The Music of Edmund Rubbra, by Ralph Scott Grover (Review)
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West Chester University Digital Commons @ West Chester University Music Theory, History & Composition College of Visual & Performing Arts 9-1994 The uM sic of Edmund Rubbra, by Ralph Scott Grover (review) Julian Onderdonk West Chester University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.wcupa.edu/musichtc_facpub Part of the Musicology Commons Recommended Citation Onderdonk, J. (1994). The usicM of Edmund Rubbra, by Ralph Scott Grover (review). Notes, Second Series, 51(1), 152-153. Retrieved from http://digitalcommons.wcupa.edu/musichtc_facpub/40 This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the College of Visual & Performing Arts at Digital Commons @ West Chester University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Music Theory, History & Composition by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ West Chester University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. 152 NOTES, September 1994 A hot tip: The Sorabji Archive, now five bra's working methods and of its evolution years old or so, is the only source for those over his career. He also makes frequent use wishing to acquire photocopies of the music of the Rubbra literature, printing sizable and the composer's writings, whether pub- portions not only of performance and lished or not. The address is: Easton Dene, record reviews, but of scholarly essays as Bailbrook Lane, Bath BA1 7AA, England. well. MARC-ANDR]HAMELIN The pity is that this excellently thorough Philadelphia book displays on nearly every page a de- fensive awareness of Rubbra's secondary stature. Like so many other studies of "mi- The Music of Edmund Rubbra. By nor" British composers, The Music of Ed- Ralph Scott Grover. Aldershot: Scolar mund Rubbra begins from the premise that Press; Brookfield, Vt.: Ashgate Pub- its subject has been accorded a "scandalous lishing, 1993. [xvii, 625 p. ISBN 0- neglect" (p. ix) and that there is a need to 85967-910-1. $74.95.] make amends. Fair enough. But when this then becomes the book's "argument," the Since the critical revisionism of the 1950s result is that the author's commentary be- and 1960s, British musical scholarship has comes imbalanced and his claims for the been torn between its progressive leanings composer exaggerated. Nowhere is this and the embarrassing facts of its conser- tendency more apparent (and more gall- vative past. That period saw the downfall ing) than in Grover's defense of Rubbra's of Ralph Vaughan Williams's reputation, "intuitive approach" to composition-his and witnessed the beginnings of a con- preference, fascinating in itself, for an es- certed attempt to raise British music out of sentially unmapped-out method of musical a presumed provincialism into a larger in- continuation. It is precisely this intuition, ternationalism. Benjamin Britten, and later we are told, which permits Rubbra's "imag- Michael Tippett, proved to be the favorites inative recognition of the possibilities in- in this critical reassessment, while previ- herent in his material," one which "causes ously "central" figures like Arthur Bliss and his music to unfold with that inevitability Edmund Rubbra lived on, still composing, that makes one realize its course could not in increasing obscurity. To be sure, the mu- have proceeded differently" (p. 31). So ex- sic of these more "conservative" figures still travagant a claim is gratuitous, and serves received some attention, but almost always only to raise doubts about the author's in a diminished context, and usually with credibility-a circumstance especially un- that air of special pleading so disastrous to fortunate in that such assertions over- sympathetic revaluation. shadow the occasional detached assess- In its sheer volume and wealth of detail, ment. (Grover, to be fair, can be directly Ralph Scott Grover's The Music of Edmund critical of Rubbra.) Where Grover really Rubbra signifies a bold attempt to assert goes too far, though, is in the treatment of Rubbra's importance in twentieth-century the Rubbra literature, which he blatantly English music. The first survey ever to ap- slants. Nearly every negative review of pear on the composer's oeuvre as a whole, Rubbra's music lacks "understanding and it assays the music in a big way, discussing sensitivity" (p. 187), and is greeted with his large output with remarkable thorough- "the contempt it deserves" (p. 65). Sym- ness. The book is divided into chapters that pathetic reviews, on the other hand, are examine the works by genre, beginning always "well thought out" (p. 99), "thor- with the symphonies and orchestral music, ough and thought-provoking" (p. 170), or progressing through the concertos and "perceptive" (p. 188). In so loading the chamber music, and ending with discussion dice, Grover belies his claim to have pro- of the choral music and the songs. Its com- duced an "objective study" (p. 592), and prehensiveness (evidenced by the inclusion undermines the book's intended aim-to of 278 music examples) extends to the na- spark sympathetic interest in Rubbra and ture of the analysis as well, which only to open an unprejudiced dialogue about rarely lapses into mere description. Draw- the composer. ing freely on Rubbra's own writings and Viewed from a larger perspective, how- on interviews he held with the composer, ever, it is possible to see the faults of Grover demonstrates an awareness of Rub- Grover's book as a reflection of the unique This content downloaded from 144.26.46.227 on Mon, 21 Sep 2015 19:23:36 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Book Reviews 153 predicament of British musical scholarship. ain's greatest composers, most perplexing. Its special pleading is as much the product Walton was certainly a major figure in of Grover's personal enthusiasm for Rub- twentieth-century music, but because he bra's music as it is of his frustration over wrote in a comparatively conservative id- the peripheral status accorded British mu- iom he has received much less attention sic as a whole. This is the real context in from scholars than the quality of his music which to view his inflated claims for Rub- might warrant. That situation may change bra's compositional method. The insistence as we depart this century and can view it that composers "can create important without the ideological blinkers that have works which rely more on intuition than often obscured our vision in the past. on a thought-out plan" (p. 73, emphasis This change in perspective will be aided added) is a defense, not just of Rubbra, but by the enterprising and assiduous efforts of of the viability of compositional approaches scholars like Stewart Craggs, who has per- alternative to central-European models. formed yeoman service with his source- Arguably, the book's exaggerations and in- books on British composers, the most re- discretions are themselves the product of cent of which is devoted to Walton. (Craggs the uncertainty and insecurity that have is already well known to devotees of British long marked the British musical scene. music for his bio-bibliographies on Richard In this respect, the highlighting of the Rodney Bennett [1989], John McCabe Rubbra literature gives the book an added [1991], and Arthur Bliss [1988], all pub- dimension of which Grover is possibly un- lished by Greenwood Press.) Nor is this his aware. The many printed reviews and crit- first foray into Walton studies. His thematic ical assessments of Rubbra, most of them catalogue of Walton's works (William Wal- dating from the 1930s through the 1950s, ton: A Thematic Catalogue of His Musical tell us less about his music than they do Works) was published by Oxford in 1977 about the conservative British musical es- and appeared in a second edition in 1990. tablishment that dominated those years. This new source book provides a perfect Again and again we read reviews praising complement to the earlier catalogue and Rubbra for being "simple and direct in ex- promises to lay a useful foundation for fu- pression" (p. 86), for being "sincere" (p. ture scholarship in the field. 118), for eschewing "today's violent and ex- In his foreword to Craggs's book, the otic fashions" (p. 147), for not letting "so- eminent Ralph Vaughan Williams author- phistication blind him to feeling" (p. 85). ity Michael Kennedy praises the author's As a document of that critical ethos-one "terrier-like persistence and pertinacity in that goes a long way towards explaining the tracking down facts and manuscripts, and music that twentieth-century Britain has unfailing devotion and enthusiasm for the produced- The Music of Edmund Rubbra is man and his music" (p. xi). That devotion a fascinating sourcebook of the period. The is evident in the painstakingly thorough irony is that Grover has not adequately treatment of the subject. measured the effects of that critical legacy, The book commences with a chronology nor of his indebtedness to it. listing the dates of significant events in Wal- ton's his and their JULIAN ONDERDONK life, works, premieres. Even casual of the re- New York University perusal chronology veals interesting details, such as his meeting with George Gershwin in May 1925, the William Walton: A Source Book. By performance by Hindemith of the Viola Stewart Craggs. Aldershot: Scolar Concerto in Berlin in January 1930 (with Press; Brookfield, Vt.: Ashgate Pub- Walton conducting), and his lunch with the lishing, 1993. [xiii, 333 p. ISBN 0- Queen (as a member of the Order of Merit) 85967-934-9. $69.95.] in November 1977. The ensuing chapter on manuscripts and Anyone who has felt the exhilaration of first editions is exhaustive. Craggs was the First Symphony, who has been enter- aided in his work by the fact that the lion's tained by the wry satire of Fafade, or who share of these manuscripts were in one lo- has exulted in the splendor of Belshazzar's cation when he prepared his catalogue.