Hess, from his film Ladies in Lavender.

In the evening, the excellent Jenny Dyson returns with her Wind Quintet to present a programme of all of Malcolm’s music for wind quintet, plus other 20th

century wind quintets with a Malcolm connection.

Sunday morning begins with a pro-gramme of orchestral music played by the marvellous Northamptonshire County Youth Orchestra to include the Sussex Overture and Second Clarinet Concerto. This will be followed by Kriss Rusman (who, amongst many other things, made the BBC Omnibus programme about Malcolm) giving a talk on our Festival theme: ‘The voice of the people’.

After lunch, John Griff presents The Forgotten Documentaries, where we shall hear (and see) some of Malcolm’s virtu-ally unknown music. This will be followed by the return of the wonderful Claire Thompson, who, with Alasdair Garrett (flute) and pianist Jennifer Redmond, will perform some more songs from the films and other sparkling miniatures (many arranged or unearthed by Alan Poulton). We are very grateful to you, the Malcolm Arnold Society, for supporting this event.

This will be followed by a very special concert, which will include another rare performance, the Piano Duet Concerto, also the Clarinet Concertino, with soloist Peter Cigleris, and the Toy Symphony with the Janus Ensemble conducted by Ben Palmer.

We are absolutely delighted to wel-come back the BBC Concert Orchestra for the Gala concert in an Arnold and Walton programme – the perfect match! – and I’m expecting a sell-out. Among other items we have the Guitar Concerto and Serenade (played by the internationally renowned Craig Ogden), Symphony No.6 and Walton’s Spitfire Prelude and Fugue.

So there’s a glimpse of what we have in store. And the Derngate are again of-fering tickets at fantastically generous prices (Box Office: 01604 624811).

See you there!Paul Harris

‘The voice of the people’: 11th Malcolm Arnold Festival

Nigel Hess

Craig Ogden

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Three works by Sir Malcolm Arnold frame this agreeable new compi-lation from Heritage Records, in

which the violinist Peter Fisher directs the London Chamber Ensemble, a col-lective of London freelancers who play together with commendable vitality and flair under his leadership.

Still, it has nevertheless to be said that not all of these pieces are likely to recompense repeated listening; some are fairly inconsequential, but even if this new compendium doesn’t always quite equal the sum of its parts, the playing from the London Chamber Ensemble and guest soloists has more than enough al-lure and spontaneity to fully engage the senses for the 65 minutes or so required to listen to this new CD in full.

Arnold devotees will surely be de-lighted by Michael Butten’s account of the Opus 50 Serenade for Guitar and Strings, which opens this new disc with a strikingly committed and technically adroit performance of this exacting score. Butten’s playing, whilst thor-oughly poised, is also noteworthy for its powerful sense of musical imagery, most touchingly and affectingly realised in the thoughtful central episode.

Of the two remaining Arnold works included here, both transcriptions receiv-ing their first commercial recordings, the first is perhaps somewhat less engaging, despite being ably performed. Roger Steptoe’s re-working (1993) of Arnold’s Sonatina for Clarinet and Piano of 1951

British Serenade: Solos with String Orchestra

Including Arnold Serenade for Guitar; Concertino for Clarinet; Five Pieces for Violin and Strings. Chamber Ensemble of London/Peter Fisher (violin/director). Heritage HTGCD 204

is recast with accompaniment for string orchestra and rebranded as a Concertino. Set in three movements, the original piece received its first performance from a then as yet unknown young clarinet-tist, one Colin Davis, later the now sadly lamented British conductor Sir Colin, who died in 2013. Steptoe’s transcription, an efficiently crafted and intelligent affair, works decently enough, though some-times goes a little too far in the direc-tion of re-invention rather than mere re-arrangement, and there are moments in the concluding section (Furioso) which might strike the listener as owing rather more to Bartok than to Arnold. Still,

Peter Cigleris proves himself an effective and attentive soloist, and his account is certainly one of the highlights of this new release.

Sir Malcolm Arnold’s output is best served here, however, by Philip Lane’s strongly idiomatic and scholarly remodel-ling of Arnold’s Opus 84 Five Pieces for Violin and Piano, in which Peter Fisher is the accomplished and thoroughly engag-ing solo violinist. Philip Lane’s ingenious and evocative string orchestration is excellent, and this spirited and brilliant performance often casts new perspective on these well-known pieces, but without ever straightjacketing Arnold’s original design into an awkward new guise. A fine reading, and with polished and vivacious playing from Peter Fisher throughout, Arnoldians will certainly discover plenty to enjoy here!

As for the remainder, the miscellany of pieces by Clive Jenkins, Paul Carr, Don Shearman, and Paul Lewis certainly won’t be as familiar as Elgar’s perennial favour-ite Salut d’amour, heard here in a version for cello and strings prepared by Levine Andrade and affectionately played by Michael Mace. To sum up, this is a pleas-ingly played collection, and the recording itself is brightly lit and reverberant with a slight tendency towards stridency in upper registers. Well worth hearing, and there’s more than enough here to war-rant further investigation on the part of loyal Arnold enthusiasts.

MicHael JaMeson

Andrew Penny was born in Hull and studied clarinet at the Royal Manchester College of Music under Sidney Fell, later taking up conducting with Sir Charles Groves and Timothy Reynish at the Royal Northern College of

Music. Andrew has been Musical Director of the Hull Philharmonic Orchestra since 1982 and is also on the instrumental music staff at Hymers College in Hull, as well as Chairman of the Beverley Chamber Music Festival. His complete cycle of the Malcolm Arnold symphonies for Naxos was released in time for the composer’s 80th birthday in 2001 and became the BBC Music Magazine’s top recommendation.

Society members will also recall seeing Andrew at the Derngate in October 2011, conducting powerful performances of Arnold’s Symphonies 7 and 8 with, respectively, the Hull Philharmonic and the East Riding Youth Orchestras: we therefore owe a great deal to Andrew for his devotion to British music and to Arnold in particular.

It is a matter of some regret that we as a Society failed to acknowledge his award of the MBE for services to music in 2014. We are happy to correct this omission now and send Andrew our belated congratulations and hope he’ll be back to enjoy the music-making at the Derngate in October.

Andrew Penny awarded MBE (sorry we’re late)

At the 2011 Festival: Andrew Penny (centre) with Sheldon Bair and

Alan Poulton

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I was listening to Gordon Jacob’s witty and highly engaging comedy overture The Barber of Seville goes to the Devil

recently. It got me thinking – Malcolm would really have enjoyed it: he would have approved of his teacher’s gentle irreverence. And I began to wonder whether Gordon Jacob’s influence was just a little more than simply the encour-agement and teaching of a good con-servatoire professor of composition.

Jacob wrote a lot of music. There are symphonies and concerti, chamber music, ballets and songs, but not much sacred music (just like Malcolm), and there are a number of works that show another distinct side to his personality. A side that clearly connected with his rather mischievous new pupil of 1938: the seventeen-year-old Malcolm Arnold. The composer of Serenade for a Donkey, Humpty Dumpty and his false relations, L’après-midi d’un dinosaur and a consid-erable quantity of music for the wartime comedy radio series ITMA was going to be much more sympathetic to Malcolm’s outrageous Grand Fantasia Op 973 than the staid and rather old-fashioned Patrick Hadley – Malcolm’s first composition professor at the RCM – with whom there quickly developed an irreconcilable per-sonality clash.

It’s well known that Malcolm and Gordon Jacob had a very happy and productive relationship — indeed Malcolm was always magnanimous in his praise and gratitude for his former teacher. Malcolm enjoyed and benefitted enor-mously from Jacob’s renowned encour-agement and support, his exemplary teaching of technical matters and the opportunities he provided for all his pupils. And they shared another unusual characteristic: “Gordon Jacob could write music at any time of the day or night,” Malcolm enthused in conversation with Piers Burton-Page. So could Malcolm, and it helped him to feel at ease with his

similar predilection. But perhaps Jacob’s influence was greater still.

Gordon Jacob had a great sense of humour. He had a particular penchant for cartoons and a love of pigs. In fact his extremely large collection of pigs (of the stuffed, potted, carved and metal varie-ties) was well known to many. Margaret Jacob (his second wife) speaks fondly of his warm and easy laugh and his ‘cheery puckish wit’. Characteristics that would certainly have brought teacher and pupil close together. And there were a number of incidents, post RCM, where seeing the funny side did just that.

Jacob played an unexpected cameo role in Malcolm’s unfortunate wartime experiences. The young composer was quite distraught at being put into the army band when in fact he wanted to be leading the battle from the front line. Malcolm’s commanding officer phoned Jacob in an attempt to understand the young soldier and he tried to help the situation by explaining, “Well, he is something of a genius you know...” “Ah,” responded the officer, “so that’s the problem!”

The two composers later worked together with the great Gerard Hoffnung.

Jacob’s contribution to the first Hoffnung Festival in 1956 was an extraordinary set of Variations on Annie Laurie for the appropriately wacky combination of piccolos, heckelphone, contrabas-soon, contrabass serpent, harmonium, hurdy-gurdy and subcontrabass tuba. Malcolm provided his legendary Grand Grand Overture for the Festival. Each would certainly have much appreciated the other’s contribution. They met again in June 1970 when Malcolm conducted the recording of both his and Jacob’s concertos for Phyllis (Sellick) and Cyril (Smith) with the CBSO at the De Montfort Hall in Leicester. Geoffrey Ogram, a good friend of Jacob was there. “Gordon loved the slow movement and turned to me with a broad grin at each of Malcolm’s riotously entertaining musical ideas in the last movement!” After the recording session was over Margaret Jacob recalls, “Malcolm treated us all, Gordon, Phyllis, Cyril and myself, to a wonderful meal with the most enormous bottle of cham-pagne I’d ever seen!”

So what was Gordon Jacob’s real influ-ence on his exceptional young student? It was certainly much more than the usual expectations of a conservatoire compo-sition professor. Gordon Jacob allowed Malcolm to be himself. And he allowed Malcolm to be funny within the serious world of classical music — it was accept-able to write both symphonies and music for radio comedies. Malcolm needed that freedom. It’s easy to imagine Gordon Jacob both chortling quietly at each out-rageous joke in the Grand Fantasia and the Suite Bourgeoise and nodding wisely at the highly imaginative Vita Abundans. Patrick Hadley would never have been able to do that. It was Gordon Jacob, perhaps more than anyone else, who re-leased the free spirit that was to become one of Britain’s great composers.

Paul Harris ©2016

Devils, donkeys, and dinosaursThe influence of Gordon Jacob on the young Malcolm Arnold

Gordon Jacob

Jacob-Arnold connections

This article lists some of the connec-tions between Malcolm Arnold and Gordon Jacob.

At a concert given in the Carnegie Hall, Northampton, on 28 March 1941, Richard Adeney and Malcolm Arnold gave the premiere of Gordon Jacob’s Suite for flute and cornet, specially written for the

occasion (see Beckus No.97).Jacob’s Symphony No.2 received

its first public performance by the Bournemouth Municipal Orchestra, con-ducted by Rudolf Schwarz, in the Winter Gardens, Bournemouth, in 1948; and in the following year the same orchestra played his Orchestral Suite No.3, written

for the 57th anniversary of the orchestra. Arnold’s own Symphony No. 2 was com-missioned by the Winter Gardens Society for the orchestra’s Diamond Jubilee three years later, and was performed at the same venue under the direction of their newly-appointed conductor, Charles Groves.

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Perhaps most significant is the sheer prolificacy of both composers, who wrote across the complete spectrum of musical genres, with a significant proportion of their music scored for wind and brass en-sembles as well as amateur forces. Jacob produced 458 works with a total play-ing time of 4,250 minutes (this includes over 180 pieces of chamber and vocal music). Arnold on the other hand pro-duced 314 works but with a total playing time of 4,350 minutes (his 100-plus film scores contributing significantly to this high total). Both composers wrote many concertos (and other concerted works) with specific instrumentalists in mind: the following table charts their concerto output by instrument, dedicatee and date of composition. It reveals a total of 63 concertos for 22 different instruments over a period of more than six decades from 1925 to 1988.

It throws up one or two surprises. For Instance there is no Arnold bassoon con-certo, nor a guitar concerto from Jacob; and neither composer wrote a concerto for harp or harpsichord. Then, aside from the two early horn concertos, there is only one other solo brass concerto from Arnold’s pen: the 1982 trumpet concerto. Jacob, on the other hand, composed six solo brass concertos between 1955 and 1978, mostly with brass or wind band ac-companiment. Lastly, among the impres-sive list of dedicatees there are only five names which are common to both composers: Leon Goossens, Dennis Brain, Larry Adler, Cyril Smith and Phyllis Sellick and ... Michala Petri. In the case of the last it must be remembered that much later in their compositional careers both composers had simultaneously fallen un-der the spell of Michala Petri, for whom

Jacob wrote a Duettino, a Sonatina, and an Encore for recorder and guitar; and Arnold wrote a fine solo Fantasy, a Theme and Variations, and a Concerto (his last). All of these works were composed during a short period of activity between 1983 and 1990 – a quite remarkable set of pieces from two eminent British compos-ers for one remarkable Danish virtuoso.

In the case of Dennis Brain, the two horn concertos written for him by Malcolm Arnold and Gordon Jacob may be heard on a 2007 Lyrita CD with David Pyatt as soloist (London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Nicholas Braithwaite); two further horn concertos by Ruth Gipps and York Bowen, plus a miniature from Gilbert Vinter make up the remainder of the disc (SRCD 316). Written only five years apart, the Jacob concerto is nearly half as long again as the Arnold (20’30” compared with 14’). Jacob’s concerto was first performed at London’s Wigmore Hall on 8 May 1951, while the Arnold received its premiere at the 1957 Cheltenham Festival in what was to be Dennis Brain’s last concerto performance. As to the two concertos for three hands (two pianos) written for Cyril Smith and Phyllis Sellick, the works were written almost concurrently: the Jacob score is dated 14 July 1969 and the Arnold, 12 June 1969.Whereas the Jacob concerto was premiered at the Birmingham Town Hall on 24 July (only ten days after completion) with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra con-ducted by Hugo Rignold, Arnold’s moving tribute to ‘Phyllis and Cyril’ was first per-formed on 16 August at a 1969 Promenade Concert held at the Royal Albert Hall, London, where the concerto’s exuber-ant Finale was memorably encored. Both

concertos were recorded the following June at the de Montford Hall in Leicester with Arnold himself conducting the CBSO. First issued on an HMV LP (ASD 2612), the record also included the Arthur Bliss 1923 Concerto specially arranged for three hands by Clifford Philips.

When the EMI recording of Jacob’s concerto was issued, Arnold took a copy over to Ischia for Walton to hear. The latter commented: “The trouble with the Jacob work is that it’s just a bit too good.” In an article first published in Music and Musicians in October 1986 enti-tled ‘My early life’, Arnold surmised that it was “a very strange thing [for Walton] to say ... maybe he thought it was just too beautifully thought out and emo-tion never took the upper hand. It was a compliment in its way ...” In the same interview Arnold recalled his composition lessons with Gordon Jacob at the Royal College of Music: “[He was] marvellous ... inspirational. He let you do free work and would criticise it very thoroughly but in a way that encouraged you.” Jacob offered the following advice to his young pupil who, when offered the LPO trumpet job, expressed his misgivings at the drudgery of “carrying [my] trumpet around and go-ing to rehearsals at nine on the morning”: “Why don’t you do like I’ve done? Get a job at the College, sit on your backside and do b..... all.” Clearly the advice was ignored but Arnold never forgot how his teacher had the ability to write music “any time of the day and night ... I used to be a bit like that,” he recalled, “able to write music at any time – and that was one of the reasons why I was able to do such a lot.”

alan Poulton

Concertos and concerted worksMalcolm Arnold Gordon Jacob

* denotes brass or wind band accompaniment

Flute 1. Richard Adeney: Concertino (1951)2. Richard Adeney: Concerto No.1 (1954)3. Richard Adeney: Concerto No.2 (1972)

1. Gareth Morris: Concerto No.1 (1951) 2. Trevor Wye: Concerto No.2 (1981)3. Judith Hill: Variations (1982)

Recorder 4. Philip Rodgers: Concertino (1953) 5. Michala Petri: Theme and Variations (1981)6. Michala Petri: Concerto (1988)

4. Carl Dolmetsch/Michala Petri: Suite (1958) [1]

Oboe 7. Leon Goossens: Concertino (1951) 8. Leon Goossens: Concerto (1952)

5. Leon Goossens: Concerto No.1 (1935) [2]6. Leon Goossens: Concerto No.2 (1954)

Cor anglais 7. Terence Macdonagh: Rhapsody (1948)

Clarinet 9. Frederick Thurston: Concerto No.1 (1948) 10. Frederick Thurston: Concertino (1951) 11. Frederick Thurston: Scherzetto (1953) [3] 12. Benny Goodman: Concerto No.2 (1974)

8. Pat Ryan: Concertino (1945) [4]9. Thea King: Double Concerto (1975) [5]10. Thea King: Mini Concerto (1980)

Saxophone 13. Gerard McChrystal: Concerto (1942) [6] 11. Paul Harvey: Miscellanies (1976)*

Bassoon 12. Archie Camden: Concerto (1947)

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Malcolm Arnold Gordon Jacob

Horn 14. Charles Gregory: Burlesque (1944) [7]15. Charles Gregory: Concerto No.1 (1945) 16. Dennis Brain: Concerto No.2 (1956)

13. Dennis Brain: Concerto (1951)

Trumpet 17. John Wallace: Concerto (1982) [8] 14. John Wilbraham: Double Concerto (1975)

Trombone 15. Dennis Wick: Concerto (1955) [9] 16. William Crane: Concertino (1977)*

Tuba 17. Ian King: Suite (1972)* 18. Thomas Everett: Cameos (1978)*

Euphonium 19. Michael Mamminga: Fantasia (1969)*

Timpani 20. Klaus Huber: Concerto (1984)* [10]

Violin 18. Yehudi Menuhin: Double Concerto (1962) 19. Yehudi Menuhin: Five Pieces (1964) [11]

21. May Harrison: Concerto (1936) [12]22. Frederick Grinke: Concerto (1953)

Viola 20. Roger Best: Concerto (1971) 23. Bernard Shore: Concerto No.1 (1925)24. John White: Concert Piece (1977) 25. Lilian Tertis: Concerto No.2 (1979) [13]

Cello 21. Julian Lloyd Webber: Concerto (1988) 26. Florence Hooton: Concerto (1955)

Double bass [14] 27. Robert Meyer: Concerto (1972) [15]

Guitar 22. Julian Bream: Serenade (1955) 23. Julian Bream: Concerto (1959)

Piano 24. Paul Hamburger & Helen Pike: Duet Concerto (1951) 25. Philip Dyson: Ballade (1952) [16] 26. Cyril Smith & Phyllis Sellick: Concerto (1969) 27. John Lill: John Field Fantasy (1975)

28. Arthur Benjamin: Concerto No.1 (1927)29. Kathleen Long: Concertino (1954) 30. Edith Vogel: Concerto No.2 (1957)31. Cyril Smith & Phyllis Sellick: Concerto (1969)32. Cyril Smith & Phyllis Sellick: Rhapsody (1970)*

Organ 28. Denis Vaughan: Concerto (1954)

Accordion 33. John Gould: Concerto (1974) [17]

Harmonica 29. Larry Adler: Concerto (1954) 34. Larry Adler: Divertimento (1955) 35. Tommy Reilly: Suite (1957)

Notes[1] The Recorder Suite, in a new arrangement for string orchestra, was recorded by Michala Petri in 1983 (Philips CD 411056-2)[2] Originally written for Evelyn Rothwell in 1933 as a chamber work but re-dedicated to Leon Goossens to ensure the concerto’s first performance in 1935[3] Arranged by Christopher Palmer from the score to the film You know what sailors are[4] The principal clarinet of the Hallé Orchestra during Barbirolli’s tenure[5] The other soloist was John Wilbraham on trumpet[6] Arranged by David Ellis in 1999 as a Saxophone concerto from the 1944 Piano Sonata[7] Edited for performance by Philip Lane and premiered at the 2006 Arnold Festival by Martin Owen with the RPO conducted by Barry Wordsworth[8] Arnold had intended for John Wilbraham to be the original soloist in his 1982 Trumpet Concerto but Wilbraham’s illness prevented this.[9] Dennis Wick later arranged Arnold’s Wind Shanties for a brass quintet (Pub: Novello)[10] Written at the suggestion of Arnold Society member Douglas Bostock[11] Arranged by Philip Lane in 2005 for string orchestra accompaniment[12] First performed in the BBC Studios on 16 December 1936 conducted by the com-poser: it was entitled ‘Fiddle Concerto’[13] The cellist wife of Lionel Tertis; written for the 1980 Lionel Tertis Viola Competition (won by Paul Neubauer)[14] Gary Karr, the American double bass player, had asked for a concerto from Arnold in the 1980s[15] An eminent double bass player who was also Britten’s librarian as well as a friend of the composer[16] The Ballade for piano and orchestra was arranged by Philip Lane from the score to the film Stolen Face; the pianist on the original soundtrack was Bronwyn Jones[17] One of the co-founders of the Malcolm Arnold Society (alongside Paul Jackson) and the pianist in the first performance of The Song of Accounting Periods in April 1969

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Cheltenham is good Arnold coun-try. Its strong associations include the premieres of the First and

Fifth Symphonies with Malcolm himself conducting the Hallé. So the opportu-nity last May to see a Birmingham Royal Ballet touring production of Solitaire at Cheltenham’s Everyman Theatre seemed auspicious. There was a bonus too, as the evening’s programme would also feature David Bintley’s entertaining version of the Four Scottish Dances.1 Spirits were high on arrival and hardly daunted by the lengthy search for an exit from the concrete jungle of a cavernous car park. Solitaire awaited –sixty years old this year!

Despite the ballet’s historic value as an important stepping-stone in Kenneth MacMillan’s early career, it is not so regularly performed as it used to be. It must have been ten years or so since I had last seen it. That had been at BRB’s home base, the Birmingham Hippodrome. A few memories of a moving occasion sur-vived: Barry Wordsworth getting ravishing sound from the Royal Ballet Sinfonia; Nao Sakuma in the leading role of the solitary girl who ameliorates her loneliness with brief encounters, real or imagined; and Ambra Vallo as the cheeky, eye-catching young lady who dances the polka. Less attractive had been the brash colours of the costumes, the result of a design makeover in the 1970s. For the 2016 re-vival, however, there would be exact cop-ies of the subtler, original 1956 costumes and backcloth – a big investment for the BRB, and an indication of how much its artistic director, David Bintley, values the piece.

There have been several versions of the story of how MacMillan came to use the two sets of English Dances. Rogue Genius, alas, got things wrong, stating that the Royal Ballet’s Ninette de Valois had suggested them to MacMillan. But when, in an article in Dancing Times, I repeated my error, a reader’s letter soon followed from Jeffrey Solomons, an old friend of the choreographer’s, giving the correct details. MacMillan, explained Solomons, had originally started creating Solitaire to Gershwin’s Piano Concerto. Problems, however, had led to the project’s abandonment. Some time later, Solomons happened to be ill in bed when he heard a recording of the English Dances on the radio. “When I was better, I took Kenneth to Imhof’s record shop in New Oxford Street and we went

Solitaire: sixty years oninto a booth and played it.” MacMillan at once realised how perfectly it would suit his abandoned Solitaire and put this new plan to de Valois. She then contacted Malcolm with MacMillan’s request for a little extra music to stretch the work to half-an-hour. “When Arnold offered to compose two extra numbers,” wrote Solomons, “Kenneth was absolutely thrilled.” These, of course, were the romantic Sarabande and roguish Polka.

The full background to the creation of Solitaire can now be found in Jann Parry’s outstanding MacMillan biography,2 which stresses the important contribution of Margaret (‘Maggie’) Hill, the original leading dancer. Parry chronicles Hill’s deep insecurities. Like Jacqueline du Pré, she radiated “an engaging openness and capacity for uninhibited enjoyment that masked her pain and insecurity”. “She was very self-contained,” reflected Sara Neil, the first Polka Girl, “with a real loneliness about her. Not a lot of people could get close to her.” At rehearsal, she would nervously hide under great sloppy sweaters; in spare moments, she could sometimes be found, somewhat eccentri-cally, eating meringues on Notting Hill Gate station; if she wasn’t smoking, she would probably be tucking into a new bag of black and white humbugs. She and MacMillan were for a time an item, living together. He shared her vulnerabilities and did his best to keep her from the meltdown that always seemed imminent. For a time she was MacMillan’s muse, inspiring his creativity. Although they had gone their own ways by 1956, they were still close. Solitaire, writes Parry, was MacMillan’s “gift to the girl he had once loved”.

Game for one Subtitled somewhat ambiguously “a kind of game for one”, Solitaire, for all its superficial charm, explores the deep anguish of loneliness. Lynn Seymour, who later danced Solitaire several times herself and was to be the greatest of all MacMillan’s muses, commented that its “central issue is the excruciating pain of not belonging”.3 Maggie Hill informed the whole piece. Without her there could have been no Solitaire. When Ninette de Valois, who preferred smaller dancers, decreed at the last moment that Hill was too tall for the leading role, MacMillan resolutely stood his ground.

The ballet was a hit from the very first performances. The Sadler’s Wells

Theatre Ballet cast included three fine male dancers, Donald Britton, Donald MacLeary and Michael Boulton. The admi-rable Jack Lanchbery conducted. Maggie Hill gave a “remarkable performance, piquant, appealing and beautifully danced”. The “warmth and tenderness of her personality” suffused and integrated the whole thing. “Kenneth MacMillan is a choreographic genius capable of trans-forming the ballet of our day,” wrote one critic perceptively. Audiences that had hitherto associated him with the macabre were delighted by the lighter side to his creative abilities that Solitaire displayed. “But there was, in fact, a distinct air of melancholy beneath the surface gaiety of the ballet,” noted Edward Thorpe in his helpful assessment. “At curtain rise the central character of the girl was discov-ered alone on stage, seeming to recall, somewhat wistfully, past pleasures. With each section of the music she was joined by various other characters with whom she became involved in varying degrees of acceptance, but at the conclusion of each sequence she was left alone. There was nothing as definite as rejection, just a gentle goodbye from transient ac-quaintances. At the final farewell, there was a sense of resignation by the girl, of being alone but not lonely, surviving on memories.”4

The piece was soon embraced by the parent company at Covent Garden and taken on tour to the USA, with Anya Linden in the leading role. Within ten years it had clocked up over 300 perfor-mances with the two Royal Ballet com-panies. And it was soon being danced the world over. When MacMillan left Covent Garden for a time for the Deutsche Oper Ballet in Berlin, he naturally introduced it into his programmes, with the Royal Ballet’s Georgina Parkinson guesting in Maggie Hill’s old role.

Like all great works, Solitaire is passed on from one generation of dancers to the next. The role of the Polka Girl, for example, will be for ever associated with the ebullient and highly popular bal-lerina Brenda Last, who chiefly learnt it from Elaine Thomas, who in turn inherit-ed it from Sara Neil. Brenda Last made it her own during the 1960s and 1970s, with a record number of 105 performances. “Solitaire was a lovely piece to dance,” she remembers. “I must have first come across it when a student at the Royal Ballet. I loved doing that flute dance with the two boys and I really enjoyed

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the polka! There was some serious and demanding work in it. All through, the steps were so beautifully in tune with the music – fitting the music like a glove – and infused with such wit. We used to call one part of it ‘the Charlie Chaplin steps’. It was an unusual role in that you had to come on and go for it straight away. No time to get into the part gradually! Just burst in and make an impact!”

By the time Brenda was in the com-pany, Margaret Hill had retired. “But I remember there was a certain, very lovely naiveté about her. I was with her in a televised Giselle, in which she was the Queen of the Wilis. It’s a performance that survives on DVD5 and it exemplifies the emphasis in those times of going for the essence of the piece. It’s a vital thing to communicate, in Solitaire just as much as in Giselle. Today, perhaps, we’re prob-ably rather less interested in finding the essence of a piece, though, of course,

everything’s much more aerobatic and technically amazing.” Brenda had known Kenneth MacMillan since her early days at Western Theatre Ballet, with whom he created The Seven Deadly Sins. “He was so insecure in his great abilities. Always unhappy. So melancholy. So vulnerable.”

Technically amazingDancing that was ‘technically amazing’ was on display last May at Cheltenham’s Everyman Theatre, where BRB’s Spanish soloist, Arencha Bazelga, led the Solitaire revival, with Philip Ellis conducting a skeleton orchestra – perhaps half of the usual Royal Ballet Sinfonia. The well-known Arnold, however, hung together remarkably well, allowing one to ap-preciate the validity of the changes that MacMillan had made to the order of the dances, a re-adjustment of resources that works so well musically that per-haps the Solitaire score, with its eleven

movements, could be considered for use in orchestral concerts. The seventh dance (Grazioso), which perfectly reflects the ballet’s theme of gaiety underpinned by melancholy, not only starts the ballet off but also makes a reappearance as its con-clusion, having swopped places with the 8th English dance (Giubiloso) to supply Solitaire with the most magically myste-rious of whispered endings. The running order is otherwise undisturbed, with the Sarabande and Polka, inserted in that order, in the heart of the ballet, between the first and second sets of dances. MacMillan created such a beautiful pas de deux on the poignant Sarabande that when Margaret Hill and Donald MacLeary first danced it before the rest of the com-pany, there was a burst of spontaneous applause at its conclusion.

How marvellous, then, it was to watch Solitaire unravel its mysteries on its six-tieth anniversary to a hugely enthusiastic

Left: Margaret Hill and Donald MacLeary. Top right: Margaret Hill. Bottom right: Michael Boulton. Photos © Angus McBean

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audience in a packed theatre. And it brought one point very strongly home. Why was it that, back in 1956, in one glorious ballet, Kenneth MacMillan was able to explore the theme of the out-sider in such an uncharacteristic way, free from the broodingly gritty, sexually provocative features that surrounded him with controversy all his career, features that run like a thread all the way from Somnambulism in 1953 to The Judas Tree in 1992? The answer must lie in the music MacMillan first heard in that listening booth in a New Oxford Street record shop, which led him to create a work of wonderfully sophisticated understate-ment. Whereas in the same year of 1956 he had been led by Humphrey Searle’s score to the eerie and highly-strung atmosphere of Noctambules, Malcolm’s music led him to an atmosphere of gaiety, while, at the same time, mirror-ing the heroine’s capacity for uninhibited enjoyment that masked her pain and insecurity. Light and bright though the English Dances are, in several movements the beauty comes tinged with an inner sadness. Malcolm was the ideal composer for a ballet exploring alienation. For all his famed capacity for uninhibited enjoyment, he understood from personal experience the feelings of the outsider. For just as Arnold the man, could veer alarmingly between delight and de-spair, so, too, for Arnold the composer,

throughout the creation of so much that is bright and the beautiful, the forces of darkness are often hovering in the background, planning discomfiture for the forces of light. The exquisite Sarabande, for example, like a piece of fine porce-lain, has a very fragile beauty, for there’s an interlude within it that hints of the forces of darkness, stealthily lying in wait for their opportunity to crush it to pieces. This ambivalence is what makes Malcolm such a great composer, able to move his listeners to tears time and time again. It also explains why he was able to inspire Kenneth MacMillan to create a work that was uncharacteristic of him, and yet, in its own way, as gripping as his gritty responses to Mahler’s Song of the Earth and Poulenc’s Gloria.

After such an uplifting evening, it hardly mattered that only one of all the pay machines in that awful car park seemed to be working. There, in the quietly uncomplaining queue that formed before it, was David Bintley, unrecogn-ised, alone and lost in thought. Perhaps he was simply musing on the inadequa-cies of car-park pay machines or a long drive home. But perhaps, too, there may have been thoughts centred on Solitaire: on the charm of the original Desmond Heeley designs, with their unique take on the traditional tutu; on Margaret Hill (commemorated with a photograph in the evening’s programme), whose life was to

end so tragically early; and on MacMillan himself, whom David Bintley would have known well. That dark and cavernous car park could have triggered sombre thoughts – like MacMillan’s distress that Margaret Hill’s success in Solitaire, far from acting as a reassurance, had actual-ly accentuated her feelings of alienation.

The silent queue in the concrete jungle was steadily diminishing before the solitary machine, a latter-day sphinx, posing its riddle in a kind of game for one. The thoughtful and unobtrusive David Bintley had vanished into the night. Time, at last, to answer the riddle. Time, now, to bid farewell to Arnold country and a memorable sixtieth birthday party.

tony MereditH

1. The BRB were presenting Four Scottish Dances, as originally choreographed by David Bintley in 1979. Six years later he added Benjamin Britten’s Scottish Ballad to create a longer work, Flowers of the Forest.2. Different Drummer, the Life of Kenneth MacMillan, Faber & Faber, 2009. 3. Revealing MacMillan, ed. Susan Crow and Olivia Swift, Royal Academy of Dance, 2002.4. Kenneth MacMillan, The Man and his Ballets, Hamish Hamilton, 1985.5. A BBC recording on the Ica Classics Legacy label, with Nadia Nerina and Nikolai Fadeyechev as Giselle and Albrecht.

Below: Programme from first performance at Covent Garden

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On 5 March 2016, the ballet ‘Generation Y’, choreographed by Antoine Jully with music

from Malcolm Arnold’s Fifth Symphony, was performed by the Oldenburg Ballet Company at the State Theatre in Oldenburg, north-west Germany. It was coupled with another ballet ‘D-man in the waters’ with music from Mendelssohn’s Octet, and there were a total of nine performances from March to June.

The State Theatre website says:

New generation - new times? Or will everything be as it was? A new genera-tion (those born between 1980 and 2000) is now entering the consumer and labour markets. It is called Generation Y – or “Generation Why”, because it calls into question existing conditions and ideas. It is relatively well developed, has the freedom to express itself openly, to express its thoughts aloud, and is characterised by a technologically savvy lifestyle. Information is immediately available, everything is closer, the world is faster.

To describe Generation Y in dance, Antoine Jully has selected the 5th Symphony of the English Sir Malcolm Arnold. This Oscar winner (‘Bridge on the River Kwai’) was one of the most pro-lific and successful composers of Great Britain in the 20th century. His Symphony No. 5 of 1960 is an encrypted Requiem. Arnold works with both serial techniques and memorable tunes, which gave the symphony a huge success with the public, but the critics of the 1960s, the decade of Stockhausen, were dismissive. Today, however, the 5th Symphony is considered not just another masterpiece from the pen of Malcolm Arnold, but one of the greatest symphonic masterpieces of the 20th century.

The programme notes say:

Antoine Jully is exploring Generation Y in his new creation with the Fifth Symphony of the British composer Sir Malcolm Arnold. In his abstract ballet he is asking: “Who is Generation Y?” His 12 dancers provide a perfect basis, since all of them belong to that generation. But how can you sum up a whole generation and describe it in a ballet? Antoine Jully constructs images based on the ideas which underlie Generation Y, but is not trying to present only one view. He ad-dresses certain issues and feelings of this

Generation Y in Oldenburggeneration in his ballet: mobility, flex-ibility, networking, and transparency. He includes typical characteristics such as staring at the mobile phone, with typical hand movements; and he incorporates contemporary street dance styles, such as jumpstyle and tectonic.

Extracts from the ballets are available on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARoqdtE2Fts. Or search for ‘Generation Y Jully’.

Information and photos supplied by Fiona Southey.

Antoine Jully, choreographer Photo: Martina Pipprich

Production photos: Stephan Walzl

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Was there something about Malcolm and islands? There was Ischia, off Naples, of course, where the Waltons lived and where Malcolm visited.

There was a feature film, Island in the Sun (1957), set in Jamaica; and another, partly filmed in French Polynesia, enti-tled Tamahine (1963).Then many years earlier, a documentary The Island (all about an oil refinery on the Isle of Grain) and a British Transport film entitled (appropriately, as it turns out for Mr Pye) Channel Islands.

In 1954 there was a score for an Old Vic production of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, inevitably bringing to mind Prospero’s “… isle full of noises, / Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight / And hurt not …” Not forgetting Arnold‘s first foray into grand opera: his (unfinished) epic drama of 1949 Henry Christophe, whose setting was the Caribbean island of Haiti in 1811!

And then, deep in the outer reaches of the Poulton cata-logue, there is For Mr Pye An Island (no. 291). This intriguing entry has largely escaped notice.1 The standard Arnold biogra-phies (Burton-Page, Jackson, and Harris and Meredith) are silent on the subject. But when a book group near where I live opted for their monthly choice to read the novel Mr Pye by Mervyn Peake, distant bells began to chime.

Writer, poet, artist and illustrator, Mervyn Peake (1911-1968) is best known for his wonderful Gormenghast trilogy of novels. But despite his sadly early death, Peake wrote a great deal else besides, including, in 1953, this delightful fantasy about a benevolent ex-city gentleman called (not inappropriately!) Mr Pye, who travels to – here we go! – one of the smaller Channel Islands, Sark, to convert the islanders by his own shining ex-ample to love of the ‘Great Pal’ in the sky above. I won’t spoil the rest of the narrative; suffice it to say that it is a delightful comic invention, beautifully written and constructed.

And then, on Wednesday 10 July 1957 at 9.45 p.m., the BBC Home Service broadcast a radio adaptation by the author himself – actually the Radio Times describes it as “based on incidents” from the novel; hence perhaps the otherwise slightly elaborate title. And for this dramatisation Malcolm wrote 12 minutes’ worth of incidental music. The manuscript score sur-vives: it is held by Eton College Library. I’ve not had a chance to inspect it, but doubtless, in the manner of these things, it is highly discontinuous, with many short snatches designed to bridge scenes or effect transitions or accompany the credits.

So that’s something, at least. Something else positive is that the radio play text is in print, in a handsome collection called Peake‘s Progress: Selected Writings and Drawings of Mervyn Peake, published by the British Library in 2011. Again, I’ve not had a chance to inspect it, not just for enjoyment but for any further clues it might hold. On the negative side, though, is the melancholy fact that there is seemingly no surviving copy of the tape, neither in the BBC Archives or the British Library; nor anywhere else that I can discover.

So this is first of all by way of a heartfelt appeal to all read-ers. Might there be a copy somewhere in private hands? If so, joy will be unconfined and amnesty guaranteed.

But plenty of other questions arise and again answers or sug-gestions will be welcome. How did Arnold come to be commis-sioned, and who at the BBC was responsible? Was Malcolm sent a script and given any specific instructions? Did he know the novel beforehand ? Or even know Mervyn Peake from some previous encounter? Was there any form of collaboration or discussion?

An Arnold mystery island?

When and where was the music pre-recorded? Or were the musi-cians – and composer/conductor – present alongside the cast, during the recording?

A lot more research is obviously needed before these and other questions can be answered definitively. Visits to the British Library (which has a large Peake holding), and maybe to the BBC Written Archives in Caversham, seem called for as a start. And if all else fails, perhaps a reconstruction, complete with Malcolm’s music, would be an interesting proposition for a future Festival. I can hear it working well in the lower depths of the Derngate.

Piers Burton-Page

Notes1. For Mr Pye An Island (1957)Length of play: 60' (including 12' of incidental music). Producer: Francis Dillon. Cast members: see Radio Times notice above. Instrumentation: 2fl 2 cl bcl tpt perc hp pno cel db. Autograph MS: full score (38 sections with cues) held by Eton College Library. Music played by: Chamber Ensemble conducted by Malcolm Arnold. Broadcast date: BBC Home Service, 10 July 1957.An adaptation of the book was made for Channel 4 tel-evision by Donald Churchill in 1986 and starred Derek Jacobi as Mr Pye; the direc-tor was Michael Darlow.

Radio Times for Wednesday 10 July 1957

The book by Mervyn Peake

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Two interesting cuttings from 1941.

With military honoursTo Mr and Mrs Will Arnold of Craigmore, St George’s Avenue, Northampton, the news from the International Red Cross, Geneva, that their son, Pilot-Officer Philip Arnold RAF was buried with military honours at the cemetery of Neu Ruppin, near Berlin, on November 15.

It is exactly eight months since he was reported missing following an operational flight over Berlin.

It will be a great consolation both to his widow and parents that he was accorded the last rites and ceremonies worthy of a very gallant airman, who was killed while on service for his country.

Simultaneously came the news that Philip’s younger brother, Malcolm, was awarded the Cobbett Prize for the best chamber music work at the Royal College of Music.

The composition was for a string quartet.

nortHaMPton Mercury, 25 July 1941

Defence work“If I carried what I believe to the logical conclusion, I suppose I should only live in a world apart from everyone or commit suicide. Either is not very useful.”

This declaration was made at a North Midland Conscientious Objectors Tribunal at the Nottingham Shire Hall today by Malcolm Arnold, 20, of St George Avenue, Northampton, a member of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, who said that his objection was not on religious but on moral grounds. He was opposed to the use of violence.

Ald. H A Hind: You realise that the first things to go in a country overrun by the Nazis are freedom of speech, free-dom of religion and freedom of action. You realise you have freedom of thought and action in coming before this tribunal? - Yes.

Mr E Purser: Have you or would you play ‘Judas Maccabeus’?

Applicant said that he had not played it, but he saw no objection to playing martial music.

Mr Purser: Do you think you could run an orchestra if everyone did as they liked? - No.

Applicant’s name was allowed to re-main on the register on condition that he took up full civil defence work.nottingHaM evening Post, 5 deceMBer 1941

n A London Weekend Television public-ity photograph of Julian Bream (right) with the caption: “Julian Bream, one of the world’s outstanding guitarists plays music ancient and modern and talks to Humphrey Burton in the Aquarius studios on Saturday June 12th [1971]. Included in his programme will be the television premiere of the Fantasy Op.107, specially written for him by Malcolm Arnold.” The premiere had been given by Bream at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, on 16 May.n A concert programme being offered for the princely sum of £50: the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra under Sir John Barbirolli playing Arnold’s Tam o’Shanter in Tel Aviv during their 1960-61 season. This was a rare performance by Barbirolli of any music by Arnold; for that matter, there was little Arnold conducted by the

From the archives

Recent items on eBay

other members of the triumvirate, Sir Thomas Beecham or Sir Adrian Boult.n A splendid poster for the 75th birth-day concert at the Royal Festival Hall (below).

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Concert roundup

The Chamber Ensemble of London gave a concert at St James’s, Piccadilly, on 14 May entitled ‘Sir

Malcolm at his club’, which included English music for strings by his fellow Savile Club members, including Vaughan Williams, Delius, Elgar, Alwyn, Walton, Stanford and Parry. The Ensemble gave an excellent performance of Arnold’s Five pieces for violin in the first half, and another outstanding performance of the Concerto for two violins after the inter-val. The soloists were Peter Fisher – who established the ensemble in 1997 – and Maya Iwabuchi. Peter is a self-confessed Arnold fan, and I have now heard him play this concerto several times. He is a superb player, and always makes the con-certo sound fresh, and slightly different.

The opportunity arose to hear the piece again at a concert on 20 July, part of the Konstanz Music Festival and per-formed in the chapel of a former mon-astery, now a hotel, on Lake Konstanz in Germany. Arnold’s Concerto for two vio-lins was the centre-piece of the concert, and the principal players were Valeriy Sokolov and Nikita Boriso-Glebsky. Valeriy in particular has a terrific pedigree, and was a pupil at the Yehudi Menuhin School in the late 1990s. Fortunately, it is not necessary or possible to compare the two performances as they were so very different, Peter Fisher’s performance is based on years of study and understand-ing, while Valeriy Sokolov emphasises the emotional content of the piece. I can safely say of both performances that I have never heard the piece played bet-ter. The German audience clearly en-joyed the concerto as well; it was played before the interval, and the players were called back for four curtain calls.

There have been two performances of Homage to the Queen recently: by the Southampton University Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Tom Hammond, early in June, and by the Royal College of Music, conducted by Peter Stark, as part of their 90th Anniversary Gala Concert on 10 July at the Cadogan Hall in

Above: Pentagon Brass:

Robin Totterdell, Andy White, Carl

Woodcroft, Nicolas Fleury and Laura

Garwin

Right: Adrian with Nikita Boriso-

Glebsky (left) and Valeriy Sokolov

(right)

London. It is, of course, a stirring work, with its wonderful opening and finale, and exploiting all the emotions in be-tween in the four sequences. Audiences always enjoy it, and it was very gratifying that the young players in both perfor-mances almost seemed surprised by how much they had enjoyed playing it!

Pentagon Brass put on a recital ‘Malcolm Arnold’s music for Brass’ at Katherine’s home in Crouch End on 27 July, playing the Fantasies for Horn, Trumpet, Trombone and Tuba, the Fanfare for Louis, and the two Quintets for Brass. What an amazing work the first

The clarinet sonatina

There is little that is serious about Malcolm Arnold’s Sonatina, a fairly recent work which is already a great favourite with audiences everywhere. Arnold is a truly great trumpet player. He conducts with skill, and his film music is among the fin-

est ever written. On the most serious side, his symphonies should be heard more often, and his overtures are both varied and extremely exciting. So it is with his Sonatina. A short, pithy first movement, full of touches of Stravinskian jazz and the wild wide leaps of which the clarinet is so naturally capable. A brief pastorale of a slow movement, punctured by a brief interlude of pseudo-drama where the two protagonists almost shoot at each other. A furious finale full of wide open holes into which the unwary can pitch and stumble. It is all very exciting stuff, the very stuff of which musical entertainment is made.

FroM discourses, a Booklet aBout tHe clarinet, 1973. suBMitted By keitH llewellyn

quintet is – they were required to play the last movement again as an encore!

And finally, a theatrical footnote. The Kreutzer Sonata, a play by Leo Tolstoy, has recently finished a run in London with Greg Hicks in the main role. The play includes a violinist and pianist, played (in both senses of the word) by Alice Pinto, a regular player and speaker at the Arnold Festival. Her part is as the wife of the main character, who towards the end of the play, murders her. Alice admitted that contemplating her impending doom night after night was a bit of a strain!

adrian Harris

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The Eton Arnold Project proceeds with considerable enthusiasm, but as Eton has a summer holiday lasting just over three months, performances are somewhat limited. However, as part of a regular service in Chapel, the Eton Choir performed Malcolm’s Laudate Dominum on 12 June. This was an excellent rendition by a very high quality choir, and includes not only organ accompaniment but also intricate organ solo parts. Malcolm was not well known for his religious beliefs, but Laudate Dominum – Psalm 150 – majors on “Praise him with harp and lyre, strings and pipe, timbrel and cym-bals” – and of course – “the sounding of the trumpet”. Strangely, it is this last line that seems to have the most repetitions and variations.

An article on the project, written by Michael Meredith, appeared in the Spring edition of the Eton College Collections Journal - reproduced below.

Music making and manuscripts

January 2016 saw the beginning of a new educational venture between College Library and the Music

Department. This centres round the work of Sir Malcolm Arnold, one of Britain’s major 20th- century composers, and its purpose is to relate the research and teaching potential of Arnold’s musical scores to the practical performance of his work.

Malcolm Arnold’s family have depos-ited for three years their entire collec-tion of his manuscript music in College Library, in order that it may be con-sulted by the general public and used in the school’s music teaching. Each year individual scores will be chosen as the subject of academic and practical study within Eton. Some of Arnold’s music was included in the school concert, and it is hoped there will be a number of chamber concerts each year. There will be talks, displays and exhibits from the archive and a screening of some of the film and television programmes for which Arnold wrote the score.

Malcolm Arnold (1921-2006), who once shocked the musical establishment by a collaboration with Deep Purple, was a compositional master craftsman, nota-ble both for the engaging accessibility of his work and its astonishing range. The creator of one of the finest symphonic cycles in the 20th-century, he was also

a prolific Oscar-winning film composer. He moved from brass bands to ballet; from opera to television; from concertos for soloists as diverse as Leon Goossens, Larry Adler, Dennis Brain, Julian Bream, Yehudi Menuhin and Benny Goodman to outrageous creations for Gerard Hoffnung with performers on vacuum cleaners and rifles. His idiosyncratic use of form and structure in all the various genres, his unerring deftness in orchestration (in his early years he had been a trumpet player with leading orchestras like the LPO) and his readiness to embrace and adapt to his use the new ideas of the day ensure that a study of his work is a stimulating and rewarding experience. He is an ideal composer round whom to create a school-based project.

The scores now housed in College Library demonstrate the variety of Arnold’s work. Among them are the Seventh Symphony, concerti for flute, clarinet and harmonica, the ballet Electra, The Return of Odysseus, a can-tata for chorus and orchestra, the songs and incidental music for Shakespeare’s The Tempest, quartets, piano music and dances, as well as the music for films as varied as The Inn of the Sixth Happiness, The Belles of St. Trinian’s and Suddenly Last Summer.

The first year will be spent in-troducing some of these to Eton and

establishing the scheme. In the second and third years it is hoped to extend the range of the project by liaising with other schools and educational institutions. College Library and the Arnold family hope to interest benefactors so that, at the end of three years, the Arnold archive may remain permanently in the library for the use of scholars and future generations of Etonians.

It is a bold and thrilling experiment. We have a strongly committed group of musicians and librarians, from inside and outside Eton, planning the project, discovering how we can best use this very generous loan. We look forward to three years of exciting music-making and hope to see many boys, masters and visitors enjoying Malcolm Arnold’s autograph scores in College Library. Perhaps, too, a number of boys will be inspired by Arnold’s music and manuscripts to write their own compositions.

MicHael MereditH

Curator, Modern Collections

Available from the SocietyPlease send a cheque payable to ‘The Malcolm Arnold Society’ to Terry Cushion - address on back page.

Maestro Issue 2, October 201564 pages of original articles, with colour illustrations. £10 including p&p.

Complete Discography 2015Including rare and deleted items. 20 pages. £2.50 including p&p.

Still available

Maestro Issue 1, October 201460 pages of articles from Beckus 1991-

2000. £7.50 including p&p.

Coming soon – available at the Festival

Maestro Issue 3, October 2016Including: the Hawes family tree; the Fantasies; the published film music – songs and themes; the Harmonica Concerto; newly-updated Bibliography by Stewart Craggs; Arnold’s score to ‘Invitation to the Dance’; Arnold and Elgar; Arnold and Vaughan Williams.

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This performance by the Birmingham Royal Ballet was part of a six-night tour, visiting Cheltenham, Poole and Truro. The Royal Ballet was founded in Covent Garden by Dame

Ninette de Valois, who famously said, “Malcolm Arnold is the most accomplished composer of ballet music since Tchaikovsky.” It acquired its new name on relocating to the Midlands in 1987. David Bintley was appointed artistic director in 1995, and main-tains the traditions of its founder.

SolitaireThe company kept very much to Kenneth MacMillan’s original concept, set to the English Dances with two additional pieces, Sarabande and Polka. The solitary girl, attempting to make friends in a playground against a backdrop of a scaffold-like outline against an azure sky was very much as per the premiere by Sadler’s Wells in 1956. The principal dancer, taking the role of the girl, was Nao Sakuma, a most youthful looking Japanese ballerina, who, surprisingly, has been with the company for over 20 years. Dressed in a vibrant vermillion top and white tutu, and sporting a floral headdress, she took centre stage throughout, displaying a youthful innocence, with a most enchanting smile, for the entire ballet.

Her performance was based on that of Margaret Hill, MacMillan’s muse, who danced in the original production. Nao Sakuma combined with the other dancers in the ensemble num-bers, weaving in and out, in intricate movements which superbly displayed child play. For the Sarabande and Polka, two pas de deux, she was joined by two other principals: in the Sarabande, by Mathias Dingman – they displayed great understanding with each other, forming an endearing partnership – and in the Polka, by Jenna Roberts, who has been with the Birmingham Royal Ballet for 12 years – her slim, long-legged physique contrasting with the petite build of her partner, blending into a delightfully spirited duo, displaying both experience and innocence in a charming, child-like fashion.

Throughout the other eight dances making up Solitaire, the corps de ballet, in aqua green outfits and dresses, produced exquisite, intricate patterns with the principal. In the Allegro risoluto (Set 1 No 4), four male dancers propelled the girl in a wonderful high lift, bringing Malcolm’s score to life in a most uplifting manner. In the Giubiloso (Set 2 No 4), the entire com-pany performed an exhilarating romp of playground antics and games which received a most enthusiastic response from the audience. In the final act, to the Allegretto (Set 2 No 3), Nao Sakuma captured the hearts of the capacity audience as she was finally left alone on stage, communicating her world of youthful bewilderment and solitude in a most enchanting manner.

Four Scottish DancesJust a quartet of dancers, dressed in national costume, was used for the Scottish Dances. The backdrop was of a Scottish landscape reminiscent of the gentle Lowlands. The two male dancers, James Barton and Kit Holder, wearing kilts, were joined by Angela Paul and Laura Purkis. All four have gained high positions within the company over recent years; they have a combined experience of 60 years of dance with the company. Their experience and artistry was fully exploited in a highly entertaining, light-hearted presentation with intricate, amus-ing choreography, much appreciated by the captivated audi-ence. In Vivace (No 2), the two girls were pursued by the men,

Concert review

Birmingham Royal BalletLighthouse, Poole, 13 May 2016

attempting to attract their attention and gain their favours, but the men were overcome by “the evil drink”, displaying drunken behaviour in keeping with Malcolm’s music. The choreography was inspired – when the two men collapsed, legs stretched out, the two girls performed a superb “sword dance” between their outstretched limbs. In the following Allegretto, a double pas de deux, we heard a lovely, sympathetic accompaniment from the harpist – a charming contrast. It was brought to an end by the rumbustious final dance.

For both Solitaire and Four Scottish Dances, the company were accompanied by their own Royal Ballet Sinfonia, which despite their limited numbers, produced a more than adequate sound, giving stridency and melancholy where appropriate.

The programme included to other ballets: Monotones II to a live piano accompaniment of Erik Satie’s Trois Gymnopédies –first performed at Symphony Hall, Birmingham, in 2004; and Five Tangos, to the music of Argentinian composer Astor Piazzola, first performed at Birmingham Hippodrome in 1991 – at this Poole performance, recorded music was used.

The whole evening was a marvellous experience and the company fully deserved the rapturous applause.

Mike Harley

Arnold Solitaire, Four Scottish Dances; Satie Trois Gymnopédies; Piazzola Five Tangos

Nao Sakuma in Solitaire

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Saturday 15 October 11 am. Launch by Nigel Hess Song of Simeon; Henry Christophe

12 noon. John Wallace event Launch of Arnold brass works CD The 4 Brass Fantasies; Brass Quintet

1 pm. Festival Lunch

2 pm. Alice Pinto: Malcolm’s early works Early piano pieces; Vita Abundans; Beauty Haunts the Woods; Kensington Gardens; 2 Sketches for oboe and piano

4 pm. Family Concert at St Matthew’s Northampton SO/John Gibbons Arnold: A Grand Grand Overture

Festival dinnerWe have arranged a pre-Festival din-ner at the Park Inn Hotel on Friday 14 October: pre-dinner drink at 7.00 pm; dinner at 7.30 pm. Our speaker is Piers Burton-Page; he’s calling his talk ‘A Toast to Malcolm Arnold’. The cost is £29.50 (£34.50 for non-members) to include a welcome drink, three-course meal and coffee. We also plan to show a rare docu-mentary with music by Arnold.

Options are available, on request, for vegetarians or anyone having special dietary requirements; please let me know when paying.

Festival ticketsSociety rates show a saving of £2 per ticket plus avoidance of the £3 per trans-action booking fee.Day passes: Saturday £7.50, Sunday

How many connections did you spot? Here’s a response from Piers Burton-Page posing as MA:

“I yield to absolutely no-one in my admiration of the Bard. I once wrote some Incidental Music for an Old Vic production of The Tempest (1954) – not a trivial undertaking, there were some 35 numbers; three of the songs were actually published a few years later.

“I tangled with a couple of Shakespearean films too, back in 1951, for an outfit called Parthian Productions, long since defunct. They must have had an interest in the Bard’s Roman plays, as there was Julius Caesar and then Antony and Cleopatra. Both featured the actor Robert Speaight, and both were heavily cut, down to only just over half an hour – can you believe it! So I think they must have been made for educational purposes, and I think both did quite well when released in the USA. I wonder if those old films still exist anywhere.

Arnold: Carnival of Animals Tim Bowers: Carnival of carnivores Nigel Hess: Ladies in Lavender Kleiper: Little Redcap Arnold: Machines Arnold: English Dances Set 2

7.30 pm. Arnold and Poulenc Jenny Dyson Wind Quintet Arnold: Wind Quintet; Dream City; Three Shanties. Poulenc: Sextet; Trio

Sunday 16 October 10.30 am. Northamptonshire County Youth Orchestra

12 noon. Kris Rusman: ‘The voice of the people’

1 pm. Lunch

2 pm. The Forgotten Documentaries

3 pm. Songs from the films

5 pm. Janus Ensemble/Ben Palmer Arnold: Piano Duet Concerto Arnold: Clarinet Concertino Paul Harris: Buckingham Concerto No.5 Arnold: Toy Symphony

7.30 pm. Gala Concert BBC Concert Orchestra/John Gibbons Arnold: Beckus the Dandipratt Walton: Funeral music from Hamlet Arnold: Guitar Concerto Walton: Spitfire Prelude and Fugue Arnold: Serenade for Guitar Arnold: Symphony No.6

11th Malcolm Arnold Festival: ‘The voice of the people’

Festival arrangements£7.50, together £15.00.Sunday evening Gala Concert (BBC Concert Orchestra): £16.00 (Circle: anyone wishing seating elsewhere should let me know and I will obtain if possible). Tickets will be handed out at the Society Dinner or at our Festival stand 30 minutes before the start of the Festival.

Total cost for dinner and all Festival events: £60.50 per person (£65.50 for non-members). Cheques to me please, payable to the Malcolm Arnold Society. The last date for receipt of monies is Wednesday 31 August.

Hotel booking We have secured the same special Festival rate as last year at the Park Inn Hotel, Silver Street, Northampton, NN1 2TA, of £80 B&B double occupancy (twin

or double bed) or £75 B&B single oc-cupancy per night. This rate includes parking and we also get free use of the private room for our Dinner. To book, please contact the hotel on 01604 739988 quoting reference ‘Malcolm 2016’.

2017As a change from the dinner/speaker format, for 2017 we are consider-ing hiring the Errol Flynn cinema at the Derngate and showing an Arnold-composed feature film. I would ap-preciate your thoughts this, and what film(s) you would like to see. For a list, see http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002185/. All feature films except ‘Up for the Cup’, which is believed lost, are potentially available.

terry cusHion

Arnold Shakespeare competition (Beckus 101)“I had good links to the

Royal Shakespeare Company at Stratford-upon-Avon, too: both my Water Music (1964) and my ballet music for Sweeney Todd (1959) were first heard there, the former from a barge moored on the Stratford Canal and the latter in the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre itself.

“I’ve probably forgotten a few other things: memory going, up here in Elysium! My favourite Shakespearean

continued on next page

16

Performance diary 2016

Editor David Dunstan (details above). Copy for the Winter 2016 edition of Beckus should be with the Editor by 31 October 2016.

When What Who Where 9 Aug Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) Royal Over-Seas League, 100 Princes Street, Edinburgh (at 22.30) 11 Aug Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) St James’s Church, Southrepps, Norfolk (Southrepps Festival) (at 12.30) 22 Aug Flute Concerto No 1 BBC Concert Orchestra Snape Maltings, Suffolk 28 Aug Padstow Lifeboat National Children’s Orchestra Port Regis School, Dorset 10 Sep Concerto for Two Violins Junges Kammerorchester Pauluszentrum, Lauffen, Baden-Wurttemberg, GERMANY

11 Sep Three Shanties (arr. brass Members of the Tonhalle Orchester Kleiner Saal, Tonhalle, Zurich, Switzerland

quintet) (morning concert) 18 Sep Serenade for Small Orchestra Forderverein Sinfonische Kurtheater im Hotel Dolce, Bad Nauheim, GERMANY

29 Sep Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) The Lantern, Colston Hall, Bristol (at 13.05) 29 Sep Brass Quintet 1 Eton Boys’ Concert (Windsor Festival) School Hall, Eton College, Windsor, Berks

4 Oct Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) Wigmore Hall, London (at 13.00) 7 Oct Scottish Dances Het Zeeuws Orkest St Willibrordusbasiliek, Hulst, THE NETHERLANDS

9 Oct Serenade for Small Orchestra Prometheus Orchestra St Bartholomew’s Church, Orford, Suffolk

(William Alwyn Festival) 14 Oct Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) Classical Music Live, Falkirk Town Hall

15 Oct Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) St Martin’s Church, Stamford, Lincs 16 Oct Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) (Landulph Festival) Landulph Memorial Hall, Saltash, Cornwall 15-16 Oct Malcolm Arnold Festival Royal & Derngate, Northampton 21 Oct Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) Sutton Valence School, Sutton Valence, Kent

23 Oct Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) Saffron Hall, Saffron Walden, Essex (14.00) 30 Oct Tam O’Shanter Glasgow Orchestral Society Glasgow Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow

6 Nov English Dances Set 1 Royal Tunbridge Wells Sym Orch Assembly Hall, Tunbridge Wells, Kent 12 Nov Symphony 6 Franz Liszt Conservatorium Orchestra Weimar, Thüringen, GERMANY

13 Nov Symphony 6 Franz Liszt Conservatorium Orchestra Weimar, Thüringen, GERMANY 17 Nov Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) 1901 Arts Club, Exton Street, London

19 Nov Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) York Guitar Festival, Bootham School, York 30 Nov Fantasy for Guitar Sean Shibe (guitar) Leeds College of Music, Leeds (at 13.05)

Patrons Keith Lockhart, Julian Lloyd Webber, John Wilson

Hon President Keith Llewellyn

Chairman Alan Poulton, Oakenhall, 27 Glenferness Avenue, Bournemouth BH4 9NE. Tel: 01202 768702 (home) 07790 246305 (mobile); e-mail: alanpoulton@hotmail.com

Treasurer Terry Cushion, 9 Lapwing Drive, Costessey, Norwich NR8 5FS. Tel: 01603 745824 (home) 07858 768194 (mobile); e-mail: tcushion@msn.com

Membership Secretary Jenny Newton, 9 Lapwing Drive, Costessey, Norwich NR8 5FS. Tel: 01603 745824 (home) 07768 452494 (mobile); e-mail: jennylouise@hotmail.com

Editor David Dunstan, 15 Birch Close, Sonning Common, Reading RG4 9LE. Tel: 0118 972 3881 (home) 07794 407842 (mobile); e-mail: davedunstan@ntlworld.com

Special Projects Frank Brand, Mount Pleasant, Llanrhidian, North Gower, Swansea SA3 1EH. Tel: 07786 001475 (mobile); e-mail: rabc41@gmail.com

The Malcolm Arnold Societycharacter is of course still jolly old Sir John Falstaff; indeed, people have sometimes compared me to him, in terms of girth and humour. Did you know my Cello Concerto was first going to be called Shakespearean Cello Concerto? But I got cold feet be-cause in the end it wasn’t that Shakespearean, and also because Elgar got there first, rather well in my view, so I was fearful of hubris.

“One more thing that’s perhaps a bit doubtful: you know my Four Scottish Dances? Well, I sometimes thought of them, not just in terms of R. Burns, but also of W. Shakespeare, who of course wrote a famous Scottish Play, whose title we’re never supposed to mention …

“Yours aye, MA. “PS. I’ve never mentioned that last bit to anyone else be-

fore, so it may just be pure speculation!”So Piers wins a copy of the Chamber Ensemble of London’s

latest Heritage CD, partly-sponsored by the Society and featur-ing three Arnold works.

Arnold Shakespeare competition (continued)