GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL CC 9127 GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL male lead in The Bear for Hemsley, who played it under the composer on BBC Television in George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) 1970. His book Singing and Imagination is a lucid guide to his finely-honed art. = `çåÅÉêíç=áå=_JÑä~í=ets=OVQ=léK=Q=kçK=S=ENTPSF= NNKNN Geraint Jones (1917-98). The son of a Glamorgan minister, Jones studied at the Royal 1-3 I Andante allegro 3.53 2 II Larghetto 4.31 3 III Allegro moderato 2.53 Academy of Music before being rejected for World War II service on grounds of poor health. Osian Ellis, harp. The Boyd Neel Orchestra directed by Thurston Dart Determined to ‘do his bit’, he made his debut as a harpsichordist in 1940 at one of Myra Hess’s A BBC studio broadcast, 26 February 1957 National Gallery concerts, later touring widely with his wife, the violinist Winifred Roberts. After the war he became highly influential in the ‘authentic’ baroque movement, forming his own = ^éçääç=É=a~ÑåÉ=ets=NOO=ENTNMF= QPKMR orchestra for the acclaimed performances at London’s Mermaid Theatre in 1951 of Dido and Aeneas, with Kirsten Flagstad and Thomas Hemsley. Jones’s many recordings included Dido 4 Recitative and Aria Apollo ‘La terra è liberata … Pende il ben dell’universo’ 5.18 (The earth is set free … The good of the universe) with those singers (plus Elisabeth Schwarzkopf as Belinda and Arda Mandikian as the 5 Recitative and Aria Apollo 3.54 Sorceress) as well as music by Bach, Handel and Mozart. He was internationally esteemed as ‘Ch’il superbetto Amore … Spezza l’arco e getta l’armi’ an organ designer. As a teacher, his protégés included Stephen Kovacevich, Hartmut Holl and (Cupid in his sweet pride … Break your bow and throw away your weapons) the singer Mitsuko Shirai. 6 Aria Dafne ‘Felicissima quest’alma’ (Happiest is the soul) 5.48 7 Recitative Apollo and Dafne ‘Che voce! che beltà!’ (What a voice, what beauty!) 6.39 Arda Mandikian (1924-2009) was born in Smyrna, Turkey to Armenian parents who Aria Dafne ‘Ardi, adori, e preghi in vano’ (Burn, adore and beg in vain) fled the country to escape persecution. Mandikian studied at the Athens Conservatoire under Recitative ‘Che crudel!’ (How cruel!) Elvira de Hidalgo, making her operatic debut there aged 15 with fellow-pupil Maria Callas. In Duet Apollo and Dafne ‘Una guerra ho dentro il seno’ (A war rages in my breast) 1948 she travelled to Britain, where her performances of Greek music written over two millennia, 8 Recitative and Aria Apollo ‘Placati al fin, o cara … Come rosa in su la spina’ 3.35 from the Delphic Hymns to modern arrangements by the scholar-composer Egon Wellesz, (Calm down, my dear one … Like the rose upon its thorn) impressed the critics through her authoritative vocal personality. By 1953 she was singing 9 Recitative and Aria Dafne 5.10 character roles at Covent Garden (Peter Grimes and Le Coq d’or) and in Paris; and two years ‘Ah, ch’un Dio … Come in ciel’ (Ah, a God should follow … As in heaven) later Britten framed the role of Miss Jessel in The Turn of the Screw around her gleaming, steely 10 Recitative and Duet Apollo and Dafne 3.13 power and awe-inspiring presence, so that (in John Amis’s words) ‘it sounds like Arda, whoever ‘Odi la mia ragion! … Deh, lascia addolcire quell’aspro rigor’ sings it’. She returned to Greece for family reasons in the 1960s, eventually becoming deputy (Hear my reason! … Oh, soften that harsh severity) director of the Athens Opera Centre and Greek National Opera. 11 Recitative Apollo and Dafne, Aria Apollo 3.10 © Christopher Webber, 2020 ‘Sempre t’adorerò! … Mie piante correte’ (‘I will always adore you! … My feet run’) Transfers from acetate discs by Norman White and Adrian Tuttenham 12 Recitative and Aria Apollo ‘Dafne, dove sei tu? … Cara pianta’ 6.25 Sourced from the Itter Broadcast Collection (Dafne, where are you? … Beloved tree) Cover image: Apollo pursuing the nymph Daphne Theodoor van Thulden (1606-1669) 2 7 GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL CC 9127 GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL Thurston Dart (1921-71). Surbiton-born, Robert Thurston (‘Bob’) Dart studied keyboard Thomas Hemsley, baritone Arda Mandikian, soprano at the Royal College of Music and completed a maths degree at Exeter University before serving The Geraint Jones Orchestra conducted by Geraint Jones as a statistician with the RAF Strategic Bombing Planning Unit. Despite barely escaping with his A BBC live concert broadcast from the Royal Festival Hall, 10 January 1955 life after a 1944 plane crash, he studied musicology in Belgium while convalescing and later became a music research assistant at Cambridge University. Rapidly gaining a permanent post, = `çåÅÉêíç=dêçëëç=áå=_JÑä~í=ets=PNO=EÄÉíïÉÉå=NTNMJNTOQF= UKNU he was made a professor there in 1962. Two years later he became King Edward Professor of 13-15 I Allegro 2.53 II Largo 3.56 III Allegro 1.36 Music at London University, where he remained until his untimely death from stomach cancer. The Boyd Neel Orchestra Directed by Thurston Dart, harpsichord Despite a prodigious workload as concert harpsichordist, fêted recording artist, conductor and A BBC studio broadcast, 26 February 1957 scholar of ‘authentic’ performance practice, perhaps his chief legacy was the enthusiasm he inspired in his many pupils – not least Michael Nyman, Davitt Moroney, Christopher Hogwood = pçë~êãÉI=çéÉê~=ets=PM=^Åí=OI=ëÅÉåÉ=ufff=ENTPOF= 6.37 and John Eliot Gardiner. Fifty years after his death, his reputation is undiminished. 16 Recitative (Elmira and Sosarme) and Aria (Sosarme) ‘Mio sposo … In mille dolci modi’ (My husband … In a thousand sweet ways) Osian Ellis (b.1928). Born in Ffynnongroyw, Flintshire, Ellis studied with Gwendolyn Alfred Deller, counter-tenor Margaret Ritchie, soprano Mason (whom he later succeeded as Professor) at the Royal Academy of Music. Establishing The Saint Cecilia Orchestra, Thurston Dart, harpsichord his name during the 1950s, he won a Grand Prix du Disque for his 1959 recording of Handel’s conducted by Anthony Lewis Harp Concerto and became Principal Harpist for the London Symphony Orchestra the following Excerpt from the studio performance broadcast by the BBC, 1 February 1955 year. He was a founder member of the Melos Ensemble, with whom he made perhaps the classic recording of Ravel’s Introduction and Allegro, and has had many works specially written for him. Ellis is particularly known for his fruitful musical association with Benjamin Britten, who Apollo e Dafne – synopsis wrote numerous operatic harp parts with him in mind – not to mention a quantity of original song [4] Having freed earth by defeating the giant serpent Python, Apollo boasts that universal cycles and arrangements to be performed with Peter Pears, and the solo Harp Suite (Op. 83), peace relies on his protecting bow. [5] The little God of Love can’t match him, for one dead which pays tribute to Ellis’s Welsh roots. He is also a celebrated penillion singer. monster is worth more than a thousand wounded lovers: Cupid should break his bow, as Apollo’s arrows are stronger. [6] Dafne reflects on the blest freedom of a soul free from Thomas Hemsley (1927-2013) was born in Coalville and commenced his musical worldly love. [7] Apollo is smitten, but Dafne replies that virginity is sacred to Diana (also training at Leicester Cathedral. Studying at Oxford on an RAF scholarship, he did his national called Cynthia), the Goddess of the wood. As he is Cynthia’s elder brother, pleads Apollo, service teaching physics to pilots, after which a vicar-choral post at St Paul’s Cathedral enabled she should obey him instead. Dafne rejects his passion, and though in a battling duet he him to train privately as a baritone with Lucie Manén. In 1951 came the golden opportunity to threatens to take her by force, she stands firm. sing Aeneas opposite Kirsten Flagstad’s Dido in Purcell’s opera, conducted by Geraint Jones at the Mermaid Theatre. His clarion tone and immaculate diction were immediately recognised, [8] Switching from tyranny to charm, Apollo praises Dafne’s perfection, warning her gently leading to contracts at Glyndebourne and with many companies in Germany, culminating in two that a rose must be plucked before it loses its bloom. [9] She chides him for behaviour seasons as Beckmesser at the Bayreuth Festival. He created roles for Britten (Demetrius, A unworthy of the God, whose reason should hold love in check. [10] In another duet, Apollo’s Midsummer Night’s Dream) and Tippett (Mangus, The Knot Garden), while Walton wrote the 6 3 GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL CC 9127 GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL demands become more fevered, while Dafne asks for death rather than submit to his lust. performance in June 1710 at the court of the Elector of Hanover (soon to be George I of [11] She flees, and he pursues her. At the moment of capture, Dafne is transformed into the England) it lay forgotten, although the composer recycled its melodic material in many of his Laurel. [12] Paying homage to her beauty and fortitude, Apollo sings sadly that he will water operas, from Rinaldo (1711) onwards. Not until some revelatory post-war revivals instigated the tree with his tears, and crown the greatest heroes with her branches: though he cannot by Dart – including a 1951 recording with Bruce Boyce and Margaret Ritchie under Anthony hold Dafne in his arms, at least he may wear her on his brow. Lewis, and this Royal Festival Hall broadcast conducted by Geraint Jones four years later – did Apollo e Dafne take a regular place in the baroque repertoire.