Old Lamps For New
WE tune in or climb to the Proms balcony oith apprehensive ears. A newly commis- sioned work, composer British, is coming up. Are we going to enjoy it? The cynic in us replies: `Commissioned works, British or other, are in- tended to be suffered, not enjoyed : this for the purging of our souls and, in some mysterious way, to the greater glory of Music in the Abstract.'
As often as not the conductor in these cases is Norman Del Mar, a mild, rather mountainous man. Confronted by a frightening new manu- script, nobody has a shrewder eye than he for what the composer intended, or probably inten- ded. Mr. Del Mar sorts out enigmatic sound- symbols and puts them over with massive patience and a kindly smile which all of us would do well to emulate in our hours of trial.
If, then, lain Hamilton's Cantos for Orchestra left me with an. impression of bittiness and defi- cient dynamics, the fault is more likely to be Mr. Hamilton's than that of his interpreter. There were themes of striking cut. There were fruity dis- sonances. There were pretty sound-textures. But no master-curve to unify these goodies; no cen- tral passion.
Two nights earlier Mr. Del Mar, again with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, had unveiled Hugh Wood's Scenes from Comus. A handful or two of Milton's lines, set for soprano and tenor voices, were sung to amiable effect by Jeanette Sinclair and Kenneth Bowen; but from the start my ears were hooked by Mr. Wood's orchestra, which modulated from sparseness and melancholy to a boiling richness. For all its affinities and remin- ders (Schoenberg, Scriabin and Tippett came to mind), Mr. Wood's orchestra has impacts of its own. Why bring in Milton? Literary pegs have been known to spike more than one musical gun.
No such risk was run by Elizabeth Maconchy, whose Variazioni Concertanti for Orchestra (in this case the BBC Scottish under James Loughran) and woodwind quartet (Messrs. Macdonagh, Brymer, Gambol! and Moore) is straight 'pattern entertainment.' By which I mean that it has neat polyphonies, spicy harmonies, logical structure, pert tunes, grotesque tunes, romantic tunes—and not an 'inner meaning' in sight, however hard you look.
Will Miss Maconchy's Variazioni live on? Are they likely to be heard by our grandchildren? Probably not. But why should we always invite Posterity to breathe down our necks? Let Pos- terity wait in the wings for once in a way. The point about the Yariazioni is that, as well as being smart and tasteful, they can be taken in and enjoyed at one go, here and now. There is far too little new music of which this can be said. If people can't be sure of listening to a ratio of new music (not necessarily all new music) with instant understanding and some relish, they will assuredly turn their backs on the lot of it and opt for the Old, the Tried and the True.
This is one reason for Sir Malcolm Sargent's annual Gilbert and Sullivan orgy, a splendidly avid affair; the people who attend know what they don't like, but what they do like they enjoy unashamedly. What secret envies their un- inhibited appetite must arouse! On Saturday night the Albert Hall was crammed, sweltering and hilarious for lumps of Princess Ida, Ruddi- , Ore, The Pirates, Pinafore, Utopia Ltd. and The Gondoliers, sung infectiously (though not always, on the men's part, with the tone and phrasing
Isabel Quigly is on holiday for two weeks.
Sullivan deserves) by a quintet of soloists (Misses Blighton and Minton, Messrs. Lewis, Cameron and Brannigan) and a mixture of BBC Chorus and Royal Choral Society. As at all observances that have become a fixed ritual, an audience of initiates go through certain motions simply because they have gone through them countless times before. Many a detached soul listening-in to the second half of the concert on the Light may have been ' put off a bit by the double repeat of the Gon- doliers cachucha finale and the community hand- claps on the first beat of the bar.
One cannot, however, grudge the initiates their Sargent-worship or Sargent the virtuoso touch with which, in the angler's sense, he plays his audience. Occasionally he will introduce a new `selection' with a brief talk. The effect is con- vulsing out of proportion to the verbal means em- ployed, though not, perhaps, to his artful timing. Thus on the subject of Princess Ida: 'Ladies and gentlemen, you are to imagine you are in the
Sir Malcolm Sargent
garden of a women's college'—(Cheers and a lone wolf-whistle)—`a land so sacred that it has never been soiled by foot of man.' (Renewed cheers.) 'But'—with a side glance at his seasoned male trio—`these three young fellows have just done precisely that!' (Explosions of delight.) 'They are in their early twenties'—(Tumult)- 'good looking'—(Uproar)—`and . . . slim!' (Pan- demonium.) Tenor, baritone and bass take this sportingly. Then off and away into their suave, elegantly- pointed trio, 'I am a maiden cold and stately.' The fine thing about Sullivan's scores, apart from the sap that keeps their craftsmanship green, is a chain of derivations (e.g. from Schubert, Rossini and Verdi) so inspired as to constitute almost a fount of originality. The bass number in Princess Ida, 'This helmet, I suppose,' is the deftest and bluffest of Handelian pastiches, just as the spook song, 'When the night wind howls,' in the family pOrtraits scene from Ruddigore, has brimstone in it from the Devil's Glen of Weber. (How horri- pilating that low growl on the trombones!) But in these and similar pages there is nothing of the copy-cat or epigone. Beneath other men's hats Sullivan remained Sullivan; and a good job, too.
CHARLES REID
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