Chan 9625 book cover.qxd 18/10/07 11:34 am Page 1 Chan 9625(2) CHANDOS CHAN 9625 BOOK.qxd 18/10/07 11:39 am Page 2 Vaughan Williams Hulton Deutsch The Pilgrim’s Progress The Royal Opera Chorus Terry Edwards chorus director The Orchestra of the Royal Opera House Vasko Vassilev concert master Richard Hickox Mark Packwood musical preparation Vaughan Williams and Lady Wilson at a rehearsal for The Pilgrim’s Progress 2 3 CHAN 9625 BOOK.qxd 18/10/07 11:39 am Page 4 Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872–1958) Judas Iscariot......................................................................................................................John Kerr Simon Magus......................................................................................................Christopher Keyte The Pilgrim’s Progress Worldly Glory ..............................................................................................................Neil Gillespie Morality in a prologue, four acts and an epilogue Madam Wanton........................................................................................................Rebecca Evans Libretto by Ralph Vaughan Williams after John Bunyan’s allegory with interpolations Madam Bubble ..........................................................................................Pamela Helen Stephen from the Bible and verse by Ursula Vaughan Williams Pontius Pilate ..........................................................................................................Donaldson Bell Usher ........................................................................................................................Francis Egerton John Bunyan................................................................................................Peter Coleman-Wright Lord Hate-Good ............................................................................................................Gidon Saks The Pilgrim ..................................................................................................................Gerald Finley Malice ............................................................................................................................Susan Gritton Evangelist ....................................................................................................................Jeremy White Pickthank............................................................................................................Anne-Marie Owens Superstition ..............................................................................................................Mark Padmore The Four Neighbours Envy ................................................................................................................................Jeremy White Pliable..........................................................................................................................Richard Coxon Obstinate ..............................................................................................................Roderick Williams Woodcutter’s Boy ..................................................................................................Mica Penniman Mistrust ............................................................................................................................Gidon Saks Mr By-Ends ................................................................................................................Richard Coxon Timorous ..................................................................................................................Francis Egerton Madam By-Ends ..............................................................................................Anne-Marie Owens First Shepherd....................................................................................................Roderick Williams The House Beautiful Second Shepherd ....................................................................................................Mark Padmore Shining Ones ....................................Rebecca Evans, Susan Gritton, Pamela Helen Stephen Third Shepherd ..........................................................................................................Jeremy White Interpreter..................................................................................................................Mark Padmore Solo Soprano............................................................................................................Rebecca Evans Watchful ................................................................................................................Roderick Williams Solo Alto ............................................................................................................Anne-Marie Owens Herald ......................................................................................................................Robert Hayward Solo Tenor ................................................................................................................Mark Padmore Voice of a Bird ..........................................................................................................Susan Gritton The Valley of Humiliation Celestial Messenger..........................................................................................Adrian Thompson Apollyon............................................................................................................................Gidon Saks Heavenly Being I ......................................................................................................Susan Gritton The Royal Opera Chorus Heavenly Being II ....................................................................................Pamela Helen Stephen Terry Edwards chorus director The Orchestra of the Royal Opera House Vanity Fair Vasko Vassilev concert master Lord Lechery ......................................................................................................Adrian Thompson Richard Hickox Demas ......................................................................................................................Jonathan Fisher 4 5 CHAN 9625 BOOK.qxd 18/10/07 11:39 am Page 6 COMPACT DISC ONE 1 Prologue: Bunyan in Prison 3:43 Vaughan Williams: The Pilgrim’s Progress Act I Ralph Vaughan Williams set his first music to John Bedford gaol. The vivid, direct and often trenchant 2 Scene 1: The Pilgrim meets Evangelist 10:38 Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress in 1906 for a prose, the symbolism and poetry of the work, make 3 Scene 2: The House Beautiful 14:38 dramatization at Reigate Priory. In a letter of October an immediate impact. The realism of many of the 4 Nocturne (Intermezzo) 8:26 1906, he outlined the music, including the characters, so recognizable from everyday experience, introduction of the psalm-tune York, in the prelude is aligned with strong reformatory messages focusing Act II and final chorus. Forty-five years later, in 1951, the on man’s spiritual journey to Eternity. The 5 Scene 1: The Arming of the Pilgrim 9:26 complete opera, or ‘Morality’ as the composer co-existence of Puritan faith with the day-to-day 6 Scene 2: The Pilgrim meets Apollyon 13:47 preferred to call it, was first performed at Covent weaknesses and fallibility of man engages and TT 60:39 Garden with that same glorious psalm-tune opening inspires us. and closing the work. That Vaughan Williams was engaged and inspired COMPACT DISC TWO Working on The Pilgrim’s Progress for at least by such qualities in the book is not in doubt. Like Act III forty-five years shows the depth of understanding Bunyan, Vaughan Williams was fascinated by man’s Scene 1: Vanity Fair and affection which Vaughan Williams had for search for spiritual salvation. In 1907, in Toward the 1 Chorus of Traders: ‘Buy! What will ye buy!’ 7:23 Bunyan’s allegory. His setting in 1921 of a ‘pastoral Unknown Region, Walt Whitman provided the source 2 Pilgrim: ‘I buy the truth!’ 11:17 episode’ from The Pilgrim’s Progress, called The for one of Vaughan Williams’s earliest attempts to 3 Scene 2: The Pilgrim in Prison 11:32 Shepherds of the Delectable Mountains, was his first capture this visionary impulse: opera to be staged. He worked on Acts I and II of the Darest thou now, O Soul, Act IV full opera in the 1920s and 1930s, and accepted a Walk out with me toward the unknown region… BBC commission in 1942 to write incidental music for In A Sea Symphony, completed in 1910, he sets 4 Scene 1: The Pilgrim meets Mr By-Ends 11:21 a production first broadcast the following year. This Whitman again, this time in an analogy between the 5 Entr’acte 2:42 contained thirty-eight sections of music, and voyager on the seas and the voyage of the human Scene 2: The Shepherds of the Delectable Mountains incorporated passages from the Fantasia on a Theme soul through life and beyond. Matthew Arnold, too, 6 First Shepherd: ‘Who so dwelleth…’ 8:15 by Thomas Tallis, a work which had associations with was a poet with a marked appeal to this visionary side 7 Voice of a Bird: ‘The Lord is my Shepherd’ 10:24 Bunyan in Vaughan Williams’s mind. By 1945, judging of Vaughan Williams’s temperament. He composed An 8 Scene 3: The Pilgrim reaches the End of 3:35 by a letter from Gerald Finzi to the composer, the Oxford Elegy, based on The Scholar Gipsy and Thyrsis, his Journey work was substantially complete, although revisions between 1947 and 1949, writing music of beauty and and additions continued until 1952. subtlety when setting such lines as: 9 Epilogue 3:19 Why was Vaughan Williams so