FRMS BULLETIN Spring 2001 No. 134

Ed i tor: CONTENTS Ar thur Baker All Ed ito rial copy to him at: page page 4 Ramsdale Road, EDITORIAL BOOK REVIEWS Bramhall, Stock port, Cheshire SK7 2QA From the Chairman 2 Wag ner and Philosophy 22 Tel: 0161 440 8746 Pen guin Guide, Yearbook 23 E-mail: [email protected] NEWS Berlioz 23 Asst. Ed i tor: Reg Wil liamson (see back New Chair man 2 PRESENTERS page for address). Public it y from Affil i ates 2 Ed i to rial dead lines: An nual Gen eral Meeting 3 FRMS Presenters Panel 24 Spring is sue - 31st De cember New Com mit tee members 5 Autumn issue - 30th June New Vice-President 6 CD REVIEWS Mar keting Man ager: Derek Henderson 6 Cathy Con nolly (see back From the Treasurer 7 Had don Hall 27 page). Ad ver tise ments are Pub lic Liability 7 en sem ble incanto 28 available from £35.00, details Pi ano Recital; J. Middleton 7 from the Marketin g Man ager. Clas sic Col lec tor 8 THE REGIONS Sec re tary’s Notes 8 Copies are distributed to all South West Re gion 29 Federation affiliates with LETTERS Sus sex Re gion 29 additional copies through West Mid lands Region 30 society secretaries. Estimated Sir John Barbirolli 9 West Middlesex Group 32 readership is well over 10,000. Missing from the Proms 9 York shire Re gion 32 Individual Subscriptions are Res ig na tion of Chair man 9 available at £6.80 for four So ci eties & Pro gramming 9 THE SOCIETIES issues. Direct orders and The Bul le tin 11 subscriptions for the Bulletin Berlioz Society 33 should be sent to the FRMS FEATURES Forest RMS 33 Treasurer (see back page). Stoke-on-Trent GS 33 The cover pic ture is a re pro - Railways in Music 12 duc tion of the Paint ing “The MiniDiscs 15 CROSSWORD Lily Pool” by Wil liam Alwyn. His tor i cal Con cepts (2) 15 Op era (after Ogden Nash) 18 Cross word 35 Type set by the ed i tor us ing Men dels sohn 18 Corel Ventura. En joying Mu sic 18 FRMS OFFICERS Please Note: No ma te rial con- No ta ble An ni ver saries 19 tent of this mag azine may be Vi enna- A Mu si cal Por trait 20 Of fi cers, Board and re pro duced else where with out Com mit tees 36 per mis sion from the pub lish - ers, Fed er a tion of Re corded Mu sic So ci eties Ltd. Printed by Maxiprint, de sign ers and col our print ers, Kettlestring Lane, Visit the FRMS Website: Clifton Moor, York YO30 4XF ISSN 09628150 www.musicweb.force9.co.uk/mu sic/frms/in dex.htm

FRMS 1 EDITORIAL

GUEST EDITORIAL From the Chairman o say that 2000 has been a difficult year for the conference to revive the Regional Group. I am FRMS is probably an understatement, and it also planning to visit as many societies as I can Twould be foolish to assume that everything conveniently arrange; obviously those with good can be put right overnight. I need not elaborate on transport links from Derby will be the easiest to the polarisation of the Federation into opposing visit, but though I hesitate to say “distance no factions with their claims and counter-claims; I object” I shall certainly try to include societies hope, following the further afield. Annual General Meeting The other way in which and the election of a “new” I hope to enable the process Committee, that we can is through the Committee. begin to repair the damage Each individual will have his and build a stronger or her own ideas — it would Federation for the 21st be a poor world otherwise Century. As Chairman my — but I want to encourage objective will be to enable them to work together and the process. to be open to what societies There are a number of and individual members ways in which we (by want from the Federation. which I mean all of us in In that respect, indeed, since every affiliated society) the Chairman doesn’t have a can make the process vote on the Committee, work. One is by please feel free to contact me maintaining links between with suggestions, whatever societies at local and your view point. regional level, and I have Ruth and I send our best already committed myself wishes for 2001 to all to this in the East affiliates. Midlands where my own society, Derby RMS, is Allan Child organising a day

Our New Chair man PUBLICITY PROVIDED BY AFFILIATES llan Child is a part-time materials science Since the last issue of the Bulletin, a growing consultant to the firm he recently took early number of Societies have sent us copies of their Aretirement from. He joined Derby RMS in current programmes. These all show that many of 1966 and was its Secretary for a few years in the our affiliates have lively programmes and we are sure 1970s; he resumed that responsibility in 1990. that they give a great deal of pleasure to their Membership of a Recorded Music Society, in members. As before, the detailed programmes are particular the challenge of presenting programmes, too large to list in full, and I would suggest that if has helped him to enjoy a very broad range of music. interested, you either see if the Society is listed on He also makes occasional forays into performance as our Website, or you contact the Secretaries direct. a recorder player and as a choral singer. Addresses and telephone numbers are available from His wife, Ruth, works for the University of me, or through our Secretary on the following Derby, and is Treasurer of Derby RMS. Allan and numbers. Ruth have a son who is a pharmacist and a daughter Pe ter Lerew (Secre tary): 01751-432652 studying childcare. John Phil lips (Vice-Chairman) 01277-212096

2 FRMS NEWS ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING he AGM was held on Saturday, 4th November the floor to proceed was seconded and carried. 2000 at the Durham Light Infantry Museum & It was agreed that the count should take place at the TArt Gallery. This was at a time when floods were end of the Meeting. Chris Leach and Roderick Shaw widespread, including the north of England and many of accepted the appointments as tellers. Subsequently Mr. those who were able to attend gave accounts of most Graham Kiteley was also appointed. horrendous travelling conditions. Many alas were The Minutes of the previous AGM were discussed. defeated by the floods and were not able to make it. One amendment was to amend details of independent Ted Shepherd (Secretary Newcastle RMS and examiners to read ‘A R Milne’. Otherwise it was Secretary North East Region FRMS) welcomed those accepted as a true record. The minutes of the May 6th present to the Meeting and thanked them for attending, general meeting were questioned. Mr. Wainwright despite the weather conditions. He gave credit to those (Wolverhampton RMS) insisted he’d put an who had organized the Meeting. Dr. John Philips acted amendment to the Motion that the Treasurer (Mr. as chairman for the meeting. Hamilton) be returned to Office with “full working The question was raised as to powers”. Mr. Williamson responded whether a quorum had been achieved. by pointing out that he knew full well After it had been confirmed that only “...most horren do us what his only Amendment said, and 21 Societies were represented against travel ling conditions” that had he known the addition was the minimum requirement of 25 it was supposed to be incorporated, he would ruled it had not. After discussion, as the not have accepted the change. He had failure to be quorate was because of the accepted the ‘Treasurer could stay in weather conditions, the Meeting decided by a majority office’ since he had never been removed. The Minutes vote to proceed with business on the Agenda. were not accepted as true record. Mr. Birchall (Hinckley RMS) expressed grave An update concerning the Treasurer’s position was concern about irregularities in the electoral system. He requested and whether full powers have been restored. alleged an abuse of the electoral process in the form of a The Chairman responded, that as far as he was aware circular letter from the Secretary distributed with Ballot this has now been done and full powers have been papers. The Secretary responded by indicating she had restored. Treasurer felt this was not so, had not been requested by members of the Committee seeking received bank statements despite requests, and has no re-election to indicate their intentions to resign if certain idea what is happening. He had not received response people had been elected as officers. She had discussed to any correspondence and had spent time since May the contents of her letter with members of the Meeting sorting out Accounts for presentation to Committee. Mr. Williamson (Stafford RMS) said that Auditors. He felt that the time lapse in sorting things as one of the nominees, he felt it was more honest to out was unforgivable. The Chairman explained the indicate his intention beforehand. delay was due to the tardiness of the Moat House in Mr Birchall alleged it was felt by some members sending copies of invoices. that the letter was intended to influence the course of the Marjorie Williamson, the retiring Hon. Sec retary election and that it was a corrupt and possibly even a presented her report. She began with the Musical criminal offence. He was prepared to take the matter to Weekend at Stratford and which was a memorable the highest levels, the High Court if necessary. He success. The downside was that although attendance requested that the Returning Officer accepted that was about 22% more than the previous year we were nominations which he suggested to have been made under the projected total of rooms prebooked and faced conditionally were invalid. The Chairman pointed out a hefty penalty. We have been fortunate however, with the Ballot has been run the same way for at least 20 an anonymous donation from a delegate of £3000 with years. Ballot Papers are anonymous and the Returning no strings attached and a negotiated £2900 credit with Officer has no idea who they are from. Moat Houses for next year. At this stage the Meeting was asked if they wanted A new agreement had been negotiated on PRS (see proceedings to continue, and it was commented that previous Bulletin) and half was paid by due date of bullying and threats of legal proceedings were not 30th Sept. The final half was due at the end of January helpful. It was pointed out that all who had received the 2001. The full agreement was yet to be signed, as some Secretary’s letter had also received the opposition’s of the fine print had not been agreed. view and electoral recommendations. A motion from This being her last AGM as Secretary she said she

FRMS 3 NEWS

could look back on over 7 years of hard work most of He said it gave him great pleasure to announce that which was enjoyable. She thanked all those who have the last Committee Meeting voted overwhelmingly to supported her and added her appreciation of letters and appoint Marjorie Williamson to the posi tion of Vice telephone calls of sympathy and regret at her departure President in recognition of the work she had done over and the circumstances prompting it. the years for the Federation. The Treasurer Mr. Hamilton had circulated a final The vari ous form al motions were then dis cussed: copy of the accounts. The auditors had to qualify Motion 1 asks the incoming Committee to look at accounts as he had not received all the necessary the feasi bil ity of attaining Charitable Status. There information. The qualifications refered to the Stratford were differing views on whether this was advisable. Week end, as despite repeated requests he had not However it was felt the committee should look at what received some invoices until last weekend, which was needs to be done and put forward proposals next year. too late, and more information Motion 2: “To disqual ify was needed re the content of some Chris Hamilton from office due bills. This was by far the largest to unsatisfactory conduct and item of expenditure incurred and serious irregularities and failure he expressed concern about the to resign after a Vote of No organisation of the Weekend. He Confidence”. A long discussion requested that in future the ensued on whether the Meeting Committee closely monitored was allowed to do this under the attendance. Constitution and the rights and At the conclusion of Mr. wrongs of the situation. It was Hamilton’s report, Mr. pointed out that Mr. Hamilton’s Williamson expressed his Marjorie Williamson, Chris Hamilton honesty was not in question but disapproval that these accounts and John Phillips at AGM. he had refused to carry out had not been seen by any of the some decisions of the Committee until the meeting. A proposal from the floor Committee. There was some question regarding the to accept the accounts was seconded and carried. wording of the Motion and whether those Societies As Vice Chairman, Dr. Phillips said it fell to him to indicating support had seen the exact wording. It was give a report subsequent to the unfortunate resignation felt the motion was improper and it was voted out of of Chairman John Gilks. In addition to areas reported order. elsewhere he also said that two issues of the Bulletin The chairman then adjourned the meeting and were published in the year and were generally held to be announced the outcome of the ballot during the buffet. successful. Thanks were dueto Arthur Baker, Editor, Results of Ballot: and the many contributors, and to Cathy Connolly who had secured a healthy advertising base. Chair man: Allan Child (unop posed) On the question of insurance cover, all problems Vice-Chair man: Dr John Phillips 75 votes, (Gordon had now been dealt with. If we ensure premiums are Wainwright 47 votes) paid on time, cover will now be secure at very Trea surer: Reg William son 79 votes (Chris Ham il- reasonable rates. On the question of legal status, he had ton 42 votes) taken professional advice and made contact with Sec re tary: Pe ter Lerew 80 votes (Tony Pook 42 Companies House to resolve matters outstanding at the votes) last AGM. These had now been resolved without any Com mit tee (in voting order): fine or penalty being levied. Cathy Con nolly (108 votes) He also stated that this year had been most stressful Mar ga ret Dor o thy (88 votes) with many Committee members on the point of John Heyes (83 votes) resignation and with the Chairman and Secretary not to Len Mullenger (82 votes) be in their respective positions next year. He felt we had Patrick Russel l (79 votes) lost two of the lynch pins of the Federation, who had Keith Cheffins (78 votes) been subjected to a continuous barrage of unjustified Brendan Sadler (74 votes — not elected) complaints and personal abuse both in writing and About 50% of the eligible affiliates voted. There verbally. He took pride in looking at efforts and was one spoiled paper. achievements of the Commit tee over the past year but The Meeting closed at approximately 6.30 p.m. said that the efforts of ‘Save FRMS Group’ had made it It was followed by a Piano Recital by Jonathan difficult. Middleton. This is reported on page 7.

4 FRMS NEWS New Committee Members New Sec re tary He attends Federation and Torbay Music Weekends. He Peter Lerew our new Secretary was born in 1932. appreciates a wide range of He is retired and lives near the North York Moors. music, chamber and choral He made his career spanning 40 years, in the public music being especially audit service. Much of his appealing. Interested in music ‘spare’ time has been devoted history he likes period to voluntary groups, making instruments. friends and having lots of fun in the process. Latterly, his Mar ga ret Dor o thy efforts have centred on Mrs. Margaret Dorothy is a retired administrative matters. Always PA/Secretary. She has been a member of Croydon interested in music, Peter is a RMS since 1964; Chairman for four years and founder member and Secretary Secretary for twelve years. She is also a member of of the Ryedale Recorded Carshalton & Wallington GS since 1981 where her Music Society which is husband, Colin, is Secretary. flourishing and has a steadily increasing membership. Margaret enjoys chamber and John Heyes 20th Century music especially. She is interested in the techniques John Heyes, aged 70 and a retired solicitor, has of film music and the musical been a member of the Newport (I.o.W.) Recorded developments that happened at Music Society for fifteen years (on committee for five the beginning of the 20th years) and of the Ryde Recorded Music Society for Century. She is a guest presenter two years. to local Societies. The Famous FRMS Musical Weekend Moat House Stratford Upon Avon April 20/22 2001 MW Dame Janet Baker, in conversation with our President, Edward Greenfield. Recital by the well-known Coull String Quartet, playing Schubert, Tchaikovsky and Mendelssohn. “The Three Editors” - Ivan March, Edward Greenfield and Robert Layton, talk about the Penguin CD Guide. Eric Jennings on “Life in the Orchestra”. Alan Thomas on William Alwyn, the Multi-talented composer. Composer Arthur Butterworth about other composers. Ray Crick on the scope & variety on the ASV CD Label. John Phillips about “A Dutch Miscellany”. For further information contact:- Marjorie Williamson, 67 Galleys Bank, Kidsgrove, Staffs. ST7 4DE Tel: 01782 782419 E-mail: [email protected] or the FRMS Website at: www.musicweb.force9.co.uk/music/frms/index.htm

FRMS 5 News New Vice-President ur newest Vice-President is surprisingly, the acrimonious time during the last two years and it first woman to hold this was inevitable that she was now bearing Ooffice in the Federation’s 64 the brunt of most letters of criticism. It was years history. It is generally agreed, understandable that Reg, concerned for that this honour would have her health, eventually persuaded her that deservedly gone to the late Audrey enough was enough and so, she decided to Rhys-Tyler, who had served us for stand down. Her last major contribution many years but subsequently had to was largely organizing the artistically retire due to ill-health. successful Musical Weekend in Stratford in Our former Secretary Marjorie 2000 and will now at the Committee’s Williamson has also a long history of request, complete the planning for this association and activity within the year. Asked what she enjoyed most during recorded society movement, joining her term of Office, Marjorie unhesitating her first local Society at the tender responded “It was the enormous number age of fifteen. In that time, she has of friends I have made throughout the served with distinction as a senior movement, friendships which I hope will Officer on the two principal Societies in the continue”. Potteries. In 1994, having been retired as the Personal Secretary to the Headmaster of a large Derek Henderson (1923-2000) Public School, she was then asked to take on the role he recent death of Derek Henderson robs the of Hon. Secretary to the Federation, an Office that Federation of one of its most faithful had to some extent fallen into decline. Tsupporters, and a tireless society secretary — a With characteristic energy and enthusiasm, post he had held in Sunbury for the last forty three Marjorie set about re-building the office. She bought years. It would be interesting to learn if any other a computer and within a few months, was making officer can claim a longer, unbroken term of service. her mark on the activities of the Federation. Marjorie Derek had joined the Gramophone movement made it clear from the outset that she would be a in those far off idealistic years after the second world Secretary with a large S, not a small one; a war, when young ex-service men and women philosophy that did not always endear her with a tiny seemed anxious to broaden their horizons in their minority within the movement. Nevertheless, many newly found love of the arts. Incidentally, those who Societies soon learned to be grateful for her came to know Derek only in his later years were uncompromising readiness to tackle awkward always surprised to learn of his considerable record problems. This came to the fore when dealing with of bravery in the latter stages of the war: as a the emerging difficulties for a small number of navigator he took part in at least thirty-six Societies after the PRS began to flex its muscles dangerous bombing raids, yet survived without the following heavy criticism by a Parliamentary Select least injury. Committee. A retiring, shy bachelor, Derek found much Society secretaries soon found that letters would pleasure in his chosen composers, mainly of the invariably be answered in full within 24 hours and more revolutionary twentieth century kind — she was always accessible by ‘phone, or e-mail which nothing before Mahler! He also loved English music she introduced very early in her seven year term of and jazz, and listening to his CDs gave him solace in Office. There was one small hiatus not generally his last illness, when after a throat operation, he was known, for early in 1998, she had to face serious no longer able to speak. surgery. The work of the Secretariat continued He left behind a society (Sunbury Music Club) without interruption on a day-to-day basis, with Reg that is thriving and popular, with a full hall at every her husband acting as he put it, “secretary to the meeting. It is a tribute to his half century of devotion Secretary.” Five weeks after she came out of hospital, to the cause of good music. He will be missed by his she attended a Committee meeting and only later, friends in the Thames Valley, and those who knew did her very closest associates in the Committee him through his regular attendance at Federation become aware of what had happened. AGMs and Weekends. R.I.P. The Federation has had a very difficult and Peter L. Jones. Chairman, Sunbury Music Club

6 FRMS NEWS

From the Trea surer someone tripping over a speaker cable and suing the Society. I do counsel that all Societies now check hen it became known last year that payment carefully whether the decision to drop PL cover is of our insurance premium on our Public wise. If in doubt please contact me (address on p. WLiability Insurance was being consistently 36). Even meetings in private homes carries a risk delayed by anything up to three months, this rightly for which, insurance at little over 39p a week, can caused a great deal of concern to the extent that the bring peace of mind. It is not too late to take it out then Chairman John Gilks was so alarmed, he now. Because of my worries about this topic, I asked immediately paid it out of his own pocket. John Heyes who has joined the FRMS Committee This practice of late payment has now been and is a lawyer to comment on Public Liability stopped. All accounts, premiums for which we are insurance and an extract from his comments is responsible on your behalf, are paid punctually and quoted below. have all been met on the due date for the current Reg Williamson financial year. What now wor ries me, is that this level of dil i- Pub lic Li a bil ity gence and fiscal respon si bil ity does not ap pear to ex - agree that it is disturbing that affiliates are tend to a num ber of our affil i ates. On tak ing Of fice in dropping Public Liability cover. If they are No vem ber, I dis cov ered that no less than 40 have Idoing this as an economy measure then this is a failed to pay their af fil i ation fee. This was due at the false economy and most unwise. Of course, there end of Sep tem ber and about 20 had yet to pay for the may be other reasons. Some may be included in the ex tra Bul le tins or dered for the Au tumn is sue. cover taken by their meeting venue. Others may Sending out re mind ers imposes a great deal of work have made their own arrangements under policies and ex tra cost that we could all well do with out. I they may have taken out primarily for other forms of now have a whole list of reasons why the re-af fili a tion cover — public liability cover is often an add-on. appli cation has not been at tended to, the most com - The risk of a claim is very small especially in the mon be ing “we did n’t re ceive the form”. The form al - case of societies carrying on low-risk activities as our ways goes out with the pre-AGM in for mation from affiliates do. However, should a claim arise the the Sec re tary around Au gust time and I can per son - damages could be very high. Figures of over a ally testify that no So ciety was omit ted. Frankly, it million pounds are not uncommon these days. had just been put aside and ul ti mately lost so another Affiliates will almost all be unincorporated has to be sent. I do ask Sec re taries, please, ex amine all associations which means that they cannot escape that we send you. The other rea son is “we don’t liability by winding up and disbanding. If a know our mem bership for the forth coming year”. judgment is given against a society then the Our new agree ment with the PRS and what the Fed - members are each jointly and severally liable for the er ation pays it will be based on what your mem ber - whole amount and it this is high they could all face ship was for the past year. It follows that what it ruin. It is no good thinking it will never happen — might be is ir rel evant — un til the next year. in all probability it will not, but it just might and if it The most common reason for non-payment for does the consequences could be so appalling that the Bulletins is “We were waiting for the invoice”. This is small cost of cover is well worth while. always inside the label on the front of the package and It is important that the terms of the public since it also carries the Secretary’s address, then it liability cover should be extended to cover claims for must have arrived. It says quite distinctly injury and loss sustained by affiliates’ own members “Documents Enclosed”. I accept that ideally, it could who strictly speaking are not the public. The be sent separately but that is again, extra expens e. principle of joint and several liability means they Finally, something that is causing me some share the responsibility and so are on both sides of concern - that an increasing number of Societies are the fence. Affiliates making their own arrangements deciding not to take out Public Liability insurance. In should be aware of this. at least two examples, the reason given is that the John Heyes meeting venue owners have PL cover. It is dangerous to make this assumption and I would urge that any Pi ano Re cital by Jon a than Middle ton Society in this situation should see and study the ollowing our normal tradition, a recital was policy of the premises concerned. We live in litigious presented after our AGM. We were fortunate times, where a solicitor could take up a claim on a Fafter the Meeting at Durham to have a recital “No Win, No Fee” basis. One can easily imagine by the talented pianist, Jonathan Middleton.

FRMS 7 NEWS

Jonathan studied at the Royal Northern College Sec re tary s Notes of Music, Manchester, and was a prizewinner in the our Advice and Comment is needed. Readers prestigious BBC TV “Young Musician of the Year”. of the FRMS News Sheet issued in December He is especially noted for his playing of the music of Y2000 will recall that the Board (honouring an Liszt. undertaking given at the AGM) has embarked on a The programme got thorough review of the FRMS’s Constitution. off to a rousing start with The working party is making good progress but the Eroica Vari a tions Op it recognises that on some special topics it cannot be 35. This is based on the reasonably certain of reflecting Affiliate Societies hyp no tis ing theme from unless it has constructive comment from Societies Bee tho ven’s Pro me theus and their members. Ballet which is also used in It has been suggested that the Board could be the fi nale of the Eroica reduced in size (by one, two or three members?) in Sym phony. The vir tu oso order to increase efficiency and reduce piece was played with the administrative costs. On the other hand, one could ut most ex cite ment — the argue that sufficient ordinary members are vital to fi nal fugue was over - ask simple pene trat ing questions (shades of whelm ing in im pact. Kipling‘s “serving men”) to satisfy themselves, on This was followed by four pieces by Chopin affiliate societies behalf, that the officers are doing (Bolero Op 19; Scherzo No 1 Op 20; Nocturne Op what is desired and necessary to an acceptably high 62 No. 2). These covered a wide range of emotions standard. In the event of a smaller Board, would the and demonstrated Jonathan’s versatility and depth of officers find themselves compelled to co-opt help feel ing. Scriabin’s Sonata No 3 is an unusual work from affiliate societies instead of being able to call which is typical of the composer’s unique style and immediately on the services of other Board played here with skill and devotion. This is a piece members? Would co-option in this way be of long which probably needs several hearings to enable one term benefit to the Federation? No doubt you will to fully appreciate it. think of other arguments both for and against the The final piece was Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody proposal. No 6 — here the virtuosity and excitement was We want and need your constructive views on overwhelming and brought the house down. Overall this topic (and anything else to do with the a most thrilling recital by a young but enormously Constitution) as soon as practicable. We certainly talented artist. need to know your ideas as to the ideal number of AB ordinary members. Taking these comments into Clas sic Col lec tor account, we should then arrive at a consensus that has a good chance of being approved at a general any members use Classic Collector, which is meeting. Please write to me (as co-ordinator) at the a computer cataloguing programme which address on the back page. Mis specially designed for cataloguing Peter Lerew classical music collections. This programme was reviewed in the Bulletin several years ago. The latest version Classic Collector2000(Rv 2p)incorporates To many improvements and for people with Internet facilities may be updated through the Elk Software Who is this Website at:- man? Where can http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/lion_ you find out more elk/Elk7CcSt.htm about him? For answers New users may ob tain a trial version free of to these questions charge from the same source or on three disks from please see page Elk Soft ware, 8 High Laws, Newcas tle upon Tyne 18. NE3 1RQ, ; in the lat ter case enclose £3.00. A registration fee of £42.00 is charged for the final programme.

8 FRMS LETTERS LETTERS LETTERS Sir John Barbirolli be forthcoming whatever the programme. Not it seems for the compositions I have in mind. An Thank you for the FRMS Bulletin which, as a example is to be found in Rachmaninov’s symphony new Secretary (Devizes RMS) I received this No 2. When I first heard this in the early 1970’s it morning and, though getting ready to visit friends in had been neglected. Now it has become an almost Poole today, I could not resist reading over breakfast! hackneyed piece with its repeated performances. (I got up very early!) I found it a very good read and, It would be interesting to hear whether any of as time is today of the essence, I have left quite a lot of the following are ever played at associate’s music articles to read on my return. Something to look evenings:- forward to — if you’ll excuse my grammar! Dohnanyi Symphony 2; Glazunov Symphony However, I must point out an inaccuracy in your 5; Lachner Symphony1; Lloyd Symphony12; Raff article about John Barbirolli — in which you state Symphony 5; Anton Rubinstein Symphony 2 (The that Sir John died 40 years ago. He died, in fact, 30 Ocean); Scriabin Symphony1; Scharwenka Piano years ago — on 29th July, 1970 — and I enclose a Concerto 4; Stanford Symphony 6; Stravinsky photocopy of the moving “In Memoriam” leaflet Symphony1; and Taniev Symphony 4. which I, and hundreds of other concert-goers, Brian R. Smith, Croydon R.M.S. received on attending the first concert (I think it must have been) of the Season of Bradford Res ig na tion of Chair man Subscription Concerts — at which the Halle Orchestra played — following the Maestro’s sad The members of this Society, strongly object to a passing. I was a “regular” at Bradford in the mid-late statement in the News Feature on page 5 of the Bul - 60’s and have treasured memories of hearing (and letin, Is sue No. 133. seeing) Sir John in action; he was truly remarkable. In the column headed “Chairman Resigns” you Even his arms describing wide arcs and even circles, print... “I know that his own secretary at Kirkcaldy hair flying in all directions. It was at one of his ‘phoned the Thurso Society in the hope that they concerts in Bradford where I was privileged to see would reverse their intention to attend”. This is and hear Jacqueline du Pré — in the Elgar Cello totally unfounded and untrue. The truth of the Concerto — but that’s another story and I must matter is in Mac Cameron’s letter to John Gilks NOT miss my bus!!! dated 10 August 2000, of which we have a copy. We Sir John Barbirolli died 30 years ago in July suggest you ask Mr. Gilks to let you have a copy! 1970, and we who were privileged to see him The Kirkcaldy Recorded Music Society perform and to hear the results, will never forget demands a retraction of this statement and, in him! addition, an apology for printing it — both to be Thanks again for “The Bulletin”. published in the next issue of the Bulletin. Mrs Pauline St John Osland President and Secretary, Kirkcaldy RMS . Missing from the ‘Proms’ Ed i tor: Mr Gilks has shown me a copy of the let ter from Mac Cameron from which it is clear that a misun der- Each year I eagerly await the publication of the standing had arisen during the con versa tion between “Proms” prospectus but am invariably disappointed the two of them. Ac cord ingly, I retract this state ment at its contents. Last year was no exception. I am with out reser va tion. However I still believe it was cor - continually longing for the day when some of the rect for the Bul le tin to re print in good faith ex tracts compositions I love are included. I realise that my from the res ig na tion let ter of the FRMS Chair man. selections consist of music that is comparatively unknown as well as the composers but I feel they So ci eties And Pro gramming deserve recognition. After reading the outspoken comments and Of course concert programmes have to contain opinion expressed by correspondents (Autumn music that is well know or they are unlikely to entice FRMS Bulletin) on how they thought recorded an audience of sufficient proportions to make it music programmes should be presented, I feel financially viable. Promenade concerts I thought prompted to support the style of the Rochdale were an exception, whereby a large patronage would

FRMS 9 LETTERS

Society, which seems to have created the discussion. The first three programmes of the Bramhall Re- The Rotherham Recorded Music Society was corded Mu sic Soci ety for 2001 are enti tled “From formed in 1947 – nearly fifty four years ago, by a the Re cord Libra ry”, “H.M.H.” and “Pick-n-Mix”. small group of professional people, predominantly These do not of course give much in di cation of the doctors and bankers, and since that time has content of the programmes! For tu nately, the mem- continued successfully. We now have a cross section bers are not as selfish or arro gant as your corre spon - of committed members from many walks of life. dent Da vid Bury, from the Wallington/ Carshalton Operating a similar system to that of our friends Soci ety, whose let ter under this ti tle was published in Rochdale, our annual programme of member in the Sep tem ber 2000 is sue of the Bul letin. presenters is prepared at the commencement of each Yes, we all have our likes and dislikes. Yes, we year beginning in September. All our programmes know that some members can present better are well researched and are of a very high standard programmes than others. However, we all go along with a varied content. The fact that we are unaware of in a spirit of friendship, with open minds and open individual programme details always leaves an ears, to have an enjoyable evening. We also find that element of anticipation, not a negative situation of we learn a lot, sometimes from unexpected sources! non-at ten dance because it is considered not worth Mr Bury’s sentence “There is a large body of the risk of giving ones time to listen to music which music which experience has shown is not for me and may not match the standard or choice considered I would wish to be warned so as to be enabled to desirable. What delights could be missed by such a avoid it” makes me wonder why he is a member of limited perspective of music. an RMS at all! We are reassured that our approach is right for us. Whilst we all should strive for high quality in our Our membership has consistently been maintained, programmes, we need to have the right attitude along with attracting new members. Having a towards the efforts of our fellow-members if the limited budget is an important factor before RMS movement is to survive. considering inviting specialist speakers. We have William Hall, Bramhall RMS. however, successfully exchanged visits with another Recorded Music Society, which we plan to repeat. They also have a similar approach to our programme planning. Friendly discussion on the programmes and presentations occur regularly at our meetings, clearly with no desire to change our present JULIAN WILLIAMSON arrangements. It would be interesting to know how many more societies have a programme similarity to Presentations to Music Clubs ours. throughout the UK Musical appreciation within a leisure based organisation of which we all are part, represents different things for different people. To write disparagingly about fellow music societies, and topics for 2001 include : trivialising some forms of music, in order to promote what appears to me, intellectual elitism is not The Magic of Verdi required. I believe that in itself, is not in the best Beethoven at the Crossroads interest of partnership, and can only serve as a How dare he say that? discouragement to those who may just be beginning Who was Salieri? to venture into the world of music appreciation. Mu sic is a univer sal language which should allow the free dom for each to ex plore, study and ab sorb, in For further on these or other subjects, a way which suits indi vid ual needs and tastes. and on fees charged, contact me at As a successful Recorded Music Society, we do not see any reason to have that image erased by 18 Balfour Avenue, individuals or organisations who choose to have a Hanwell, different point of view, which are often an intrusion London W7 3HS into the true value and enjoyment which music has to offer. T el : 020 8579 5643 J. Ewart Brittain. Chairman, Rotherham RMS.

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I should like to take issue with Messrs Bury and ing from from the text of the SGM minutes and Davies (Issue 133) who ap parently cannot tol erate other seri ous omissions were ap parent. It is sad to so ciety programmes which, in their opin ion, are not report that even when the omissions were brought suf fi ciently well-com piled and pre sented to “ed u cate, to the at ten tion of the AGM, there con tin ued to be chal lenge, stim u late, in form and en ter tain”. de ni als from one or two in di vid u als. Whilst I agree that a properly researched and The pil lo rying of Mr Hamil ton whom I know to professionally introduced programme can be both be a good,hon est and active Chris tian man contin ued informative and entertaining, surely it is not the with an at tempt to move a motion against Mr Hamil - primary role of the recorded music society to act as an ton which con tained the words ”se ri ous ir reg u lar i- educational establishment. Instead we should be ties”. This given Mr Hamil ton po si tion sug gested encouraging all lovers of ‘seri ous’ recorded music to dis hon esty, con firmed by tele phone calls I re ceived share their interest with others of like mind in the ask ing that very ques tion. The motion was appall ing (hopefully) convivial atmosphere of a club or society and was rightly thrown out by the dele gates . meeting room. It follows that poor or inexperienced The huge loss of £7000 on the musi cal weekend speakers should not be spurned. in April 2000 contin ues to be a major concern. The A member who prefers to play “a few of my com mit ment to a min i mum num ber of res i den tial favourite things” in the hope that he or she has del egates was ut ter folly so please, please no more of included something for everyone to enjoy, is just as that. valid as one offering a themed presentation As many of you know, a number of us concerned supported by copious background notes. I suggest about the way the Fed er ation was be ing run formed that those wishing to study music and/or the lives of a group called “ Save the FRMS”. It was therefore a composers would be better served by attending an great plea sure to see two of our group elected, adult education class in their chosen subject. namely Allan Child as Chair man and Patrick Rus sell Roger Taylor, Hon. Treasurer, Uplands (Guildford) as a com mit tee mem ber. I just hope and pray that RMS. common sense will now return to the Fed era tion. The Bul le tin Gordon Wainwright. Wolverhampton As I am renew ing my sub scription for the FRMS Bul letin, I thought I would add a few lines of appre ci- ation for the ‘new look’ Bul letin of the last few is sues. I find it very in ter est ing and I of fer my con grat u - lations to you and your con tri bu tors. I write as chair - man of the Ightham and Dis trict RMS, this is one of the small est af fil i ates and we are from a small Kent ish Vil lage. We are how ever one of the last of the lo cal asso cia tions still ex tant in the vil lage, and we are very proud of our con tin ued ex istence. Frances Parfitt, An nual Gen eral Meet ing As one of the rel atively few del egates who man- aged to attend the AGM at Durham, despite the ad - verse weather condi tions, I would wish to share with folk some of the con cerns ex pressed at that meet ing. In my con sid er able ex pe ri ence of at tend ing meet - ings in a pro fessional and volun tary capac ity, it is un - prec edented for a meet ing to re cord that the min utes of a pre vi ous meet ing, namely the min utes of the FRMS SGM held on the 6th May 2000 in Birming - ham were NOT a true record (slight amendments not with stand ing). Much of the con cern cen tred on the previ ous FRMS Treasurer Mr Chris Hamil ton. The vital words “ re stored to full working powers” were miss-

FRMS 11 FEATURES

FEATURES... FEATURES...FEATURES... RAILWAYS IN MUSIC usic is a social and artistic activity of the first and there was no reg u lar bandmas ter or musi cal di- importance. Railways, in the modern sense, rector. However in 1856 a fresh start was made with Mhave been with us for some 170 years and a Doncaster Plant Work’s Band, again a brass en- for maybe half that time they were THE major form sem ble, that was con ducted by George Birkinshaw of long-haul transportation by land. They have now (father of a simi larly named leading cor net player perhaps lost their primacy in that respect but they with the world famous Black Dyke Mills Band). remain important. It is hardly surprising that This band won many prizes in com pe ti tions be - railways and music should have been associated for tween 1859 and 1861, some of them held in practically all of that 170-odd years. Doncaster. The Band played concerts, too, in One or two fami lies have had connec tion with Doncaster, in and out of doors, not in frequently fea- both. Sir Al ex an der Butterworth, of the North East- tur ing com po si tions, mainly marches and dances, ern Rail way, was the father of the com poser George and ar range ments by Birkinshaw him self. Butterworth killed on the When the Plant Works West ern Front in 1916 aged formed its own Vol un teer 31 and still re membered as a Company in 1859 follow ing a minor master of the “Eng lish war scare with France, its band folk song” school. Sir Ralph be came a “mili tary band” in

Wedgewood of the LNER NIIES E C o one sense, as it was re-styled was related to Ralph Doncaster Vol un teer Band, al- Vaughan Wil liams. And though in mu si cal for ma tion it there are doubt less other ex - remained a brass band. am ples. Birkinshaw left Doncaster in Dozens, in deed hun dreds 1865 but the Vol un teer Band (I mention over 500) of musi cal compo sitions have sub se quently flour ished un der band mas ters J. Red- featured the railway and this is ba sically what this pa - fern and S. Wilson un til the vol un teers were ab- per is about. But as a kind of overture it may be worth sorbed into the 5th KOYLI under the Haldane re call ing that rail way men have them selves made mu - reforms in 1908. sic, in the same way that throughout recorded history By 1860 there ex isted a GNR Glee and Mad ri gal work ing men in all indus tries have done so. So ci ety based at King’s Cross, and ac tive in char ity If I fo cus my ob ser vations in this di rec tion on my and other con certs. Mexborough, near Doncaster, home town of Doncaster, this is not to im ply that had a railway works (Manches ter-Shef field and sim ilar activ ities did not take place on railways other Lincolnshire Rail way, later Great Central) also than the Great North ern and later on the LNER, es - called the Plant and this, too, had a band, or bands, pecially at Crewe and Swindon. Doncaster’s GNR and in the 1860s, refounded in the 1880s and still “plant” works opened in 1853, it is gen erally under - extant in the nineties. stood, though my resea rches suggest that parts of it Over the past cen tury and half, if not for longer, were oper a tional by the last two months of 1852. At brass bands have been one of the three ways in Christ mas 1852 a Doncaster Loco Band played which work ing men have tra di tion ally made mu sic. hymns around the town; this had been formed in The other two were hand-bell ring ing and male June that year and £350 spent on in stru ments. It cel - voice choirs. Doncaster’s railway men have indulged ebrated its an niver sary on 28 June 1853 with a sup - in both this century. The choir and ring ers — called per at which 66 persons were present. On 5 June “The Clangers” (they did not drop many!) — both 1854 it accom pa nied the Plant school chil dren on an existed until quite re cently, but the choir’s great days ex cur sion to Askern Spa on the oc casion of the laying were during the LNER era between the wars, when of the foun dation stone of the Plant Schools. This at times it com bined with other LNER choirs in a band soon faded out; its or ganisa tion was infor mal major concert, sometimes held at Doncaster Corn

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Ex change, when it was THE concert of the town’s But now to the mu sic in spired by the rail way. musi cal calen dar, at other times in Lon don. Ini tially, and indeed at most pe riods since, this has Oc ca sionally Leslie Wood gate, Di rec tor of Mu sic been mostly pop u lar in charac ter Broad side ballads, to the LNER and a big fig ure in broad cast mu sic, like New castle and Carlisle Railway (ca. 1835) and con ducted them. Wood gate com posed mu sic for the Battle on the Shields Rail way (1834) were sung to LNER, as did St Paul’s Ca the dral or gan ist, Stan ley folk tunes. Pos si bly the ear li est ti tle I have un earthed Marchant (1883-1949), Chudley Cardish, him self a so far is the rather simi lar ballad Johnny Green’s Trip railway man and composer of the pop u lar choral to ‘Owdam to see the Liv er pool Railway which is, of num ber The Song of the Jolly Roger, and Dr. Coleman course, the Liv er pool & Man ches ter Rail way of the Peterborough LNER So ciety. In much the opened in 1830. same way Sebastian Meyer, As- In 1831 Doncaster’s Thea - sis tant Gen eral Manager of the tre Royal stage a pan to mime Hull & Barnsley wrote A Hol i - with music enti tled The day Rem i nis cence for that Rail- Rail-Road (composer un - way’s Cho ral As so ci a tion in known). A Char ac ter istic 1887 and, perhaps, rather more Rondo for piano solo, also nota bly, the cantata for men’s c.1830, conveys the char acter - voices Men on the Line was com- is tic rhythm of the steam blast; posed for the Great East ern the sheet mu sic cover car ries a Railway by Hubert Bath, later pic ture of the Sankey Viaduct to earn fame with his Cornish on the Liv erpool & Manches - Rhap sody. ter Rail way and the mu sic ap - The Doncaster LNER Mu si cal So ci ety’s con duc - parently rep resents a jour ney on that line. By tors dur ing the pe riod 1925-40 were H.A. Bennett contrast William Wilkes’ Qua drille of around 1840 (1925-30) and Percy Saunders (1930-40), both of has no es pe cial railway col our in the mu sic de spite them succes sively organ ists of Doncaster Parish the cover pic ture, of Wolverton Viaduct on the Lon - Church and both later to become cathe dral or gan ists. don & Bir ming ham Rail way (later LNWR). It was Bennett who insiste d that the Doncaster Soci - One very early ti tle, a song per formed at the ety alone among the LNER’s pro vin cial so ci et ies, Vauxhall Gar dens in even 1830, is Rail ways Now Are formed an orches tra in addi tion to a male voice choir. All the Go With Steam, Steam, Steam. Rather later is a This was to be come the town’s lead ing or ches tral en- Rail way Gal lop (sic), by an un spec ified com poser, semble dur ing the 1930s. Un der Saunders, who also which en livened a concert at Ellis’s Mu sic Hall, composed, though not for Doncaster’s rail waymen, Worksop on 24 Feb ru ary 1847 and which, accord - the LNER So ci ety di ver si fied its am a teur operatics, ing to the Doncaster Ga zette of 5 March 1847, was basi cally Gilbert & Sullivan. “a highly amus ing piece played in a mas terly style by The Doncaster rail way re vived only briefly af ter the or ches tra which elic ited con sid er able ap plause”. the Sec ond War, in around 1950, under one John On 31 May that same year the New Orleans Ethio - Craven. Since around 1910 Doncaster has had no pian Sere naders came to Doncaster’s Theatre Royal, spe cifi cally railway brass band but no ta ble bands with con clud ing their show with “the cele brated Rail road railway connec tions else where in Eng land have in- Over ture”. (Railroad to us usu ally implies a Transat - cluded Leeds Rail way Foundry, which flour ished in lan tic piece, but as we have seen this was not always the 1850s, Harwich Rail way men’s In sti tute, win ners the case and as late as 1890 Doncaster heard sung in of the Brit ish Open Champi onship in 1915 and con cert A Ri val Rail road Ride, composed by one 1916, and York Railway Insti tute which I remem ber King, forename unknown. This may possi bly have hearing in the early 1970s and which I be lieve still ex- been an Ameri can song but the artists this time were ists. Brit ish.) Bands, whether spe cifi cally railway ones or not, James Briton’s Rail way Ma nia, a music-hall type were prom i nent in the early days of railways. One song, appeared appro pri ately in 1846, at the height was usu ally present, often to play Handel’s See the of the Mania of the 1840s. Con quering Hero, when a line was opened and one of- Since 1830, then, an enormous num ber of rail- ten ac com pa nied early rail way ex cur sions, in clud ing way pieces have flowed from com pos ers’ pens on Thomas Cook’s famous out ing in 1840 from both sides of the At lantic, both songs and — mainly Loughborough to Leicester, even Sunday School light or pop u lar — in stru men tal or or ches tral pieces. “days out”. First, here are a few (there were surely many

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more) in stru men tal move ments from Amer ica: the 5.15 (1914), On the 5.45, I’ve Been Working on a Gustave A. Scott, Pa cific Rail road Polka (1862), Rail road, Alabamy Bound as so ci ated with Al Jolson Frank Dibble, Pen in sula Rail way [not Railroad?] but later re vived, Rail road Bill, Rail road Cars are March (1871), E. Mock, Pull man Car (Sun beams) Com ing, W.C. Hardy’s The Yellow Dog Rag, Billy (1872), Charles J. Richter, Rail road Ga lop (1872), Ternant’s I Like Riding on a Choo-Choo, the rather sa- the anon y mous Snowed-in Ga lop (1872), C. tir i cal 2.15 by none other than the “March King” Dunheller, Iron Moun tain Railroad (1873), Simon A. John Philip Sousa, The Train is a-coming , Henry Hassler, Rail road Ga lop (1874), J.N. Goodman, Mar shall’s Oh Mr Railroad Man, Won’t You Take CB&Q [Chi cago, Burlington & Quincy] Rail road Me back to Ala bama? (1914), The Atchinson To peka (1876), M.B. Clark, and Santa Fe, Pull man Light ning Plea sure Train Por ter’s Pa rade, Un ion (1877), Clara Hickman, Train, Last Train to San The Junc tion Rail way Fernando (1957) asso - (1877), John Jo seph, ciated with Johnny New York El e vated Rail - Duncan, Shuffle Off to road Galop (1879), E. Buf falo, Drill Ye Tan - Eberhard, Frank lin Av e - ners Drill, Tim ber Line nue Rail road Galop (1931), Down by the (1883), Clarence J. Rail road, Wallace Sargent, Cen tral Ver - Cham ber’s Hold Dat mont Rail road Grand Train! (1919), Harry March (1883), The 2.19 Blues (early 1900s), J. Hoyt Partch’s U.S. High ball, The Run away Train, Two Toler, Up Broadway (1900) and Harry J. Lincoln’s Tickets to Georgia and another Al Jolson, Toot Toot march two-step Sun set Limited (1910). Tootsie. The early Ameri can railroad-fla voured songs are Of the instru mental pieces with train titles per- now adays largely forgot ten, but here is a group of ti - haps the leader is Glenn Miller with Chat ta nooga tles: F.L. Martyn, Stand ing on the Plat form (1870); Choo Choo, Tux edo Junc tion, Sleepy Town Train and Henry G. Work [best known for his Grand father’s Slow Freight, all of them well known, espe cially the Clock], Con ti nen tal Rail road Cho rus, Cross ing the first two, in big band or ches tra tions, though one or Grand Si erras, for solo ists, cho rus and pi ano duet two have ap peared in other ver sions, even one for (1870); George D. Ches ter, The Rail road Ac ci dent at re corder con sort, ap pro pri ately so be cause massed Richmon d Switch, Rhode Islan d ( 1873); T. record ers do sound a bit like an Amer ican train Stephenson, The Gospel Rail road (1873); a chorus by whis tle! one Diethelm, The Pat ent Railway Punch (1874); Moving on from Glenn Miller other ti tles are Sam Devere’s Riding on the El evated Railroad (1878) Choo-Choo Ser e nade by B.P. Godinho from 1951, and T.B. Kelly’s sim ilarly titled song of 1879; W.S. Little Rootie Tootie and Lo co mo tive (1954) both as so - Mullaby, The Rail road Con duc tors (1881); Gussie ci ated with the jazz pi anist Thelonious Monk, Trixie Da vis’s In the Baggage- coach Ahead (1895); Max Smith’s Rail road Blues, The Children Met the Train Drefu, At the Sound of the Sig nal Bell (1898); Lucy by Alec Wilder (1907-80), Choo Choo Choo Boo gie, Schief, Does This Rail road Lead to Heaven? (1902); Sil ver Streak by Henry Mancini, Bea ver Junc tion, Char lie Tillman, The Railroad Song (1906); Ed 9.20 Special, Super-chef, the Count Basie num ber Bimbert, The Railroad Rag (1911); Leo Ed wards, Rails, the very pop u lar Duke Ellington stan dards There’s Lots of Sta tions on my Rail road Track (1912) Choo Choo (1924), Day break Ex press, Across the and Clay Smith, Rag time En gi neer (1912). Track Blues (1940), Build the Railroad (1950), Moving a little, we may now list a number of Honky Tonky Train Blues, Happy Go Lucky Loco Ameri can song ti tles, many of which come from gen- (1953) and Track 360 (Trains) (1958), Stan erally later peri ods, some of which were later incor - Kenton’s Lone some Train, Os car Pe ter son’s Night po rated into films and not a few became known in Train, Steel Rail Blues and Take the A Train, Burt instru mental versions or were conceived for instru - Bacharach’s Trains and Boats and Planes from the ments from the start. There are the very pop u lar 1960s and Six Five Spe cial (Bob Cost). She’ll Be Coming Round the Mountain and the pos - To be contin ued si bly even more fa mous and of ten re vived Casey Jones Philip Scowcroft which may date from 1909. To these we may add On

14 FRMS FEATURES MINIDISCS MiniDisc recorder/player will do what a You might won der how the MiniDisc man ages to cassette machine will do except that it does it have as long a play ing time as CD yet is so small. This Adigitally instead of analogue. The Disc is a is achieved by a cun ning piece of dig i tal pro cess ing. small aluminium disc in a plastic container As much as 80% of the re cording is discarded with- approximately 70mm square by 5mm thick. A sliding out the hu man ear notic ing, largely due to the ‘mask - cover, opens automatically when the disc is ing ef fect’ where two frequen cies close pushed into the machine, protects the to gether but differ ing in volume cannot be recording area from dust and sticky fingers de tected, only the louder one be ing au di - etc. Up to 75 minutes of sound can be ble. It makes no dif fer ence if the less loud recorded. This is the same length as a one is omit ted from the re cord ing. The recordable CD although commercial CDs, main practi cal disad van tage of this system nowadays with careful manufacturing, get is that it is not rec om mended for re cord ing up to 8o minutes. digi tal radio. In dex points and titles can be added later On a purely aural compar i son, even on or while record ing as required. Just as with cassette, high qual ity equip ment, few peo ple can tell the dif - the MiniDisc can be used over and over again but ference between MiniDisc and CD. Be ing a re cord - with the ad van tage that ed it ing fa cil i ties are quite able me dium makes the MiniDisc a very ver sa tile com pre hen sive ie. tracks can be moved, di vided or addi tion to any one’s hi-fl sys tem. For all practi cal de leted and new track num bers as signed. The re cord - pur poses it be haves like a re cord able CD and is ing is made and played back (read) by a la ser and is played just like a CD. not vul nera ble like cassette to dam age and wear. Dennis Bostock, FRMS Technical Officer

Historical Concepts -part 2 he critic and artist interviewer Bill Newman Eng lish Song Al bum takes me back to the 1960s continues his personal recommendations of when I was busy at Abbey Road Studios equaliz ing Trecordings dedicated to musicians who apply re cord ings of Brit ish sing ers for HMV’s Golden faith and truth beyond the printed score. Voice Se ries. Dig i tal re mas ter ing for CD is far eas - ier! Purcell, Arne, Butterworth and Quilter form an Op era & Song. at trac tive se lec tion, and sing ers Astra Desmond, Bellini’s Norma , one of the great John Heddle Nash, Richard Lewis, tragi-op eras of the early roman tic John Cameron, Gwen Catley, Alfred era, has al ways of fered a chal lenge to “mu si cians who ap ply Piccaver, Walter Midgely and Owen leading di vas. In the 20th Cen tury, faith and truth beyond Brannigan pro vide nos tal gia, sad ness Callas, Milanoy, Gencer, Suther land the printed score” and beauty to melo dies that con jure and Caballé‚ have all enjoyed suc cess up memo ries of our glo rious land - in the star ring role, but none, in my scape (Dutton CDLX 7104). opin ion, combine that mix ture of grief, malice, jeal- Mention Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov and ously, passion , and the right to fight her cause to the Feodor Chaliapin and Boris Christoff come bitter end than Gina Cigna, who studied with Calvé‚ immediately to mind. There is still another whose and Storchio. Re cently I read a few rude com ments portrayal I prefer even more. Mark Reizen’s voice — about the lady’s ‘shout ing’ and ‘screaming’ — she was a cross between burnished bronze and molten gold highly self-criti cal throughout her career — and the — gives sardonic, brutal reality to his mock-belief ‘hack’ con duct ing of Fausto Cleva — he di rected 677 power over the people, outpouring his emotional per for mances for the New York Met ro pol i tan. Ig - feelings to his son. The terrifying fantasies that lead noring the frustrated reviewer, I relished being swept to the death scene, are based on the famous 1948 off my feet by its white hot in ten sity, the au di ence Bolshoi Theatre production with the strongest of go ing wild with en thu siasm on the night in 1937. casts: Georgy Nelepp as Grigory the Pretender, (Arkadia 2CD 50006, distr. Target Re cords). Maria Maksakova as Princess Marina and the

FRMS 15 FEATURES

incomparable Ivan Kozlosky as the Simpleton. Kempe follow ing up with fur ther successes at Golovanov directs. (Lyrica O1092-2, 2 discs, Italian Covent Gar den. The 14CDs made in Ger many are import; leading stores). available on Audio phile Classics (APL 101,755/ Royal Op era House, Covent Gar den re lays with 101.841/101.842/101.843, distr. Parsifal). inter national casts continue to ap pear on the market. In 1955, Renata Tebaldi, Ferruccio Tagliavini and In stru men tal. Tito Gobbi starred in Puc cini’s Tosca , perhaps the Dame Myra Hess , well-loved fig ure dur ing the best-bal anced perfor mance of a glori ous era — al- war years with her National Gallery Concerts, is re- though Milanov and Callas are still viv idly re mem- membered for her calm dig nity on the con cert plat - bered. Molinari-Pradelli di rects. (Legato Clas sics form, her white hand ker chief care fully placed in the LCD157-2 - 2 discs, distr.Parsifal). cor ner of the pi ano’s soundboard. Com mercial re- I re turn to the New York Met for the 1949 ap - cord ings are all too few, so a double welcome to pear ance of Czech art ist Jarmila Novotna as Violetta Bee tho ven Prom con certs with the im mac u late Sir in Verdi’s La Traviata. Here, badly-stored long play Malcolm Sargent direct ing the BBC Sym phony Or - transcrip tions — pre-dating recorded tape — are ches tra. Her re gal pres ence in the ‘Emperor’ Con - amazingly restored. Well worth the effort. Novotna certo, p.1957 is unique. Sweeping, dramatic arpeg - — invited to the States by Toscanini in 1938 — had a gios in the in tro duc tion set the whole tone of the complete grasp of the role, like Ponselle be fore her, per for mance that fol lows, lyr i cal, high spir ited turns Callas latterly. There is no clinging sen ti mental ity of phrase con trast ing with fierce, im pe ri al ist out - sur round ing Violetta’s fa tal illness; one senses the bursts, e.g. note the erup tion of oc taves half way proud trage di enne spotlit in an aura of make believe, through the open ing movement and the mag ical compel ling you to hang on to ev ery phrase, enact ing Compiled by Brendan Sadler her part in the face of misplaced love and wrongful COMPOSERS - Born [b]; Died [d] ad vice. The young Jan Peerce and won der ful Law- rence Tibbett portray the two Germonts, Ettore 14 02 1602 Cavalli, Pietro It. comp.d Panizza di rects (Myto 2 MCD 933.80 2 discs/ ? 08 1677 Lock, Mathew Eng. comp. d 23 01 1752 Clementi, Muzio It. comp/pia nist d Parsifal). Finally, two Wagner ‘Ring’ cy cles — the first based on a se ries of con cert per for mances, Vi enna, 1948. Rudolf Moralt was in charge and Fürtwängler, in the au di ence and amazed at hear ing the young Günther Treptow (Siegmund/Siegfried) for the first time, complained in a rage: ‘Why haven’t I been in - 21 East Bond Street, Leicester. Le1 4SX formed. He should be in MY cy cle!’ The cast in cludes Hilde Konetzni, Helena Braun, Ferdinand Frantz, Specialists in Ro sette Andav, and in Siegfried/ Götterdämerung a singer hith erto un known to me as Brünnhilde — CLASSICAL MUSIC Ger trude Grob Prandl, described as proba bly the most gleaming, most vir tu oso of the post-war era — Compact Discs - DVDs the world has heard nothing like her since. Midway Hundreds of Bargains be tween Flagstad and Nilsson in prowess, her pitch is Special Offers available spot on! Das Rheingold (Myto 2 MCD 962.144), Die Wälkure (3 MCD 971.152), Siegfried (3 MCD972.155), Götterdämmerung (4 MCD973. GREAT PIANISTS OF THE 20th CENTURY 159); from leading stores. Rudolf Kempe’s live Ring from the Bayreuth Fes - 2CDs for £9.99 ti val, 1960 was cer tainly the ear li est lyr i cal re al iza tion While stocks last of Wagner’s or ches tral score to be re layed by the BBC Third Programme. Fresh singers were mak ing We shall be at Stratford upon Avon in April their mark on the in ter national cir cuit: Hermann Uhde, Thomas Stewart, Gerhard Stolze, Otakar Email:classictracks@lineone Kraus, Wolfgang Windgassen, Gottlob Frick, Phone(0116) 2537700 Jerome Hines, Aase Nordmo-Loeberg, Astrid Varnay, Herta Topper, Hans Hopf, Birgit Nilsson,

16 FRMS FEATURES

Her bubbling, high spirits make for a sparkling with Maazel is spe cial. (Music & Arts CD-972 (4), read ing. (BBCL Music 4028-2). distr. Har mo nia Mundi). Noel Mewton-Wood , who com mit ted sui cide in Af ter Lionel Tertis, no one did more for spread- 1953 is remem bered as the fin est com monwealth pi - ing in ter est in the vi ola than William Primrose. anist of the last cen tury. I still have memo ries of his On-go ing series of past re cordings features a new great Bliss Con certo at the Royal Fes ti val Hall. Lis - CD: a Handel Con certo (in re ality a pastiche by tening again to the Bee tho ven Fourth and Schumann Henri Casadesus), a W. F. Bach Sonata (now identi - Con certos di rected by Wal ter Goehr — his regu lar fied as a m.s. by Graun) a work by Amer i can Roy part ner — I noted the sim ilar ity to Clara Haskil. He Harris, and four de light ful pieces by Ar thur stroked the keys to dis cover sono rous beauties, and Benjamin (Biddulph LAB146). I enjoyed Tully Pot - how nat u ral were his concep tions, the pac ing un hur - ter’s notes, equally. ried, with real know-how for transform ing poetic Julian Sitkovetsky died of lung can cer at the age rhet o ric into gran di ose ges tures. (Dante HPC 106). of 32 in 1958. His work is carried on to day by his son These very special gifts also belonged to vi olin ist Na - Dmitri. There re mains lit tle on re cord, but it is quite than Milstein. Here, a large white hand ker chief cush - ev i dent that he be longed in the same league as ioned the in stru ment’s chin sup port — his up right Oistrakh, Kogan and Menuhin as a mas ter of the vi o - stance the per fect pic ture of the com mand ing vir tu - lin. At 8, he played for Thibaud, won honours at the oso. Outsid e commer cial record ing s — sometimes All So viet Un ion Young Per formers Com pe ti tion, too aus tere in their pre cision — concert per for- be gin ning his ca reer co in ci den tally with mances have a more hu man aspect — Con certos by Rostropovich and Rich ter in 1945. His compa tri ots Mozart (2 of No.4, 1 of 5), Bruch (No.1), Dvorak, can not even em u late his mu si cal /tech ni cal ex per tise Brahms, Goldmark, Prokofiev, Beetho ven; Paganini in the Glazunov and Khachaturian Concertos (3 Caprices), and his be loved Bach. They in clude (Kondrashin/Niyazi, 1952/4), where pitch, pulse, part ner ships with Albin, Kletzki, Monteux, Walter, clarity of sing ing tone and en semble shine through Schuricht, Ansermet, but the Bee tho ven Con certo every bar. (Russian Disc RD CD 15 009, Koch). To be contin ued

Four Hands Music

FRMS 17 MISCELLANY

OPERA Who are these Cool - looking people? (after Ogden Nash) See box at bottom of this page. While some enter tainments are not consid ered proper, oth ers are deemed much properer, And the properest of all is undoubt edly op era. But I can never re mem ber whether we are see ing La Traviata or Il Trovatore, And what ever it is, I can not make any sense of the story.

Be cause in op era they all dress up as each other, So the Count ends up con fus ing his girl-friend with his mother Despite the fact that the latter is much larger than the for mer, and sings bass, But she is hold ing a piece of card board with two eye holes in front of her face, Mendels sohn And in the world of op era this counts as an ad e- quate disguise. Mendels sohn is a gen erous high-minded crea- ture, but, to descend from these heights, he was Also, there is the fact that ev ery body sings very dressed very badly, and looked in sad want of a piece health ily for a long time of soap and the nail brush which I have so of ten when he or she dies. threat ened to of fer him, Oh dear, Oh dear And fur ther more, when you get two young lov ers Fanny Horsley like Tristan and Isolde, (Letter to Lucy Callcott They are both forty pounds heavier than you ex - July 7, 1833 pect, and fifty years older.

So please do not at tempt to take me to Figaro or En joying Mu sic Lu cia di Lammermoor: To know whether you are en joying a piece of I would rel ish sit ting in a swamp being hit on the music or not you must see whether you find yourself head with a ham mer more. look ing at the the adver tise ment of ‘Pears’ soap at I hope you en joy your eve ning at La Bohème or the the end of the programme. Magic Flute or Carmen. Samuel Butler Speaking for myself, I plan to renew acquain tance (Note Books) with several barmen. Michael Swan Re printed from the Spec ta tor, with per mis sion.

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18 FRMS FEATURES Some Notable Anniversaries for 2002 27 01 1802 Zumsteeg, Johann Ger. Comp. d 26 03 1827 Beetho ven, Ludwig v. Ger. comp/pia nist d ? 1827 Hook, James Eng. comp./org. D - sic ni y 29 01 1852 Cow an, Freder ick Eng. comp. b Mu n ar A rs 12 11 1852 Hellmetsberger, Geo.II Ger. comp d ve 28 06 1852 Huber, Hans Swtz. comp. b 19 02 1877 Auber, Louis Fr. comp./pia nist b 27 07 1877 Dohnányi, Erno Hung. comp/pia nist b 01 02 1877 Dunhill, Thomas Eng. comp. b Enescu G Roumanian Rhap sody No. 2 07 01 1877 Gar di ner, Balfour Eng. comp. b Ger man E Merrie England 21 11 1877 Karg-Elert, Sigfried Ger. comp. b Glazunov A Symphony No. 7 01 11 1877 Quilter, Roger Eng. comp. B Glière R String Sextet 11 01 1902 Duruflé, Maurice Fr. comp/org. b Ives C Vi o lin so nata No. 2 23 11 1902 Rodrigo, Joaquin Spa. comp. b Jongen J Piano Quartet 29 03 1902 Walton, Wil liam Eng. comp. b Mahler G Symphony No. 5 20 03 1927 Joubert, John SA. comp. b Five Rückert songs 20 11 1927 Stenhammar, Wilhelm Swed. comp. d Massenet J Le Jongleur de No tre Dame Compared with other years, the number of com- Nielsen C Saul and David [op era] poser an ni ver sa ries is some what mea gre. How ever, Symphony No. 2 “The Four Temper a m ents” there are two of some note. They are the 175th an ni - Rachmaninof S “Spring” [cantata] ver sary of the death of Bee tho ven on 26th March and Reger M Pi ano Quin tet the hun dredth an niver sary of the birth of Wil liam Vi o lin So nata Walton on 20th March. Respighi O Pi ano Con certo In con trast to the above, the list of compo si tions Saint-Saëns C Cello con certo No. 2 Wolf-Ferrari E Pi ano Trio is of consid erable length and is no ta ble for the in clu - Vi o lin So nata sion of a number of works by twen ti eth cen tury 1952 avant-garde compos ers. This should satisfy even the Ar nold M Three Shanties for Wind Quintet most ad venture some of programme planners! Aubert L Cinéma Berio L Allez Hop for Voice Mime and Dancers YEAR OF COMPOSITION, PUBLICATION Berkeley L Flute Concerto OR FIRST PERFORMANCE Bernstein L Trouble in Tahiti [opera] Won der ful Town [p = Published ; fp = First perfor mance ] Bliss A The Enchant ress Scene for Con tralto and Orch. 1752 Pi ano So nata Han del G F Jeptha Bloch E Sin fo nia Bréve Gluck C W Issipite [opera] Concerto Grosso for String Quartet & Strings 1802 Boulez P [fp] Struc tures for Two Pi anos Bk. 1 Beetho ven L V Sym phony No.2 Britten B Canti cle "Abraham and Isaac" Prome theus Varia ti ons Cage J Water Music [p] Piano So natas Nos.12 to 15 4’3"[tacit] for Piano Piano So natas Nos. 16 to 20 Dallapiccola L Quarderno Musicali di Annalibera Kreutzer Sonata Goethe Lied er 1852 Dohnanyi E Vi o lin Con certo No. 2 Adam A Si J’étais Roi [Opera] Horn Con certo Balakirev M Grand Fanta sia on Russian Folk Songs Finzi G Loves Labour Lost [suite] Septet for Flute Piano and Strings Foss L Para ble of Death Brahms J Piano So natas Nos. 1 & 2 Fricker P R Con certo for Piano and Small Orches tra Gade N Symphony No. 5 String Quartet No. 2 Gounod C Faust Gerhard R Sym phony No.1 Liszt F Hungar ian Rhapsodies 1 to 15 Goehr A Pi ano So nata 1902 Ham il ton I Vi o lin Con certo Henze H W King Stag [opera] Bantock G Tone Poems Nos. 4,5 & 6 Bartok B Scherzo for Orches tra CONTINUED AT BOTTOM OF NEXT PAGE Bridge F Berceuse for Vio lin and Small Orches tra Cilea F Adriana Lecouvreur Debussy C Pelléas et Mélisande D’Indy V Sym phony No.2 Elgar E Symphonic Study “Falstaff” Dream Children

FRMS 19 FEATURES Vienna - A Musical Portrait This ar ticle is based upon a presen ta tion given to the who kept the mu si cal tra di tions alive and made no Car diff Re corded Mu sic So ci ety by Rainer Lenk. compro mise with munif i cence, where music and ienna is the capital of Austria. Originally a op era were con cerned. The Em peror Leopold I Celtic settlement, it later became a Roman composed, as did his son, Jo seph I (died 1711); Vmilitary town and finally the capital of the Charles VI was an able conduc tor. Whole op eras Duchy of Austria in the 12th century. It came under were per formed by mem bers of the Habs burg fam- Habsburg rule in 1278, and expanded greatly as the ily and the no bil ity. With the death of Charles VI in capital of the vast Austro-Hungarian Empire which 1740, the Classi cal Vien nese School was on its way. was dissolved after World War I. Mis un der stood Com- Since that time it has been the posers capital of the Federal Republic of Austria. Par a dox i cally, most com- posers who lived and created Vi enna and Clas si cal Mu sic in Vi enna were mis un der - Geo graphically Vi enna was stood dur ing their lifetime. des tined to be come the cen tre of The im age of “Papa Haydn” clas si cal mu sic. The mu si cal is as silly as it is untrue. As a melt ing pot of na tions and races child prodigy, Mozar t was — Aus tri ans, South Ger mans, spoiled, and as a ma ture ge - Czechs, Moravians, Poles, Slo- nius he was ignored. His op- vaks, Slovenes, Croations, Hun - era Le Nozze di Figaro could gar i ans, Ital ians and Jews — all Rainer Lenk at his presentation, be per formed only af ter the of whom brought their peasant Roland Edward and Kathy Cannon are dressed as Emperor Joseph II had or- melo dies and folk songs. The in - waiter and waitress at a Viennese café. dered it. But even the Em - terna tional charac ter of Vienna’s peror opined af ter the cul ture in the 18th cen tury ac cepted many in flu ences pre miere of the ear lier Il Sera - — Flem ish and Span ish Church mu sic, French comic glio, that there were “too many notes, my dear Mo - op era, Italian baroque op era — and blended these in - zart”. “Just as many as are neces sary, your Majesty”, fluences to create something of its own. Johann Jo - was the com poser’s curt reply. Bee tho ven, too, felt seph Fux (1660-1741), the great mas ter of com pletely mis un der stood in his adopted city. His coun ter point, helped to pre pare the great clas si cal only pop u lar success in Vienna was his symphony school. The Habsburgs were passion ate music lov ers, Wellington’s Vic tory, with its re al is tic bat tle field sounds — which he later dismissed as “nonsense”. ANNIVERSARIES CONT. When Rossini came to Vienna in 1822, after the world-wide success of his Il Barbiere di Siviglia, the Henze H W Sonata for Four Horns much greater lo cal compos ers Beetho ven and Schu- Honneger A Suite Archaïque bert were com pletely ig nored. The Vi en nese never Kabalevsky D Piano concerto No. 3 Cello So nata un der stood ge nius; in Vi enna, ge nius was ap pre ci- Lutyens E String Quartets Nos. 4 to 6 ated only by a fellow-ge nius. Schu bert — the most Malipiero G F Vio lin concerto Vi en nese of all com pos ers, and, one of the very few Martin F Le Tempête who was a genu ine Vien nese was no success in his Menotti G C Vi o lin Con certo Prokofiev S Cello Con cer tino home town and would have starved to death with - Rawsthorne A Can ticle of Man out his few de voted friends. Rubbra E Vi ola Con certo Shostakovich D Ballet suite No. 3 About the Vien nese String Quartet No. 5 Only after living in Vi enna for a long time can Stockhausen K-H Punkte/Kontrapunkte Spiel for Orches tra one be gin to un der stand, why the Vi en nese are so Schlagtrio for Piano & Timpani of ten un able to sep a rate re al ity from leg end and Klavierstücke 1 to 1V truth from make-be lieve. The Vi en nese have a pe - Stravin sk y I Can tata on Old English Texts ren nial in fat u ation with drama and mu sic. For them Brendan Sadler “the whole world is a giant theatre”, so wrote a critic

20 FRMS FEATURES way back in 1728. They will often tailor real ity to fit Wenzel Müller (1767-1835) was a great bal lad their imag ina tion. Life is noth ing but a play. The city singer, mu si cian and un ri valled mas ter of the is a vast stage, where every body performs a part while folk-op era. The duet ‘Ja, nur a Kaiserstadt’ (Only watch ing his own and oth ers’ per formances. People one Im pe rial Vi enna) from the play “ALINE” be - fight, but are soon friends again: they have only came the unof fi cial National Anthem of Aus tria, un- played a scene. Life be gins, and ends, at the theatre. til Johann Strauss wrote The Blue Danube . The Even di sas ter is ex pe ri enced with de tach ment. Noth - com pos ing sub ur ban coun ter parts to the Strauss ing is really as bad as it seems. Life may be hope less, family were the Schrammel broth ers — Johann but it is never seri ous. One can sift through one’s (1850-93) and Josef (1852-95), who with two memo ries and re turn to mesmerised child hood days friends set up the “Schrammel Quar tett”. It was of turn ing mor tals into imag ined leg ends. “Die gute made up of 2 vio lins, clari net & dou ble-gui tar; later, alte Zeit!” (The good old days)... And when the end the clar i net was replaced by an ac cor dion. Be tween co mes, fu ner als, too, must be thea tre. “A schöne them, the Schrammel broth ers wrote some 400 Leich!” (A beauti ful corpse). It is pure nonsense, of songs and marches. Vien nese Song reached its course. But in Vienna, IMAGINATION IS prime in the second half of the 19th cen tury, with EVERYTHING count less com pos ers. The fun da men tal idea of all Pop u lar Mu sic Vi en nese songs is a se rene, re signed. fatal ism. Make the best of things — the world can’t be changed any - From Vi enna’s ballrooms, inns, parks and streets way. Songs about approach ing death are le gion. poured forth a kind of mu sic, whose dis tinc tive style Heurige and mes sage had great so cial sig nifi cance in the 1820s and came to repre sent an era and Vien nese life- The arrival of each year’s new wine (Heuriger) is style. Pe riod writ ers com mented on the Vi en nese announced by the banging of a pine branch over the passion for dancing and its ef fect on their char acter. door of small taverns in the Vienna suburbs of Vi enna’s most elab o rate fes tive balls were held in the Nussdorf, Heiligenstadt, Grinzing and Sievering. In ner city and re served for the Car ni val sea son. Sub - Places that sell the wine (light, white & served ur ban dance halls provided not only en ter tainment for the city’s work ing classes, but also a good liveli - hood for tal ented mu sicians from the lower classes. The great de mand for new dance mu sic for these halls pro moted com pe ti tion and ex per i men ta tion that contrib uted to the high quality and unique charac ter of the clas si cal Vi en nese waltz. Most res tau rants of fered light Tafelmusik con- sist ing of marches, dance mu sic, and pop u lar songs. Vi enna’s wine and beer halls featured zither mu sic and folk sing ers. Folksingers, called Bänkelsänger, sang pop u lar songs, ac com pa ny ing them selves on harps or gui tars. Although most of Vi enna’s folk sing ers were known only to small lo cal audi ences, a few gained wide pop u lar ity over three cen tu ries and are known by name today. In 1679 the bag piper Marx Augustin wrote the fa mous song with the re - Schubert and Friends at a Grinzing frain “All is gone” — the re signed ac ceptance of the Heurige (drawing by Schwind) in ev i ta ble. Johann Baptist Moser (died 1863) re or gan ised the whole street sing ing busi ness: he made lis ten ers chilled in large glasses) were established by Imperial pay an “en trance fee”. He also re placed the harp with decree in 1784, as places where owners were a pi ano. If his own mu si cal in spi ra tions failed him, he allowed to sell the wine grown in their own “arranged” that of Lanner and. Strauss. There was a vineyards. There are almost 200 Heuriges in the very close connec tion be tween Vi ennese Song and vicinity of Vienna. Even the great composers Vi en nese Thea tre. The great ac tor/play wrights revelled in them; Schubert and friends more than Raimund and Nestroy intro duced street singers and anyone. ped dlers into their plays. Rainer Lenk

FRMS 21 BOOKS

Book Reviews... Book Reviews... Wagner and Philosophy Wag ner and Phi los o phy by Bryan Magee. as the most im por tant in tel lectual event in the com - Allan Lane £20.00pp £3.98. poser’s life and there is no doubt that Wag ner was ost composers had few if any intellectual ob sessed by Schopenhauer’s writ ings for the rest of interests outside music; a great exception is his life. MRichard Wagner who in his younger days Kant had describe d two kinds of real ity, the was passionately involved in politics and had a life ‘phe nom e nal’ which we can ex pe ri ence (see, hear, long obsession with philosophy. He wrote books on measure etc) and the pos si bil ity of a part, the philosophy and no doubt could have made an ‘noumenal’, which we cannot ex peri ence and whose academic career if he were not a composer. This book form or prop er ties which we can not even con ceive. descries the influence of philosophy on Schopenhauer took this a step further his life and on the operas. and de scribed the phe nom e non and As a young man Wagner was very the noumenal as two dif fer ent as pects in flu enced by the thoughts of Hegel of the same thing. who pos tu lated that re ality is in a con- This com plex set of ideas led stant state of change. This was ex- Wag ner to a Schopenhauerian atti - panded by Feuerbach by re ject ing tude of res ig na tion and pes si mism to re li gion and set ting ma te ri al ism on the re place his uto pian op ti mism about throne. Soon Wag ner was attracted to the ef fect of change. It was too late to the idea of change by rev o lu tion rather amend the li bretto of the Ring but than by evolu tion and he was fur ther Tristan, Master sing ers and Parsival in flu enced by the an ar chist Bakunin were deeply in flu enced by his read ing and then be came active in the so cial- of Schopenhauer. ist/an archist move ment. He was in - An other im por tant in flu ence of volved in the 1849 up ris ing in Dresden, Schopenhauer was that the latter con- when this failed, he eluded ar rest and sid ered mu sic to be the most im por - with Liszt’s help man aged to es cape to safety in tant art form because of its meta phys i cal prop er ties. Swit zer land. Magee sees this as the rea son for Wagner moving The au thor de scribes how these ideas in flu enced away from the pre-em i nence of words in his op eras Karl Marx and led to mod ern commu nism; this is a to a much greater em phasis of the orches tra and to a fas ci nat ing part of the book. How ever by the time more symphonic structure as demonstrated in his Marx wrote Das Kapital, Wagner had lost in ter est in later operas. so cial ism and there is no ev i dence that he ever read it. Magee is ob viously an enthu siast about the work The He geli an ideas of change were in te gral to the of his two idols Wag ner and Schopenhauer and with ideas behind Wag ner’s libretto for the Ring which he a re laxed style makes com plex ar gu ments ac ces si ble started to write in 1844. Wagner also decided that and recounts his story in a telling manner. His last the form of op era should change so that in stead of chap ter is about the al most pa ter nal role adopted by con sist ing of a se ries of in di vid ual pieces such as arias, Wagner to the famous philos o pher Nietzsche and cho rus etc., and spec tac u lar sce nic effects, the mu sic contains some startling medico-sex ual infor ma tion should fol low the words (po etry) of the drama in relat ing to the lat ter’s ill ness prior to his in sanity. contin u ous manner. This leads to a format where the In many ways, Wagner was a nasty piece of work words were predom i nant and the music almost sec- and an Ap pen dix deals with his ob ses sive anti-Sem i - ond ary. This was put into ef fect in Das Rheingold tism. It discusses some of the reasons for this aspect but by the time that Wag ner was writing the music of Wagner’s thoughts and also has an objec tive look for the other op eras in the Ring, Wag ner had at the re lation ship be tween Hit ler and Wagner’s changed his philo soph i cal al le giance. mu sic and the ab sence of anti-Sem itism in the op - Wag ner dis cov ered the writ ings of Schopenhauer eras them selves. I found the en tire book in 1854 when the li bretto for the Ring was complete thought-pro vok ing and in ter est ing. and he was compos ing Die Walküre. Magee sees this A.B.

22 FRMS BOOKS Penguin Guide to Compact Discs Yearbook 2000/1 By Ivan March, Edward Greenfiel d and Robert Layton Although there is much in the press about the Pen guin Books, Lon don. Pp 706. PB £14.99. crisis in the recording industry, the sheer number of he Penguin Guide has achieved classic status new CDs proves that the crisis affects the new and the last main guide was reviewed in these recording by the major companies rather than the Tpages in March 2000 (No 132). activity by the smaller companies and Edward Greenfield, of course, is the those concentrating on reissues. President of FRMS; we are fortunate One recent trend which has that for the first time in the history of the produced a good many very interesting Guide, all three authors will appear compilations are ‘duos’, originally together on the same platform at the introduced by Philips. In these, two forthcoming Musical Weekend at standard records are presented Stratford. together as a double album for the When a Year book ap pears, many price of one disc. There are also huge reader’s reac tions are mixed — has suffi - multi-disc collections covering most of cient occurred in one year to warrant the available output of certain well buy ing a new book? Do we have to look recorded artists such as the new Artur up in two books be fore ev ery pur chase? Rubinstein collection of over 50 discs. How ever this par tic u lar Year book is These large collections are more dif fer ent be cause it con tains what the au - problematic in appeal as in most cases thors call a “Cor nu copia of Collec tions”. This com - admirers of the artists in question will already own prises about half of the pages of the book and cov ers many of the recordings. Duplication is always a or ches tral, in stru men tal and vo cal re cit als of short potential problem for large collections, especially pieces, which for practi cal reasons have had to be ig - when individual discs are not available separately. nored in re cent edi tions of the guide. What a wealth There are also a surpris ing number of new com- of great mu sic is dis cussed here (mu sic does not have pos ers, of which one of the old est is Reginaldus to be long to be good); some in modern record ings Libert (born c. 1430). There are also good new discs but many com prise truly in com pa ra ble his tor i cal per - of seldom heard 19th Cen tury com pos ers which are formances of the reper toire which was meat and well worth ex plor ing. drink in the 78 era. In very many cases the re cord ings Because of its na ture, this is a vol ume to be have been im proved be yond rec og ni tion due to mod - dipped into for un ex pected trea sures as well as its ern digi tal techniques . ob vi ous ref er ence value. Be cause of the Col lec tions Whilst in the days of the 78s, we used to curse be- sec tion, this is a more im por tant pub li cation than cause it was so diffi cult to lis ten to a long work such the av er age Year book and it will prove to be a use ful as a Mahler sym phony, now we have the op po site ref er ence vol ume. prob lem. We might like Rossini overtures and there - AB fore we purchase a disc contain ing perhaps eight; but Berlioz do we wish to hear all eight af ter each other? In many ways a well balanced collec tion is the ideal way of lis- he two volume biography by David Cairns, ten ing to mu sic, but alas few discs are planned with ‘Berlioz: the making of an Artist’, and such lis ten ing in mind. However, this volume con- T‘Berlioz: Servitude and Greatness’ which was tains de scrip tions and re views of many really good given a strong welcome in a review in the last edition col lection discs which con tain short pieces in a way of the Bulletin has now been issued in paperback which is a de light to lis ten to. format by Penguin Books at £12.99 for each In the main section there has been a flood of new volume. is sues and re is sues cel e brat ing the 250th an ni ver sary This must now be regarded as the definitive of Bach. The first discs from the Philip’s fascinating biography of this great composer and it is good that “Great Pi anists of the Twen ti eth Cen tury” was cov - it is available in a very affordable price in good time ered in the main vol ume but are completed in the for the bicentenary of Berlioz’s birth in 2003 Yearbook.

FRMS 23 PRESENTERS FRMS PRESENTER PANEL Societies are invited to recommend successful presenters for inclusion in this section. Please note, for those charging a fee there is a modest charge per entry per annum. An entry on the FRMS Website is also offered free. In addition, many record companies are generally available on application to give presentations, especially the smaller firms. Contact the companies directly. Officers and committee of the FRMS are experienced presenters and are generally available to give presentations within reasonable distance of home. Contact them directly (see inside back cover). This supplement is intended to be a general guide to programme planning. Reasonable care is taken to ensure accuracy of the details given but neither the FRMS Committee nor the Editor can accept responsibility for any consequences arising from the use of this list.

ASV Group Mu sic So ci ety. Wide va ri ety of on Kathleen Ferrier and Enrico programmes most of which in - Caruso. These appearances led to ASV Records, 1 Lochaline Street, clude au dio phile items. Cur rent two successful books and an Lon don W6 9SJ. programmes in clude: exciting life as a writer and Tel: 0171 381 8747 Vive la France lecturer. His first book ‘Ferrier Con tact Mar keting Man ager André Previn, the LSO and friends — A Career Recorded’, charted Sound Waves Ray Crick for details of presen ta - Exploring Lyrita the recording career of Britain’s tions avail able to so ci et ies: The Golden Age of Re cording best-loved contralto, and The art of Guido Cantelli Anthony Barker research uncovered some Fascinatin’ Gershwin previously unissued recordings. 17 Benslow Rise The unknown Sibelius The award-winning ‘Glynde- No fee, trav el ling ex penses Hitchin SG4 9QX bourne Recorded’ was published only. Tel: 01462 451900 to celebrate sixty years of the Non-tech ni cal talks, in ter - Dr Harry Brierley Festival and is the first survey of spersed with sig nif i cant mu si cal il - sound and video recordings 4 Syca more View, Upper lus tra tions dem on strat ing the which feature Glyndebourne Poppleton, York YO2 6LN de vel op ment of cher ished se lected forces. Tel: 01904 785809 compos ers and based on thor ough Paul has since writ ten for San Tu tor U3A Cam bridge and re search of mu si cal au thor i ties. Fran cisco Op era Guild and is Barbirolli So ci ety mem ber. Mem ber of the Dvorak So ci ety cur rently en gaged on pre par ing Programmes de voted to var i ous and the Respighi So ci ety. book let es says for Naxos’s ‘Great as pects of the life and work of Sir Cur rent programmes in clude: Op era Re cord ings’ CD se ries. As John Barbirolli. No fees but sug - Falla: his life and works; his operas a lover of fine sing ing, Paul en- gest con tri bu tion to the Barbirolli Janacek: his life and works; his early operas joys sharing this inter est with Poulenc:his life and works;his operas Soci ety. Puccini: his later operas other en thu si asts coun try wide. Ravel: his life and works; his operas Paul Cam pion Respighi: his life and works; his operas Talks in clude: Shostakovich: his life and works; his op - 20 City Harbour Kathleen Ferrier – Her Life and Leg acy eras 8 Selsdon Way Glyndebourne Recorded — Sixty Years No fee or ex penses, ra dius Lon don E14 9GR of an Opera Festi val within 25 miles of Hitchin E-mail: [email protected] MASTERMIND — Secrets from the Website: Black Chair! Geoff Bateman ACIB La Divina: Maria Callas, the Woman www.musictalks.freeuk.com who changed Opera 34 Frizley Gardens, Brad ford, phone/fax: 020 7987 7259 Happy and Glori ous — The Proud W. York shire BD9 4LY. An enthusiastic TV quizzer, Story of the Proms Tel: 01274 783285. Paul Campion took part in BBC’s Fee ne go tia ble, plus ex - Sec re tary, Brad ford Re corded Mastermind, answering questions penses.

24 FRMS PRESENTERS

Allan Child So ci ety are: John Gilks 12, Highfield Road, Lon don Dr R Clark, The Old School, Derby DE22 1GZ 61 Torridge Drive, High Street, phone: 01332 332649 Didcot OX11 7QZ Nawton e-mail: [email protected] York YO62 7TT Chairman of FRMS and Mid lands Hywel Davies, Phone:01439 771273 Secretary of the Derby RMS. 24 Col lege Grove, Malvern For mer chair man FRMS, Topics include: WR14 3HP his talks in clude: North of the border – an ex plora tion of Mu sic of Saint Saëns the music of Scotland North West Mrs P Hurst, Music of Greig Espana! – an ex plora tion of the music of Dancing through the years Spain 60 Homewood Rd, Northenden C is for Composer Magyar rapszódia – an explo ra tion of the Manches ter M22 4DW Cylin d ers to CDs music of Hungary Ex penses only. Who? – music by lesser known British REGIONS: compos ers from the 16th to 20th Beresford King-Smith centu ries Southern Region Time, gentle men please! – music related Mrs J Nicho las, Canta bile, 8 South Pa rade, in some way to time, from Dowland to 9A Guildown Rd, Guildford Sutton Coldfield, Messian GU2 5EW West Mid lands B72 1QY. Open to sug ges tions for other South West Region Tel/fax: 0121 355 5018. top ics. Ex penses only Roger Dubois, Retired after 30 years as se- Neil Collier St Bar na bas Vic ar age, Daventry nior ad min is tra tor with City of Rd, Knowle, Bristol BS4 1DQ Bir ming ham Sym phony Or ches - Pri ory RecordsLtd., Yorkshire Re gion tra; au thor of its of ficial his tory 3 Eden Court, Eden Way, Den nis Clark, 227 Tinshill Rd, ‘Cre scendo!’. Leighton Buz zard, Leeds LS16 7BU Talks available include: Beds LU7 8FY. Scot tish Re gion The story of the CBSO Tel 01525 377566. Britain’s Sharron Bassett The story of Birming ham’s choral soci - Pre mier Church Mu sic La bel. eties 6 Pitcorthie Road Dunfermline What is genius? As dis trib u tor of 26 other la - Fife KY11 5DR Six suberb singers bels, Priory is available for talks Da vid Fligg Fee: £75, in cludes travel up and lec tures to af fil i ated so ci et ies to 15 miles from Sutton il lus trated by ma te rial on cas sette Leeds Col lege of Mu sic, 3 Quarry Coldfield. and CD. Hill, Leeds LS2 7PD Alastair Mitch ell LGSM The Dvorak So ciety Tel: (H) 0113 268 7440; (W) 0113 222 3423 47 King Ed ward’s Gar dens Pro motes the mu sic of all E-mail: [email protected] Lon don W3 9RF Czech and Slovak compos ers, past Website: Tel: 020 8992 0600 and pres ent. A few of its mem bers www.impulse-mui c.co.uk/fligg.htm Lec turer, con duc tor and mu - are invited on oc casion to give Lec turer in mu sic his tory, si cal his to rian. For mer in struc- talks and lec tures to so ciet ies at com po si tion and har mony at tor/tu tor for HF Hol idays Ltd var i ous lo ca tions. Leeds Col lege of Mu sic. Com - and Mu si cal Ap pre ci a tion Hol i- En quiries to: Shawn Pull man, poser and conduc tor. Member of days cov er ing the Bath and Hon Sec, The Dvorak Soci ety, 32 the In cor po rated So ci ety of Mu si- Cheltenham Fes ti vals, and for - Glebe Way, Burnham on Crouch, cians, and the Brit ish Acad emy of mer horn player and organ ist. Essex, CM0 8QJ. Composers and songwriters. Con- Ed itor of A Chron icle of First The Elgar So ci ety trib u tor to var i ous mu sic mag a - Mu si cal Per for mances Broad cast zines. CD sleeve notes and in the United Kingdom, The So ci ety will ar range for ex pe - programme notes writer. Vari ous 1923-1996, and con trib u tor on ri enced present ers to give il lus - non-tech ni cal and en ter tain ing the or ches tral mu sic of Lt. Col. trated talks on general or specific top ics. Sir Vivian Dunn KCVO OBE top ics con cern ing Elgar’s life and Con tact to dis cuss avail abil ity, Royal Marines in a bi og raphy by work. Branch Secre taries to con- de tails of fees and your Soci ety’s Derek Oakley MBE. tact to ar range a speaker from the re quire ments.

FRMS 25 PRESENTERS

Sub jects: Over the Hills and Far Away — an Life and mu sic of Wil liam Boyce Tony Pook (York RMS) evalu a tion of Freder ic k Delius Off the Beaten Groove — a personal Symphonies of Ralph Vaughan 1 Lower Friargate, York Wil liams search in the byways of music Symphonies of Sibelius YO1 1SL. Tel: 01904 642407 No fee for Hyperion presen - History and Devel op ment of the March Par tic u larly in ter ested in the ta tion; other talks min i mum ex - (mili tary and orches tral) mu sic of lesser-known but tuneful penses. Midlands, N. Eng land, Or chestral colour: a study of compos ers of 19th and 20th cen - orches tra ti on Wales, Scotland preferred. Highlights of First Musi cal Perfor manc es tu ries. Ex am ple programmes: Finland: Uuno Klami Mi chael Magnus Osborn Broad cast in the United Kingdon Poland: Mieczyslav Karlowicz (gauges trends in twenti eth century OBE Amer ica: Beach, Bernstein, British musi cal life, and the role of the Gershwin, Gottschalk, 171 Yarborough Road, Lin coln BBC in their promo tion) Hanson, MacDowell etc LN1 3NQ. Each talk can be tailored to lo - Mex ico: A selec tion from Tel: 01522 523117 cal re quire ments, and can be ex - Chavez to Ponce The Paderewski re cord ings. tended to form a short series. Czechoslo va ki a: Suk, Novak, No fee. Travel ex penses over Please send SAE for fur ther details Fucik, Nedbal (aka the pupils of Dvorak), 100 miles. Fees: From £100 plus rail Fibich, Smetana travel and over night ex penses if Russia: Borodin, Shostakovich Clive Wilkes over 10 miles from West London. Eng land: The lighter Britten, 70 Filching Road, Eastbourne, Sup ple men tary fee of £40 for spe - Vaughan Williams East Sus sex BN20 8SD. cially pre pared sub jects, if re - Travelling expenses only. Tel: 01323 724916. quired. Betty Rob erts, ALAM So ci ety re cit al ist for many years. Miss Joy Puritz 20, Western Drive, Grassendale, Details of present Programmes: Wagner and Liszt, an uneasy friend - 149e Holland Rd, Liver pool LI9 0LX. ship. Lon don W14 8AS Tel: 0151 427 1854. (Programme linked to) Tel: 020 7602 4187 (eve) For mer pro fes sional ‘cel list Wagner and Liszt, their musi cal legacy. 020 7494 3130 (day). BBCSO, CBSO, Hallé, RLPO Vienna – Mahler and his contempories. Grand daugh ter of Elis a beth (prin ci pal). Avail able for mu si cal (Programme linked to) Schumann and transla tor of her bi - talks and lectures, some with read- Exiles and emigres – follows fortunes ogra phy (written by the singer’s ings of verse and prose. Many sub- of compos ers who fled Vienna and Nazi Germany son, Gerd Puritz). jects in cluding: Il lus trated pre sen ta tion en ti - The ver satil ity of the Cello (choice of 2 George Gershwin – Crazy for you – a programmes) tled A Por trait of the So prano, cente nary tribute Glori ous John — the life and work of Sir Sergei Prokofiev – the prodi gal son. Elis abeth Schumann has been well John Barbirolli Golden age of film music re ceived at the ROH Covent gar - Shakespeare and music As pects of opera in the 20th Century den and The Brit ish Li brary Na - Philharmania — a lighthearted look at Fur ther de tails on request. orches tral life tional Sound Ar chive. Composers in lighter mood No fee; ex penses only. Fee ne go tia ble. Pictures in music Julian William son Siva Oke LRAM Also a wide range of programmes in ‘Music for Pleasure’. 18, Balfour Av e nue, Hanwell, 13 Riversdale Rd, Thames Travels coun try wide. A com- Lon don W7 3HS Ditton, Surrey KT7 0QL pre hen sive bro chure avail able. Tel: 020 8579 5643 Tel: 020 8398 1586 Fees ne go tia ble plus ex penses. Lec turer, Con duc tor, Mu si - Fax: 020 8339 0981 Donald Rooksby cal Di rec tor. Pre sen ta tions on all For mer profes sional musi - as pects of mu sic from cham ber cian, vet eran of the record in dus try Glanrafon, 14 Heol Garrog, mu sic to op era. Programme and owner of SOMM Re cord ings, Eglwysbach, Colwyn Bay, ti tles for 2001/2 in clude: spe cialist label in cho ral and vocal North Wales LL28 5AQ. A Millen nium survey, a thousand years mu sic. Tel: 01492 650244. of music in a single eve ning Founder of Derby RMS and gen - Giuseppe Verdi, a centenary ‘Sailing through Trou bled Wa- assessment of one the greatest opera ters’, with music from current cat- eral man ager Hyperion Re cords composers a logue. un til 1986. Sub jects in clude: No fee. ‘Britain ’s Brightest Record Label’- some Con tinued at Bot tom of next page re cent issues of Hyperion

26 FRMS CD REVIEW Haddon Hall

Written by Syd ney Grundy; Com posed by Sir Ar thur John Manners from Haddon Hall her ances tral Sullivan. home. The pe riod had been changed by a cen tury to Per formed by The Prince Con sort, Ed in burgh, in volve roy al ists and Pu ri tans. The pub lic re ac tion con ducted by David Lyle. was mixed, the Sullivan’s mu sic be ing highly The di vine art re cord com pany, 21201. praised but Grundy was not seen as a satis fac tory re- placement for Gilbert. It ran for 204 per formances his recording was undertaken and was popu lar for sev eral in association with the Sir years but it was diffi cult to stage TArthur Sullivan Society. It is and is now sel dom played. two medium priced CDs in a slim The mu sic is most im pres - format case with an attractive sive, full of good tunes and booklet containing good notes by many unique touches to dif fer - Alan Borthwick and a full libretto. enti ate it from the G. & S. op- The light op era was writ ten in eras. The Scottish numbers and 1892 when Sullivan was at the or ches tral bag pipe ef fects are height of his powers, having re- hilar i ous; there is a storm scene cently writ ten The Gon do liers and which brings that of Rigoletto his ro man tic op era Ivanhoe. to mind; the brief ap pear ance Sullivan was barely on speak ing of La Mar seil laise and Yan kee terms with Gilbert and had to col- Doo dle Dandee are most unex - lab o rate with a dif fer ent li bret tist Syd ney Grundy (al- pected. The use of the cho rus is though the Gilbert. & Sullivan com bi nation was later very ef fec tive with ex cel lent cho ral writ ing. At times to pro duce Uto pia Limited and The Great Duke). there is a slightly au tum nal feel to the mu sic which Grundy’s plot is based on an actual his tor ical inci - well re flects the ro man tic na ture of the story, how - dent, the elope ment of Dor othy Vernon and her lover ever a good se lec tion of pat ter songs keeps the at - mosphere light. The orches tra tion is perhaps fuller PRESENTERS CONTINUED than many of the other Savoy Operas with the brass The oratorio from Handel to Britten, a look at an art form more in ev i dence and there is the usual ex pres sive - which has been a central part of this country’s music ness of the wood wind. tradition for over two hundred years. How dare he say that! a light hearted survey of music critics The Prince Consort was formed in 1972 by a over the ages with ex amples of those who got it wrong. group of semi-profes sional musi cians as part of the Musi cal eccen trics an evening which reveals the more zany Edin burgh Fringe. Later it was expan ded and aug - side of musi cians and their art. mented in collab o ra tion with the Gilbert and Many other programmes are avail able on ap pli - Sullivan So ci ety of Ed in burgh. cation to the pre senter. The per for mance through out is very pro fes - Reg Wil liam son sional. It is perhaps unfair to pick out partic u lar singers, but I was espe cially impressed by the sing- 67 Galleys Bank, Kidsgrove, Staffs ST7 4DE. ing of Mary Timmons as Dor othy and by Ian Law - Tel: 01782 782419 son as Rupert. The cho rus is ex cellent and the E-mail: [email protected] or ches tra plays well although the vi olins seem Techni cal writer and designer for over 35 slightly un der nour ished in places. David Lyle con- years, author ity on all audio sub jects. For mer vis- ducts with style. it ing lec turer at Uni ver sity of Keele. Wide mu si cal The re cord ing is good, but it is im por tant to in ter ests; spe ci al ities in clude Brit ish, Amer i can and play the mu sic at a rea son ably high vol ume as the Scan di na vian mu sic. sound has a rather distant feel when the discs are Can provide own high quality playback equip- played softly. ment, includ ing DAT, MD on request. Write to It is a pleasure to see the re corded rep er toire ex - Reg for sug gested programmes. No fee. Ne go tia - tended to such good ef fect and these discs can be ble ex penses only, to affil i ates within 60 miles of recom mended to all who like light op era. Kidsgrove. AB

FRMS 27 CD REVIEW ensemble incanto

Dar ius MILHAUD; Suite (1936) had pro vided fi nan cial sup port to Stra vin sky and Bela BARTOK; Con trasts (1938) who was also a clari net tist. Typically Stravin sky Igor STRAVINSKY; L’Histoire du Soldat, Suite achieves a very trans par ent tex ture for this mu sic (1919) which com bines a neo-clas si cal treat ment of ma te - Aram KHACHATURIAN; Trio (1932) rial based on pop u lar dance styles. Arte Nova Classics 74321 72105 2 [61.03] There is a ten dency to pat ron ise the mu sic of Khachaturian. This I be lieve is most un fair as al- he ensemble incanto consists of three young though his Symphonies are rather overcooked, musicians which have achieved great acclaim in much of his mu sic is tune ful and skil fully pre sented. Ttheir native Germany and in He is one of the very few com pos ers of international concerts. The Cd is at the latter part of the last century to be- super bargain price and has a come gen u inely pop u lar with peo ple of pleasant sleeve and good notes. It or di nary mu si cal taste; I well re mem ber was recorded in 1997 a time when his ‘Sabre Dance’ was genu - These four trios for vio lin, clari - inely top of the pops. This trio is one of net and pi ano were all written be - his earlier works and is sat u rated with tween the wars and are all in the Arme nian folk music presented in a then pop u lar neo-clas si cal style. most in ter est ing and ap peal ing way. Each has to some ex tent been in flu - I found this to be a most inter est ing enced by National folk id ioms, each CD with fasci nat ing mu sic played with is also very charac ter is tic of it’s re- zest, in ten sity and en thu si asm in good spec tive com poser and they are all very dif fer ent from re cord ing. Rec om mended. each other in style. AB The Milhaud Suite is de rived from his in ciden tal mu sic for Jean Anouilh’s ‘Le Voyageur sans Bagages’, it was writ ten in one day and makes per fect use of all three in stru ments. It is a very tune ful work Attention all Programme Secretaries! which has led to a well de served pop u lar ity; it in - cludes quo ta tions of South Amer ican Dances. Right from the start this en sem ble dem on strates ex cep - CD, BOOK & VIDEO SELECTIONS tional bril liance of playing and master of complex (Bargain mail order specialists) rhythms. DORCHESTER ‘Contrasts’ was com missioned by the jazz clari - offer net tist Benny Good man. The three move ment piece was writ ten for Good man and the vio lin ist Jo seph FREE RECITALS Szigeti and Bartok played the pi ano part in the pre - (No fee, no expenses) mier. The piece is a fas ci nat ing mix ture of frag ments of Hungar ian folk music inter wo ven with jazz and “PROGRAMMES - BY - POST” also available blues in flu enced ma te rial. Like much of Bartok it is featuring CDs in Company's current catalogue mu sic which becomes more and more in ter est ing with re peated hear ings. It must be in cred i bly dif fi cult Please ring or write to:- to play, but the per formance on this record ing can- not be faulted. Brian Bishop, The ‘L’Histoire du Soldat’ will be more fa mil iar 39 Walker Crescent, to most of us than the other pieces pre sented here. Wyke Regis, The orig i nal piece was writ ten for a small chamber Weymouth, ensem ble which include d a trum pet and drums; these Dorset DT4 9AU instru ments tend to de fine the work and their ab - Tel: 01305 759 505 sence is the first impres sion on hearing this Suite. The Suite was ded i cated to Werner Reinholt who

28 FRMS REGIONS FROM THE REGIONS... FROM THE REGIONS... South West Re gion and no work lon ger than ten min utes and no re cord - ing es pe cially pur chased for the week end. With the ast year, Brendan Sadler of Street and afore men tioned re straints Jon a than, like all the Glastonbury Recorded Music Group, team, pre sented an eclec tic programme of works. Lcirculated societies in the South West to Sousa led the way (or perhaps marched!) with ‘Un- ascertain whether enough would be interested to der the Cu ban Flag’, then came Weinberger’s once form a regional group. It has to be reported that the hugely pop u lar but now ne glected ‘Schwanda the response was not encouraging. However, the Bag piper’. The “pas sion ate in ten sity” of Janacek’s exercise was not completely fruitless since a number String Quartet ‘In ti mate Let ters’ was next followed did report that they had members who were willing by Ibert’s amus ing pas tiche ‘Divertissement’. From to travel to other societies in their area to present 1934/5 Walton’s Sym phony No. 1 and mu sic of programmes. Brendan would like to enlarge the list Carl Orff, Dag Wiren and Eric Coates were also fea - before making it available and invites societies in the region, which have not yet done so, to send him the tured. Then from 1942, Copland’s ballet ‘Ro deo’; names of anyone who is willing to be added to it. A Martinu’s 2nd Symphony and from 1943 to finish cut off date of 30th April is suggested. just be fore din ner the ‘pick led boys’ from Britten’s ‘St. Any so ci ety which would like to receive a copy of Nich o las Can tata’! the list should send a stamped, addresse d enve lope On Sunday morning, it was still raining we had [after the above date] to Brendan Sadler, Orchard two programmes by Alan Thomas, 1975 to 1999 House, Church Lane, West Pennard, Glastonbury, fea tur ing com pos ers such as Rubbra, Arvo Pärt, Al - Somerset, BA6 8NT. fred Schnittke, Gorecki, and a complete string Quar - tet by Eliz abeth Maconchy her No.13. Sus sex Re gional Group From South Amer ica came a ‘Ma ter Aeterna’ by he Sussex Regional Group held its 44th Music Sam uel Lyman, the Philip Glass Vi olin Concerto Weekend on 28th/29th of October. It was and ‘To wards the Sea’ by Toru Takemitsu. To end, Tpossibly the wettest weekend on record but the we had a ‘roman tic’ vio lin Concerto writ ten in 1993, spirits of the twenty four guests were by no means by Nich o las Maw. dampened. Every room of the historic and cosy Pyke Alan’s second programme was selected from the House was taken to celebrate music of the twentieth whole century with works by Malcolm Arnold (his Century. 8th Symphony); a ‘Symphonic Serenade’ by The century was divided into four twenty-five Korngold, a string quartet partly based on a year segments with each presenter choosing music stork-like bird, a ‘Jabiru’, by Australian Peter written during their allotted quarter. Eileen Taylor Sculthorpe. Referring to ‘World Music’ and the over launched the weekend with a wide ranging 400 works commissioned by the Kronos Quartet, programme from 1900 to 1924 with the next item was ‘Pannonia Boundless’ by Vrebalov Rimsky-Korsakov’s ‘Wedding March’ from The relating to an area embracing part of Croatia and Golden Cockerel. Eileen spoke of Rimsky Slovenia and the music reflecting the “tunes from -Korsakov’s influence on several composers, Pannonian gypsy taverns”; this was played by the particularly Stravinsky. Kronos. Continuing the theme of opera, which is alive From 1950 Copland’s ‘Quiet City’ and another and kick ing in the 20th and now 21st century, Eileen Amer i can, Sam uel Bar ber pro vided a fur ther ro man- played ex tracts from Puc cini’s ‘Turandot’ and tic 20th Cen tury vi olin concerto. A feature of Alan’s Strauss’s ‘Die Frau Ohne Schatten’. Vaughan Wil- se lec tion were the sym pho nies of Rob ert Simpson liams, Sibelius and Rachmaninov were also fea tured for which Alan let the writer Malcolm Macdonal along with Prokofiev, Respighi and Dohnanyi. pro vide an in tro duc tion with ex cerpts from the first Eileen fin ished with ‘Praise to the Holiest’ from Elgar’s and fourth sym pho nies. ‘The Dream of Gerontius’ thus cel ebrat ing one hun - Af ter a splen did Pyke House lunch, Alan Gilbey dred years since its first per for mance in Bir ming ham. kept ev ery one awake with his per sonal choice of mu - Af ter a tea-break, with the fa mous Pyke House sic from the years 1950 to 1974. Bernard short bread bis cuits, Jon a than Parris delved into the Hermann’s score for the film ‘North by North west’ period 1925 to 1949. Jon athan had laid down some was followed by Tippett’s ‘Fan ta sia Con cer tante on a “ground rules” for him self: one composer one work, Theme of Corelli’. “The best drunken mu sic” was not previ ously ‘covered’ by Pyke House compos ers how Alan in tro duced Ar nold’s won der ful Over ture

FRMS 29 REGIONS

‘Tam O’Shanter’. Walton’s ‘Orb and Sceptre’ from the “the short est distance between two points in Bir- 1953 Cor o na tion, ‘Concierto Andaluz’, the delight ful ming ham...is al ways un der con struc tion” but lesser known gui tar con certo by Rodrigo fol - joked Lyndon Jenkins at the open ing of his pre sen- lowed. Next we heard ‘Van ity Fair’ from Vaughan ta tion, yet as his ex cellent aural journey “Voices in Wil liam’s ‘Pil grim’s Prog ress’. the city” went on to prove, the city’s build ing efforts ‘Ro meo and Juliet’, in the sel dom heard not only re volved around bricks and mor tar. For al- Kabalevsky version and ‘Belle of the Ball’ by Leroy most a cen tury and a half Bir ming ham worked hard An der son was a neat jux ta po si tion. Alwyn’s lovely at con struct ing one of the most im pres sive mu sic ‘Lyra An gel ica’ contraste d with the grim sound of the festi vals in the country. guil lo tine de scend ing in Poulenc’s ‘Les Di a logues des Begun in 1768 as a one-off, a means to raise Carmelites’. From 63 sympho nies of Alan Hovhaness money for a local hospi tal, its artis tic and finan cial Alan chose to play No.22 ‘City of Light’. To close, we success soon estab lished it as a reg u lar three-yearly heard the 2nd Pi ano Concerto by Shostakovich es pe- event. In deed it fu elled a bur geon ing de sire among cially written for his son, Maxim. the city fa thers to estab lish a fitting It was an extremely success ful and cul tural icon to mir ror its grow ing en joy able week end and, strangely, the ...Golden nuggets of in dus trial es teem. com pos ers that im me di ately spring to the twen ti eth cen tury... Strongly re liant on Handel in its mind were barely rep re sented, but it early years, the fes ti val’s sense of ad - proved that mel ody was not dead and ven ture only grad u ally emerged, al- that the for mats of cham ber mu sic, con cert and op era though by 1802 parts of Haydn’s ‘Cre ation’ were were very much in ev i dence and will con tinue to do be ing presented , barely 4 years af ter the work’s Vi - so along side much splen did or ches tral writ ing. It also enna pre miere. How ever, the “ap pro pri a tion” of showed that the world was now the compos ers oyster Men dels sohn as per former and ef fec tive “com - embrac ing mu sic from many di verse cul tures. The poser-in-res i dence” was un doubt edly the Tri en nial’s week end also showed how for tu nate we are to be able first ma jor coup; an as so ci a tion which cul mi nated in to use re corded mu sic to en joy the fruits or the the world pre miere of ‘Eli jah’ in 1846. “golden nug gets” as Si mon Rat tle called them, of Sadly Mendels sohn died the fol low ing year, and Twen ti eth Cen tury mu sic re corded, for pos ter ity, by cast ing around for a guid ing fig ure the fes ti val com - an indus try it self now over one hundred years old! mit tee set tled on the com poser/con duc tor Mi chael It should be mentione d that we had guests from Costa. Al though ca pa ble, un der his di rec tion the so ci et ies in Eastbourne, Hastings, East-Grinstead, mu si cal diet pet ri fied, dom i nated by per for mances Hove, Portslade and Lustington, which repre sented of long for got ten or ato rios by the likes of Smart and a good cross sec tion of affil i ates from the Re gion. Sterndale Bennet. Whilst bright ened by vis its from Our next week end is on March 24th/25th, 2001 figures such as Bruch and Skint, it wasn’t un til the when we shall be mark ing the death of Verdi in 1901 mid 1880’s, follow ing Costa’s de mise and his re- and also listen ing to some Prokofiev. place ment by Hans Rich ter, that a real breath of Alan Thomas fresh air was felt. Richter not only en cour aged Grieg and Dvorak to visit and con trib ute ex clu sive new West Mid lands works, he also aided the de vel op ment of do mes tic A bo nanza in Bir ming ham ... tal ent, not least of course the young Ed ward Elgar. Whilst Elgar cer tainly had his ups... and downs o rise at 5.30 am on a chill October morning, (most nota bly the deba cle over ‘Gerontius’), a more and set off on the long journey from the Kent amusing festi val story revolves around a work of his Tborders to Birmingham, needs a pretty strong great Czech con tem po rary, Dvorak. In present ing a reason. Well, a line-up of Lyndon Jenkins, Jerrold new cantata to the festi val man agemen t, the com- Northrop Moore and Brendan Sadler provided just poser’s repre sen ta tive had roughly translated the ti- the incentive...at least for this happy (but weary !) tle as... ‘The bridal shirt’..!?! .The ef fect on a prim traveller. The occasion ? ... the West Midlands and proper Victo rian com mit tee was doubt less Regional Group’s 5th one-day music conference, priceless to behold ! Hastily re-translated as ‘The held at the Birmingham and Midland Institute, on Spec tre’s Bride’ it was duly welcomed with open the 12th of October. arms. Al though the Tri en nial con tin ued un til 1912 Speaking with a single voice... (where it witnessed Elgar’s “The Mu sic Makers”), Lo cal folk lore as serts that, the ef fect of the war was ter mi nal, the im pe tus

30 FRMS REGIONS within Bir ming ham turn ing to ward or ches tral mu sic out put is worth more than merely su perfi cial at ten- after 1918. Although spo radic efforts were made tion. dur ing the ‘60’s and ‘70’s to revive the tri ennial they Cider...with Carmen ? proved un suc cessful. As Lyndon concluded, whilst Its not of ten that feet are the foun dation of op era the cur rent fes ti val, “Voices in the city”, did n’t aim to but in the case of the Strode Op er atic So ci ety this is ape its distin guished prede ces sor, it does at least hope quite lit er ally true. Clarks, the fam ily foot wear firm, to capture some of its spirit... has long been a major player in the indus trial land- Not al ways merrie... scape of Somerset. As a Quaker fam ily firm its his - “You ad mire my mu sic...but I love yours..” tory has long been marked by a de sire to plough is the perhaps slightly surpris ing admis sion of Ed- prof its back both into the busi ness and into the lo cal ward Elgar about the music of his friend and col- commu nity. It was therefore no surprise when, in league Ed ward Ger man. Al most as much a rev ela tion 1963, Clarks be came the driv ing force be hind the as Jerrold Northrop Moore’s decla ra tion that Ger - construc tion of the new 400 seat Strode theatre. man’s mu sic means as much to him Lo cated in the town of Street, as anyone’s — save that of Elgar. Somerset, its ex cel lent fa cil i ties Originally named German ...more tal ent than quickly es tab lished it as the fo cus of Edward Jones, German was anyone had bargaine d lo cal ac tiv i ties. Cer tainly by the time convinced by one of his professors to for... Brendan Sadler, our presenter, ar - change his name. After all — “No rived in Street in 1969, it was obvi - one com poses mu sic with a name like ously the venue for his new ven ture, Ger man Jones my boy !” an op er atic so ci ety. Yet com pose he did, cre at ing a great deal of im - The exist ing Street & Glastonbury group were mensely like able theatre mu sic. To il lus trate this facet de ter mined to stay at the in ad equate Glastonbury of German’s talent Dr Moore’s talk was dis tin guished Town Hall, so Brendan and his colleagues de ter - by the pre sen ta tion of a re cent per sonal dis cov ery, a mined to strike out on their own. Their initial pro - re cord ing taken from an cient Ber liner disc. Di rect duc tion, a semi-staged ‘Gon do liers’, was a success, into its wax sur face is etched the num ber 570X (no and so the so ciety was formally consti tuted in the pa per la bels at this date !). It is joined by de tails of the autumn of 1970, with Brendan as music di rector. work, a date of 12/10/1898 and what looks very The com pany quickly de vel oped, and within a much like the sig nature of Ed ward Ger man him self. year or so were involved in a joint produc tion with Fur ther more, the per for mance (of the berceuse from the Op era Players, a profes sional group directed by ‘The Tempter’), shares many per for mance char ac ter is - Pe ter Gelhorn, chorus master at Glyndebourne. Pe- tics with a later and much better known set of ter’s mem o ra ble ad vice to Brendan, Metropole 78’s, dat ing from 1928 and known to “..we will at all times display out ward calm ..” have been di rected by the com poser. If the Ber liner is is a motto our speaker had never for got ten ! gen u ine it would rank as pos sibly the earli est com - Il lus trating the var i ous pro duc tions with very poser-conducted work on record and this was, Dr cred it able live re cord ings, Brendan gave us a fla vour Moore be lieved, its first pub lic per for mance. of such var ied fare as ‘Iolanthe’, ‘Traviata’ and ‘Die De spite being some five years youn ger than Fledermaus’ - the latter featur ing a Frosch com plete Elgar, both com pos ers ex hibit the same sense of nos - with broad York shire accent ! talgia and lost in nocence although , as our presenter By 1978 the company had pro gressed to in vit ing was at pains to stress, it is an in nocence shaded by its first profes sional producer, from the Bristol Old knife-edge dark en ing into mi nor to nal i ties. Vic thea tre School, to mount ‘The Bartered Bride’. Self-evi dent even in an early piano work such as Despite constantl y ar riving late, (with toy-boy in the ‘Pol ish Dance’, this char ac ter is tic be comes even tow!), she achieved much in re-thinking standards. clearer in ma ture pieces such as ‘Jill all alone’ (from Cer tainly an ex tract from the same year’s ‘Merry ‘Merrie Eng land’), and his orches tral master piece Widow’, fea tur ing so prano Mar ga ret Walters, ‘The Sea sons’. At the cli max of ‘Au tumn’ there is a showed that the com pany, what ever their dra matic bleak ness and pain far removed from the common short comings, were not short of strik ing vo cal tal- concep tion of Ger man’s music. A world order is un - ent. der threat, and German , like his distin guished col- Amongst the many highlights perhaps the league, real ised that cer tain val ues were go ing to be participation of Gillian Knight, well known to lost for ever. It is this, more than anything, that con - Covent Garden audiences, in a production of vinces Dr Moore of German’s stature, and that his ‘Carmen’ stood out for Brendan ...albeit that on one

FRMS 31 Regions

evening a low-cut dress meant that Miss Knight pieces played on other instru ments than the ones momentarily displayed more talent than anyone had they were written for. Bach was the promi nent com- bargained for! poser as we were of course re member ing the 250th Clearly a la bour of love, Brendan’s story of Strode anni ver sary of his death. We heard some very strik - Op er atic, il lus trated by fine re cord ings, ad mi ra bly ing adap ta tions of famil iar music, some intrigu ing showed that with hard work, remark ably high stan- and quite beauti ful. dards can be achieved in am ateur mu sic mak ing, Last, but by no means least we heard from Philip whilst at the same time gain ing much enjoy ment and Goodall, for merly of the BBC Re cord Li brary. He sat is fac tion along the way. certainly covered the cen tury from old 78s played on Here’s to the next 30 years... and in deed here’s to an old wind up gram ophone to the latest in tech nol- the next West Mid lands Confer ence!... now just ogy. We saw records made of cardboard, all differ - where did I put that rail ticket ? ent colours, one the size of our modern day CDs and Ian Bailey, Lewisham RMS / Orpington RMS very old sin gle-sided ones. The scratchy sound brought back mem o ries of child hood. The re cord - West Middlesex Group Festi val. ings were many and var ied, mainly of great sing ers he Seventh West Middlesex Festival was held of the twen ties and thir ties. One de light ful song was between October and December 2000. It was sung by the won der ful ac tress who played Janet, the Tentitled “Towards 2000” and was a Festival of house keeper in the TV se ries, Dr Finlay’s Case 20th Century Music, the period taking us towards Book. the year 2000 and the 21st Century. All in all we had a feast of mu sic and we covered The Fes ti val con cerns the seven so ci et ies of the the whole of the twen ti eth cen tury. group. The idea is to bring the so ciet ies of the group Una Szeux closer to gether. Alan Ball and Denis Jiggins pre- sented the programmes in turn around the soci et ies. Works pre sented cov ered a period from 1904 to THE FRMS YORKSHIRE REGIONAL GROUP 1996. Rachmaninov’s Pi ano Preludes to James ‘Cello ANNUAL SPRING MUSIC WEEKEND Saturday 28th to Monday 30th April 2001 conterto’. Composers included were from our own land, France, Germany, Russia, Sweden, the USA WILLIAM LLOYD WEBBER: A neglected genius and oth ers; Con certos, Symphonies, Song Cycles Dr Donald Webster and this year, for the first time, ex cerpts from op era. Writer, Lecturer and Yorkshire Post music critic Allan S. Ball. MOZART IN VIENNA: The final decade Terry Barfoot Yorkshire Regional Group Autumn Lecturer in Music at South Downs College

Meet ing. AN EVENING WITH LYNDON JENKINS Lyndon Jenkins he theme “Celebrating the Century” was Special Projects Manager, Symphony Hall chosen for the millennium year meeting held WE'LL HAVE MANHATTAN: Ton the 14 October 2000, hosted by Bradford. A musical survey of the Big Apple The meeting was held in the Quality Victoria Hotel, David Fligg and over seventy people attended. The morning Lecturer in Composition, City of Leeds Music College speaker was Geoff Bateman who entertained us with THE DUTTON TOUCH: The supreme magician of CD remastering a programme entitled “The Golden Age of Mike Dutton Recording”. We were treated with works very varied Dutton Laboratories by Mozart. Stravinsky, Britten and Borodin to name 100 YEARS OF THE DOG: but a few, not a CD in sight. All were played from Nipper and some significant HMV recordings Dennis Clark vinyl; we also learned how much some of these YRG Secretary precious L.Ps are worth and it made me wonder if at MUSIC FROM THE NORTHLANDS: some time in the past I may have given a fortune to Scandinavian Music charity shops. Tony Pook Our second speaker, after lunch, was John YRG Chairman Crabbe, a Beetho ven and Berlioz biog rapher and for - At a basic cost of under £100 this is probably the best mer ed i tor of Hi-fi News and Re cord Review. We Value-for-money Music Weekend available this year! Details from Dennis Clark, YRG Secretary heard such treats as Swin gles Mozart and Bach, 237 Tinshill Road, LS16 7BU Scarlatti played on piano accor dion, Mussorgsky played on Electronic syn the sizer plus many other

32 FRMS SOCIETIES

From the Societies... From the Societies...

The Berlioz Soci ety and focal point of the Society. You can imagine that he was a very hard act to follow and to be honest he Berlioz Society was founded by a small no-one else in the Society really wanted to take the group of Berlioz enthusiasts in London in job on. However although I am the youngest T1952. Its membership, which includes eminent member at fifty, having taken early retirement and Berlioz scholars and champions, now comes from having time on my hands I agreed to take on the job, around the world (Australia, Asia, Europe and North particularly as I have a lifelong love of music and America, as well as the United Kingdom). records. The Soci ety’s patron is Sir Colin Da vis, and its Happily ev ery one has been very sup port ive and pres i dent and chair man are, re spec tively, Jacques we have just had a very suc cess ful sea son. Fif teen Barzun and David Cairns. mem bers presented programmes, we had three very The main aims of the So ciety are: good guest speak ers, we had our mem bers eve ning l To bring to gether, and pro vide a focal point for, and our first programme was a tribute to Ger ald. We enthu siasts of the music and writings of Hector now have fifty-eight mem bers but in re cent years Berlioz; our prob lems have been those of de clin ing mem ber - l To dis sem i nate in for ma tion to the mem ber ship ship and of the dif fi culty in at tract ing youn ger mem - about all matters of in ter est con cerning Berlioz bers. I thought we were alone in this but in reading and his work; and earlier editions of the mag azine I found that all other l To fos ter a wider ap pre cia tion of Berlioz’s mu sic so ci et ies have the same prob lems! At our AGM we and to en cour age more fre quent per for mances of all agreed the season was a success so I am de lighted it. that the Soci ety is surviv ing and that it has now en - The So ci ety pub lishes a thrice yearly Bul le tin, tered a new, and I hope ex cit ing phase of its his tory. which is issued to indi vid u al and insti t utional mem - Andrew Golds, Chairman bers, and features scholarly arti cles and live perfor - mance re views as well as contri bu tions from Stoke-on-Trent Gram o phone So ci ety members. In ad di tion, the So ci ety has an ex ten sive The Mersey Beat multi-page website. It has pages de voted to the t 11.30 a.m. on 25th October 2000 a coach scores of Berlioz’s instru mental works and two il lus - rolled away from the Village Hall, trated sur veys of his home town, La Côte AWalton-on-the-Hill, carrying 17 members of Saint-André, and Paris, where he lived for most of his the local Music Circle. After picking up colleagues life. There are also ex ten sive sec tions pro vid ing a di - from the local Music Societies in Stafford, Stone, ary of events and perfor mances, publi ca tions, news Stoke-on-Trent and Nantwich (home base of The and re views; these are con stantly up dated. Many of South Cheshire RMS.), we headed for The the pages ex ist in both Eng lish and French ver sions. Philharmonic Hall in Liverpool. For fur ther in forma tion please visit the So ciety’s The sudden and sad death of Conduc tor David home page at: Shallon whilst tour ing Ja pan, and the conse quent www.standrews.u-net.com/BerliozSociety.html with drawal of his wife, Tabea Zim mer mann, who Or write to: was to have played Walton’s Viola Concerto, had Dr Monir Tayeb occa sioned changes to the orig inal programme. Ca - 31 Doocot Road na dian Pe ter Bergamin, Artis tic Di rec tor of The Vi - St An drews KY16 8QP enna Taschenoper since 1997, had stepped into the Scot land breach to con duct. The twenty-one year old vi olin - Email: [email protected] ist, Jack Liebeck, took on the solo spot, playing the For est RMS Men dels sohn Con certo. This meant re plac ing the orig i nal over ture, Men dels sohn’s ‘Ruy Blas’, with n July of last year the Forest Recorded Music the over ture to Bee tho ven’s ‘Egmont’. The fi nal Society completed its forty-third season. Last work, the very sat is fy ing Rachmaninov Sec ond Iyear the Society s future was in jeopardy as our Symphony, was retained. Chairman, Gerald Verrier, had died having been The afternoon started with the privilege of chairman for the past twenty-eight years. Gerald was relaxing in the best seats to observe the final a marvellous chairman, very much the central figure

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rehearsal before the evening’s concert. There seemed to be few specific problems to iron out, the rehearsal amounting to what was virtually a complete pre-run of the evening’s entertainment. It was interesting to see how many members of the orchestra stayed behind to run through something on their own after Peter Bergamin had formally terminated the rehearsal. Dur ing the tea-and-bis cuits break in the mid dle of the rehearsal we were in tro duced to Jack Liebeck, Leamington Czech and were amazed to find that his par ents live in Music Festival Stoke-on-Trent and that he had per formed at a local fes ti val there. Next time we will be on the look-out 4 - 9 May 2001 for him. All concerts at the Royal Pump Rooms The tour of the build ing was far more in ter est ing Leamington Spa than I ex pected, with its in fra structure set in the re- fur bished hall of 1995, still re taining some of the fea- You can hear works by Skroup, Smetana, Dvorak, tures of the sec ond Phil har monic Hall opened in Fibich, Janacek, Sevcik, Foerster, 1939. Reminders of its asso cia tions with his toric Novacek, Drlda, Kocian, Martinu, mu si cians of the past were still in ev idence. Of par tic - Schulhoff, Korngold, Haas, Slavicky, u lar inter est was a plaque acknowl edg ing the sup port Vilem Tausky, Klein, Sylvie Bodorova, of the fam ily of the actor Clive Swift, whose tal ents Pavel Novak and Hanus Barton range from Shake speare to the long suffer ing hus - Artists from the Czech Republic include the Martinu band of Hya cinth Bucket. An in ter est ing and moving and Janacek String Quartets, Lenka Skornickova, sur vival from the origi nal Phil har monic Hall, burnt Jitka Dobrilkova, Pavel Sporcl, Petr Jirikovsky and down in 1933, was a trib ute from this mar itime Phil - Juventus Wind Quintet har monic So ciety to the mu si cians who per ished in Plus British musicians specialising in Czech music: the Ti tanic. The Schubert Ensemble of London, Be fore the main event we en joyed a much wel - Victoria Soames and Pirasti Trio come, and varied de li cious buf fet, pro vided by the Also Choral Concert award-win ning ca ter ing di vi sion of the RLPS. at St Mary’s Church Warwick The at tendance at the re hearsal had not dimin - Saturday 5 May 7.45pm ished the antic ipa tion and ap pe tite for the con cert it - Lenka Skornickova soprano, Frances Bourne alto, self, as we took our seats in a packed concert hall. For Paul Thompson tenor, Leandros Taliotis bass, the sec ond time that day we en joyed the pol ished per - Petr Mateják violin, Helen Cole harp formance of Mr. Bergamin and the orches tra, and for Christopher Betts organ the sec ond time we re laxed into a seem ingly ef fort less The Scholars Choir, Chris Monks conductor and very mu si cal per for mance of Men dels sohn by the Includes Janacek’s Mass in E flat ex cel lent Jack Liebeck. By 10 o’clock we were heading back to the our 4 - 15 July 2001 vari ous homes in Staffordshire and Cheshire to regale the members of our vari ous soci et ies with the plea- sures of the day, which had cost us less than £25 per Artists invited include CBSO conducted by Sakari Oramo, head. St Petersburg Quartet, The Opera Group, Tony Baines; Secretary Opera Restor’d, The Burning Bush, Emma Bell, Fine Arts Brass Ensemble, Raphael Wallfisch, Fujita Piano Trio, Joanna MacGregor, The Hanover Band, Gabrieli Consort & Players and Academy of St Martin in the Fields

Pick up a copy of the Leamington Czech Music Festival leaflet at the Stratford Moat House during Please support our adver tis ers and quote the FRMS Annual Musical Weekend the Bul letin when you con tact them. For further details of both Festivals telephone the Festival Box Office on 01926 496277

34 FRMS CROSSWORD

Cross word 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 (Mainly Music!) By Hein and Margaret Kropholler

8 9 imbus Records have very 10 kindly sponsored this Ncrossword and will give a 11 12 13 prize of any CD from their catalogue to the winner.This will be chosen by a draw from all 14 15 16 17 18 correct answers received by the 19 editor before the 1st July. In the event of a correct answer not being received, the best attempt (at the discretion of 20 21 22 23 the editor) will win the award. If you are nearly there, 24 chance your arm! 25 26 ACROSS 6 It is the 100th anni ver sary of this famous opera composer. [8, 5] 27 8 makes; insists. [6] 9 Nowa days called “head voice” ! [8] 10 How many came at 4? Shostakovich knocked off orches - tra tion in 45 minutes. [3] 11 All great perform ers have these for the business side.[6] 12 Weird net changed to be useful for oboist[4, 4] Solution to Crossword from Edition 133 14 dream; make up.[7] C 16 Opera or ballet — pull it all together. [7] S A K B U T S B O O S E Y 20 Pop u lar Span ish dance. [8] A O R U S T E A 23 Henze bal let — Margot Fonteyn danced the lead role [6] 24 Lay; collec tion [3] L U D W I G B E E T H O V E N 25 His libretto for Stravin sky’s Oedipus Rex? [8] A I T A E E E K 26 French for bridge of stringed instru ment with ‘and’ lost turns into horse [6]. D E N O T E S A L L O N C E 27 Cav? Whose what? [8, 5] S B E T L R DOWN 1 Great opera composer as found in the index. [7, 1] T A R N H E L M O S C A R 2 One does this at Glyndebourne with both food and opera [6, 2] B L L E A S 3 Choose by changing poor fat. [3, 3, 1] E R A T O E A T S T O N E 4 All things are sup posed to do this includ ing music [6] 5 Stop. [6] L N K U H C 6 English harpsi chord ist, pia nist, composer and conduc tor C O N C E R T J C F B A C H [6, 7] 7 Bach adver tises cof fee here! [2, 4, 7] A A T R E T R A 13 For instance Katia and Maria Labeque. [3] N I C H O L A S W I S E M A N 15 Bolero on this? Torvill and Deane?[3] 17 Carrots for exam ple. [4, 4] T R G S E O B T 18 Staggered about like Coppelius. [8] O B E R O N F L A N D E R S 19 Wrote operas, overtures and retired early. [7] 21 Met sty is changed. [2, 4] 22 Die Fledermaus, a man or a mouse? [2, 1, 3]

Mar ga ret Kropholler Alas this is the last edition where Margaret was She was a mem ber of the Bramhall RMS and able to assist her husband Hein in the preparation of formerly a mem ber of Loughborough RMS. She the Crossword, as she died in January of this year served on the com mit tee of each so ci ety and made after a long illness. many presentations. Marga ret used to be a regu lar Margaret obtained a French degree and was at tender of the FRMS Mu si cal Week ends. She is fluent in several languages. Music has always been deeply missed by her very large num ber of friends one of her main interests and she was a fine amateur throughout the country. pianist.

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Fed er a tion of Re corded Mu sic So ci eties Ltd.

Website: www.musicweb.force9.co.uk/mu sic/frms/in dex.htm Pres i dent Ed ward Green field OBE MA (Cantab) Hon. GSM Vice Pres i dents J.R.Bulman; J. R. Shaw; M. B. William son Board Of fi cers Chairman: Allan Child, 12 Highfield Rd., Derby DE22 1GZ Tel:01332 332649 Vice-Chairman: Dr John Phillips, 19 Hogarth Ave, Brentwood CM15 8BE Tel: 01277 212096 Secretary: Peter Lerew, The Old School, Flatts Lane, Wombleton, York YO62 7RU Tel: 01751 432652 (Note. All Feder a tion matters should be addresse d initial ly to the Secre tary ) Treasurer: Reg Williamson, 67 Galleys Bank, Whitehill, Kidsgrove ST7 4DE Tel: 01782 782419 E-mail: regwilliam son @beeb.net Bulletin Editor: Arthur Baker, 4 Ramsdale Road, Bramhall, Stockport SK7 2QA Tel: 0161 440 8746 E-mail: [email protected] Technical Officer: Dennis Bostock, 16 Imperial Road, Huddersfield HD3 3AF. Tel: 01484 530978 Board/Com mit tee Keith Cheffins, 4 Morningside Courtyard, Prestbury, Cheltenham GL52 3BU Tel: 01242 571810 Cathy Connolly, 49 Landford Road, Putney, London SW15 1AQ Tel: 020 8785 6809 Margaret Dorothy, 25 Milton Avenue, Sutton, SM1 3QB Tel: 020 8661 6155 John Heyes, 46 Mayfield Drive, Newport PO30 2DR Tel: 01983 520885 Dr Len Mullenger, 95 Arnold Ave, Coventry CV3 5ND Tel: 024 7641 3867 Patrick Russell, Three Corner Park, Calstock PL18 9RG Tel: 01822 832245 Na tional and Regional Sec re taries E. Surrey G. Kellie , 42 Kaymoor Road, Sutton, Surrey. SM2 5HT Tel: 020 8642 3227 North East E Shepherd, 35 Elmfield Gardens, Gosforth, Newcas tle NE3 4XB Tel: 0191 285 7003 Scot tish Miss Isabel Page, 11 Re gent Place, Balfour St., Kirkcaldy, Fife KY2 5HE Tel: 01592 262727 S.E. London A.J. Walker, 13 Waterer House, Beck en ham Hill Road, Catford, London SE6 3PN Tel: 020 8461 1007 Sus sex A. Thomas, 5 Acacia Road, Willingdon Trees, Eastbourne BN22 OTW Tel: 01323 509518 W. Middlesex Mrs. P Jiggins, 140 Holylake Crescent, Ickenham, Middlesex UB10 8JH Tel: 01895 634485 W. Midlands G. Kiteley, 11 Ragley Crescent, Bromsgrove B60 2BD Tel: 01527 870549 W. Sur rey L.C. Warner, MBE The Stiles 22 Mar shall Road Godalming GU7 3AS Tel: 01483 417119 York shire D. Clark, 227 Tinshill Road, Leeds LS16 7BU Tel: 0113 267 1533

Registered in England No.700106. Registered Office: The Old School, Flatts Lane, Wombledon, York YO62 7RU

36 FRMS