Richard Watkins horn

with tenor • piano Paul Watkins cello • The

SEA EAGLE works by Gerald Barry • • • David Matthews • Mark-Anthony Turnage • Huw Watkins RICHARD WATKINS horn

Peter Maxwell Davies: Sea Eagle 9’08 The Nash Ensemble 1 Adagio 4’05 Marianne Thorsen violin 2 Lento 3’33 3 Presto molto 1’30 Laura Samuel violin Lawrence Power viola Gerald Barry: Jabberwocky 5’44 4 Adrian Brendel cello

with Mark Padmore tenor • Huw Watkins piano Saunders photo: Keith Colin Matthews: Three of a Kind 9’34 5 Vivo 1’47 6 Largamente 1’13 7 Calmo 6’34 with Paul Watkins cello • Huw Watkins piano

8 Huw Watkins: Trio 12’48 with Laura Samuel violin • Huw Watkins piano David Matthews: Quintet for Horn and Strings (live recording) 13’13 9 Andante 7’57 10 Molto vivace 5’16 The Nash Ensemble

11 Mark-Anthony Turnage: Prayer for a great man 3’57 with Paul Watkins cello Robin Holloway: Trio for Horn, Cello and Piano 20’08 12 I Liberamente 11’33 13 II Poco allegro 8’35 with Paul Watkins cello • Huw Watkins piano Total timing 75’29

2 SEA EAGLE Introduction by Richard Watkins Matthews and Holloway, it’s certainly years have played in several of his a winning one. chamber works, most notably with the Nash, so when I discovered that his I met Peter Maxwell Davies when I Horn , and after prolonged David Matthews’ first piece for solo Cello Concerto, written for the joined the Fires of London, my first negotiations, it finally came to fruition horn was his Capriccio for Two Horns brilliant Paul Watkins, had a short professional experience in 1981. We with Esa-Pekka Salonen and the written for the occasion of my were touring two operas, The Philharmonia in 2001. Colin initially Philharmonia tribute to movement for cello and horn alone, it Martyrdom of St Magnus and The wrote the short Tanglewood Fanfare at the in 1991. It was seemed too good an opportunity to Lighthouse, both of which have for a recital at Kings Place with Huw immediately taken up and championed miss. We have included this with fiendishly difficult horn parts. I think it Watkins; he had also written a Horn by Barry Tuckwell amongst others, so Mark’s blessing and it is a truly was in Florence that Max approached Trio as a 50th birthday present for it made perfect sense when Amelia beautiful piece. me and asked if I might like to have a , which he arranged for Freedman commissioned David Gerald look at a ‘study’ he had written for horn, cello and piano and this, Finally the incomparable Matthews to write a Quintet, as a solo horn. I suggested that he might integrated with Tanglewood Fanfare, Barry: Jabberwocky was potential companion piece to the write some more, and the result is became Three of a Kind. Colin was commissioned by the Mozart Quintet K407. It was first Sea Eagle. Although considered by determined to be the first to write a to be performed in a series of performed at the Wigmore Hall in many at the time to be impossible, it’s piece for the Watkins Trio – although lunchtime concerts in 2013. It was a 2010 by the Nash Ensemble. now the contemporary set-piece for Robin Holloway may have a claim to wonderful opportunity to work with the prestigious Munich Horn this too! Another important Nash commission two great friends and performers – Competition! It has taken its place in is Huw Watkins’ Trio, premiered at Mark Padmore and Huw Watkins. We Robin had already written a Horn our repertoire and is regarded as a the Wigmore Hall in 2009. Huw and I rehearsed Jabberwocky on Skype Concerto for Barry Tuckwell (on NMC classic. have worked together for many years, before Gerald attended the first D097) as well as two challenging regularly playing his Trio. It is such an performances. The piece is My relationship with Colin Matthews Partitas for solo horn, so I was exciting, vibrant and challenging unmistakeable Barry with some also goes back a long way. I played in delighted when Huw Watkins came piece, now firmly established in the wonderfully idiomatic, and the premiere of his Suns Dance with across this previously unperformed repertoire. unconventional horn writing – another London Sinfonietta in 1985, an Trio for horn, cello and piano. It may treat! excitingly vibrant piece with a be an unusual combination but with I have always been a huge admirer of virtuosic horn part. We talked about a such different and exciting works by Mark-Anthony Turnage and over the © 2015 Richard Watkins

4 5 Peter Maxwell Davies Over the course of his career, the status of Son glaive vorpal en main il va- Als stand er tief in Andacht auf, Sea Eagle for solo horn Peter Maxwell Davies (b.1934) has changed T-à la recherche du fauve manscant; Des Jammerwochen’s Augen-feuer from enfant terrible to leading cultural figure at Puis arrivé à l’arbre Té-Té, Durch tulgen Wald mit wiffek kam Over the years Davies has written a number the heart of the British establishment. His Il y reste, réfléchissant. Ein burbelnd ungeheuer! of works for unaccompanied wind appointment in 2004 as Master of the Queen’s Pendant qu’il pense, tout uffusé, Eins, Zwei! Eins, Zwei! instruments, including The Kestrel Paced Music is a tribute to the revolutionary influence Le Jaseroque, à l’oeil flambant, Und durch und durch Round the Sun for flute, First Grace of Light he has had on the British contemporary music Vient siblant par le bois tullegeais, Sein vorpals Schwert for oboe, and The Seven Brightnesses for scene and the public’s perception of it. From Et burbule en venant. zerschnifer-schnück, clarinet. Sea Eagle dates from 1982, and his radical works of the 1960s, he has Da blieb es todt! Er, Kopf in Hand, developed a more conventional, but no less Un deux, un deux, par le milieu, was written for Richard Watkins, then horn Geläumfig zog zurück. player with The Fires of London. He gave startlingly original, idiom often drawing on the Le glaive vorpal fait pat-à-pan! the first performance at Dartington Summer music and landscape of the Orkney Islands Le bête défaite, avec sa têtre, Und schlugst Du ja den Jammerwoch? Umarme mich, mein Böhm’sches Kind! School in August that year. where he has lived since 1971. Il rentre gallomphant. O Freuden-Tag! O Halloo-Schlag! It is a virtuoso piece full of the kind of Gerald Barry As-tu tué le Jaseroque? Er chortelt froh-gesinnt. Viens à mon coeur, fils rayonnais! bravura writing, particularly the rapid Jabberwocky (2012) ascending runs, which is such a striking O jour frabbejeais! Calleau! Callai! Original text by Lewis Carroll for voice, horn and piano Il cortule dans sa joie. French translation by Frank L. Warrin (1931), German feature of Davies’s orchestral scores. The translation by Robert Scott (1872). first movement is the most varied in mood, Jabberwocky is a move from light to dark, Der Jammerwoch starting gently but working up to a from French to German; the horn, the Es brillig war. Die schlichte Towen Gerald Barry was born in Ireland in 1952. fortissimo climax marked by flutter-tonguing boatman who takes you there. Wirrten und wimmelten in Waben; His time in Germany with Stockhausen and and spectacular upward swoops. The Lento Und aller-mümsige Burggoven © 2013 Gerald Barry Kagel proved to be a liberating experience is a quiet, ruminative interlude before the Die mohmen Räth’ ausgraben. Le Jaseroque and he soon came to public attention in 1979 scherzo-like third movement. Here Davies Bewahre doch vor Jammerwoch! with two radical works, _____ and ø. exploits the horn’s capacity for nimbleness Il brilgue: les tôves lubricilleux Se gyrent en vrillant dans le guave Die Zähne knirschen, Krallen kratzen! and rapid articulation, and explores the Barry’s surreal, virtuosic music is Enmîmés sont les gougebosqueux, Bewahr’ vor Jubub-Vogel, vor instrument’s entire range, sending it down to unmistakable in his five operas and wide body Et le mômerade horsgrave. Frumiösen Banderschnätzchen! its very lowest register before taking it up to of works for ensemble, orchestra, and choir. the stopped high G, the highest note in the Garde-toi du Jaseroque, mon fils! Er griff sein vorpals Schwertchen zu, Recent works include a Piano Concerto entire work, on which it ends. La gueule qui mord; la griffe qui prend! Er suchte lang das manchsam’ Ding; (2012) for Nic Hodges jointly commissioned Garde-toi de l’oiseau Jube, vite Dann, stehend unten Tumtum Baum, by the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen © 2014 Michael Wheeler Le frumieux Band-á-prend. Er an-zu-denken-fing. Rundfunks and the City of Birmingham

6 7 Symphony Orchestra. His most recent opera, Richard and Huw’s Tanglewood Fanfare; a Producer of NMC Recordings, and has also Watkins’ growing body of orchestral works The Importance of Being Earnest (2010), reflective linking passage for Paul and Huw produced recordings for many other major includes his widely acclaimed Violin Concerto was commissioned by the Los Angeles leads to the extended third section, for all labels. (2011) and Flute Concerto (2014); among Philharmonic and the Barbican, and first three, which is a substantial reworking of a his chamber music is the Cello Sonata for presented, to huge acclaim, in the concert piece originally written for viola and piano in Huw Watkins Paul Watkins, Partita for , a hall. In 2013 it had three new productions by 1999, Calmo. I’m now on the lookout for Trio for horn, violin and piano viola Fantasy for Lawrence Power, and the L’Opéra National de Lorraine, Royal Opera more Watkinses. recent for the Carducci House and Northern Ireland Opera; a The idea to write a horn trio came to me Quartet. Music Theatre Wales has recording of the London performance with the © 2014 Colin Mattthews after giving a concert with Richard Watkins commissioned two chamber operas with Birmingham Contemporary Music Group libretti by David Harsent: Crime Fiction and In Born in London in 1946, Colin Matthews and David Alberman which included the conducted by Thomas Adès was released by the Locked Room, a co-commission with read Classics at the University of Nottingham, Ligeti and Brahms horn trios. When Amelia NMC (on NMC D197) in 2014. He is Scottish Opera. Watkins’ 2013 disc of and then studied composition there with Freedman asked me to write a new piece currently writing his sixth opera, Alice’s chamber music on NMC (NMC D164) has Arnold Whittall and Nicholas Maw. In the for the Nash, I immediately thought of the Adventures Under Ground. been highly praised. 1970s he taught at the University of Sussex, ease with which Richard played the Ligeti, where he obtained a doctorate for his work on Colin Matthews which must be one of the most challenging David Matthews Mahler, an offshoot of his long collaboration pieces in the repertoire, and knew that I Three of a Kind with Deryck Cooke on the performing version wanted to write something new for him. My Quintet for horn and string quartet for horn, cello and piano of Mahler’s Tenth Symphony. During this trio is in a single movement and lasts about I composed my Quintet Op.114 for horn period he also worked at Aldeburgh with Three of a Kind owes its origin to a piece 12 minutes. It alternates fast, driven music, and string quartet between July and Benjamin Britten and Imogen Holst. for Richard Watkins which I wrote at always going forward, with slower, more October 2010 for the Nash Ensemble. Tanglewood in 2009. At the first Matthews has completed many major works reflective passages. There are, surprisingly, few pieces written performance his accompanist was Huw for ensemble, including Suns Dance and for horn and string quartet, and none of Watkins, and when a review misidentified Contraflow for the London Sinfonietta; © 2009 Huw Watkins them are in the repertoire (Mozart’s Horn them as brothers, it made me want to Hidden Variables, ... through the glass and Huw Watkins was born in Wales in 1976 and Quintet, the only one that is at all well include Paul Watkins, Huw’s real brother, in Continuum for the Birmingham Contemporary studied piano at Chetham’s School of Music known, has one violin and two violas). Music Group; and The Island (2007) for the a ‘Watkins Trio’. Although works for violin, and composition with Robin Holloway, Nicholas Maw, my friend and mentor for 40 Nash Ensemble and soprano Claire Booth. horn and piano form a distinct repertoire, I and at years, had been intending to write a horn couldn’t find any examples of works for the Colin Matthews is active as administrator of Cambridge and the . quintet for the Nash Ensemble, but had not attractive combination of cello, horn and the Holst Foundation, chair of the Britten In 2001 he was awarded the Constant and done so by the time of his death in 2009. piano. (I didn’t know that Robin Holloway Estate, and trustee of the Britten-Pears Kit Lambert Junior Fellowship at the Royal So I have dedicated my own Quintet to his had beaten me to it.) The piece begins with Foundation. He is founder and Executive College of Music. memory.

8 9 The Quintet is in two movements, slow and David Matthews (b. 1943) read Classics at The Concerto is in general lightly scored; Tassie, premiered in 2000 by English National fast, separated by a cadenza for the horn. the University of Nottingham before spending and the fourth of the five movements is a Opera; trumpet concerto From the Wreckage The first movement is an Andante in sonata three years as an assistant to Benjamin duet for cello and horn. Called ‘Prayer for a (2005) for soloist Håkan Hardenberger; and form, whose first and second subjects are Britten. He was Music Advisor to the English great man’, it is based on a piece that his third opera, Anna Nicole, premiered at the unified by their prominent use of major and Chamber Orchestra for many years and Turnage wrote in the spring of 2010 for the Royal Opera in London in 2011 and revived in minor thirds. At the end of the movement I Artistic Director of the Deal Festival. funeral of his father-in-law Neil Swallow, a 2014. His ballet scores include UNDANCE quote a passage from Maw’s orchestral Matthews has been much concerned with pioneer of dentistry for children and the (2011) for Sadler’s Wells, recorded by NMC working in the great inherited forms of the (NMC D194), and Trespass (2012) for the work, The World in the Evening, one of my disabled and, the composer says, ‘an past and with finding new ways of renewing Royal Ballet. favourite moments in his music, where a inspiring man’. (The whole Concerto is them. Dubbed one of Britain’s ‘most theme for the violins (which I have given to dedicated to his memory.) The horn begins Turnage is Research Fellow in Composition at prodigious symphonists’, he has written seven in an accompanying role, but later takes on the Royal College of Music, and published by the horn) is projected over superimposed to date, together with twelve string quartets. Boosey & Hawkes. Works written before triads of E major and F minor. The cadenza Chamber works include commissions by the an equal share of the wide-ranging melodic 2003 are published by Schott. that follows changes the mood from what Schubert Ensemble, the Brodsky Quartets writing. up till now has been thoughtful and and the Nash Ensemble. © 2014 Anthony Burton somewhat melancholic music to a new, Robin Holloway brighter energy: the second movement Mark-Anthony Turnage Born in Britain in 1960, Mark-Anthony Trio for horn, violin and piano Turnage begins Molto vivace with a theme again studied with and This trio for horn, cello and piano, Prayer for a great man Gunther Schuller. With the encouragement of based on major and minor thirds, in composed in 2010-11, is the second of for cello and horn Hans Werner Henze, he wrote his first opera, characteristic ‘hunting’ rhythms. Contrasting three to combine a wind and a string Greek, which received a triumphant premiere music based on a cantabile phrase is Mark-Anthony Turnage’s Cello Concerto instrument with piano, both for compatibility in 1988. The many ensuing productions gradually introduced. The momentum is was written in 2010 in response to a joint and for contrast: the first pairing was viola worldwide established Turnage’s international interrupted twice, first by a recapitulation of commission of the Royal Flemish and clarinet, the third oboe and violin. With reputation. The important works that followed the cadenza, over a cello pedal note, then Philharmonic, the Royal Liverpool – Three Screaming Popes, Kai, Momentum all three, the charm and challenge lies in by a shadowy reference to the first Philharmonic Society, the Tampere the fact of the two line-instruments sharing Philharmonic Orchestra in Finland and the and Drowned Out – stemmed from a four- movement. At the last resumption of the year period as Composer in Association with roughly the same tessitura, thus permitting Molto vivace, the music becomes more and Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra. The solo all kinds of interweaving and interplay part was conceived for Paul Watkins, the the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra more exuberant until finally bursting into a and Sir Simon Rattle, from 1989 to 1993. across the same space with their utterly full statement of the cantabile music, now soloist throughout the first round of different timbres. performances (and a former colleague of unified into a long arch of C major melody. Among his major works are Blood on the Floor Richard Watkins in the Nash Ensemble – for Ensemble Modern with John Scofield, Peter The horn and cello combination shows this © 2010 David Matthews though no relation). Erskine and Martin Robertson; The Silver from the very start, as they exchange free-

10 11 floating, fluidly expressive lines without acclaimed Second Concerto for Orchestra Richard Watkins harmonization, gradually overlapping, and (1979), NMC’s recording of which won a Richard Watkins is one of the most sought- Richard Watkins has a long association with Gramophone Award, and the Double eventually coalescing on a unison after horn players of his generation. He was Aldeburgh Music, first performing Britten’s Concerto (1987-88) written for the London introducing the first movement’s second half: Principal Horn of the Sinfonietta. Other works demonstrate a Serenade with Sir Peter Pears in 1983. Since a long, dark-hued adagio, initially for piano for twelve years, and is currently a member of radical liaison with Romanticism and tonality, then he has appeared regularly as soloist and alone. After its apparent end, the horn and the Nash Ensemble and a founder member of namely Scenes from Schumann (1969-70), recitalist, performing by Colin cello gently steal in, and all three work up to London Winds. the opera Clarissa (1976), and Seascape and Matthews and Oliver Knussen as well as an impassioned climax, dying down into a Harvest (1983-4). Richard has appeared at many of the world’s Britten’s Serenade, Canticles and works for broadened yet foreshortened restatement of most prestigious venues in the UK, Europe and solo horn. He has been actively involved with Recent works include a Fourth Concerto for the piano’s opening melody. The second the USA, and has worked with conductors the Britten-Pears School, coaching and giving Orchestra premiered by the San Francisco movement begins in solemn mysterious such as Giulini, Sawallisch, Salonen, Sinopoli, master-classes. He has also recorded Symphony under Tilson Thomas in 2007, introduction, clearing into a vigorous rondo – Rozhdestvensky, Sir and Sir Britten’s Serenade with Allan Clayton and RELIQUARY, incorporating music by maybe rather ‘Hungarian’ in idiom; this is Mark Elder. In recital, he regularly performs Aldeburgh Strings, and recently directed the Schumann for the 2010 BBC Proms, and a with singers such as John Mark Ainsley, Ian inaugural Britten-Pears Brass Week. punctuated twice more by the introduction’s Fifth Concerto for Orchestra premiered at the Bostridge and Mark Padmore, and with return, before a long gradual animato which 2011 BBC Proms. Robin Holloway is Richard Watkins holds the Dennis Brain Chair pianists , Julius Drake, Paul raises the bass semitone by semitone, to published exclusively by Boosey & Hawkes. of Horn Playing at the Royal Academy of end the whole piece in the, at last, Lewis, Roger Vignoles and Ian Brown. Music, where he is also a Fellow. His unambiguous E-major which had been Closely associated with promoting extensive discography includes recordings of implicit from the very first note. contemporary music for the horn, Richard has concertos by Mozart, , Glière, given premieres of concertos by Maxwell Ethel Smyth and Colin Matthews, as well as © 2014 Robin Holloway Paul Watkins is an exclusive artist Davies, Osborne, Lindberg, Muldowney, Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante and chamber Robin Holloway (b.1943) sang as a chorister of Chandos Records and appears LeFanu, and both Colin and David Matthews. music for horn by Schumann, Schubert and at St Paul’s Cathedral and studied by their kind permission. Recent premieres have included Colin Poulenc. Recent releases include the Britten composition with Alexander Goehr as a Matthews’ Horn Concerto and Trio, quintets Canticles with Mark Padmore (Wigmore Live), by James MacMillan, David Matthews and Edward Gregson’s Horn Concerto with the teenager. He was a lecturer in music at Information about the artists and Cambridge University from 1975 to 2011, Mark-Anthony Turnage, and trios by Huw BBC Philharmonic (Chandos) and Alexander teaching a generation of composers composers on this disc can be Watkins, Alexander Goehr and Gerald Barry. Goehr’s Largo Siciliano (NMC D187). including and Thomas Adés. found on NMC’s website: His earlier orchestral works include the First www.nmcrec.co.uk Concerto for Orchestra (1969), the much

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