118Booklet 24/1/08 21:11 Page 1 Also AVAILABLE on signumclassics Dvorákv Symphony No.8 Symphony No.9, From the New World Sapporo Symphony Orchestra / Tadaaki Otaka SIGCD110 Enjoy an extraordinary performance of two of Dvorák’sv best known symphonies, beautifully performed by Japan’s leading symphony orchestra under the baton of Tadaaki Otaka. Available through most record stores and at www.signumrecords.com For more information call +44 (0) 20 8997 4000 118Booklet 24/1/08 21:11 Page 3 ‘Don’t let them tinker with it, Billy - burn it!’ inoperable, malignant tumour in October 1933, ELGAR and Elgar’s death four months later. Symphony No. 3 I am hoping to begin ‘scoring’ the work very Pomp & Circumstance March No.6 shortly: I am satisfied with the progress made After the end of the Great War and most especially with the ‘sketch’ & I hope that the ‘fabric’ of the the death of his greatest supporter, his wife Alice, music is as good as anything I have done, - but in 1920, Elgar wandered into a creative no man’s naturally there are moments when one feels land. Over the next ten years he was to produce uncertain: however I am doing the best I can & up little music of substance, falling back on Edward Elgar (1857-1934) to the present the symphony is the strongest thing transcriptions, arrangements, some incidental I have put on paper. music and a few songs. Monetary concerns The sketches for Symphony No.3, elaborated by Anthony Payne surfaced: the cost of maintaining his home in the 1. Allegro molto maestoso [16.11] Elgar’s letter to John (later Lord) Reith, titan of the grand Edwardian fashion was at odds not only 2. Scherzo Allegretto [9.48] BBC and ultimate commissioner of the aging with the times but with the income Elgar was 3. Adagio solenne [15.05] composer’s Third Symphony, suggests that the receiving. Just as our world of digital downloads 4. Allegro [16.34] piece was well on its way to completion by is fraught with debacles over payments to February 1933. Indeed, just two months later, he composers and performers, so the nascent BBC was confident enough to begin correspondence radio broadcasts, record companies, publishing 5. Pomp & Circumstance March No 6 [8.41] with the BBC concerning the date of the first houses and collecting societies were often initially The sketches of Edward Elgar completed and performance and, intriguingly, mentions that he mistrusted by musicians. The BBC, The orchestrated by Anthony Payne should be able to ‘feed’ his publishers with Gramophone Company and the Performing Rights manuscript material in the near future. The very Society were just getting into their stride in the Total Timings [66.21] same day he suffered the first of a series of ‘bad 1920s and, and although Elgar was treated well, turns’ that forced him into a nursing home for financially and recording-wise, by the renowned examination and to take a step back from Fred Gaisberg of The Gramophone Company, promoting and continuing work on the symphony. relations with his publishers were on the wane, Sapporo Symphony Orchestra He was soon asking Reith, in a confidential letter, reflecting the decline in production of new Tadaaki Otaka conductor not to ‘refer publicly to the Symphony in any way at works, procuring of new commissions and of their present; we will wait to see what happens to me’. once attendant audience. As the decade dragged What happened was the diagnosis of an on for Elgar, the Cello Concerto in E minor of www.signumrecords.com - 3 - 118Booklet 24/1/08 21:11 Page 5 1919 looked increasingly likely to be his final It was to Reed that the terminally ill Elgar uttered Thereafter, newspaper speculation over the were an open invitation for Carice to sanction a major composition. the famous words, ‘Don’t let them tinker with it, progress of the symphony only mirrored Elgar’s similar reconstruction for her father’s unfinished Billy - burn it!’ That Billy Reed didn’t consign the own contradictory comments. The work was, in work, albeit a mightier task than dealing with But Elgar wasn’t quite ready to put down his pen sketches to the bonfire reflects not only his Elgar’s letters to friends, confidantes and curious Mahler’s almost entirely continuous draft. Efforts and the year 1930 saw the 72 year-old experiencing perception of Elgar’s state of mind at the time, but journalists variously ‘mythical’, ‘practically made by the BBC, with Carice’s endorsement, to something of an Indian summer, completing the also the fact that Reed seems to have been under complete’ and then uncertain - ‘whether you will realise Elgar’s material came to nothing. But, Severn Suite, Pomp & Circumstance March No.5 the impression that he had played through what ever hear more of Sym. III ... remains to be seen’. copyright was fast running out and the and the Nursery Suite in a matter of months. The he thought to be the complete work - complete at With a mass of sketch material, a handful of manuscripts would be free for all and sundry to fifth Pomp & Circumstance March, which was least in Elgar’s mind, and when he was at the pages in full score and no clear, continuous draft, tinker with come January 2005. Thus, Elgar’s heirs added to the earlier four marches forming Op.39, piano with Billy, if not actually annotated on what remained to be seen was whether a version took the laudable and sensible decision of is an admixture of freshly composed material and manuscript paper. of the work could ever see the light of a concert hall. commissioning Anthony Payne to complete an sketches from a generation before. Although not in ‘elaboration’ of the entire symphony in 1995. any manner a symphonic composition, this was The initial and prime force behind the symphony With Billy Reed saving the symphony’s sketches Payne had been aware of the sketches since 1972 his first work for large orchestra since the Cello was the dramatist and former music critic, George from the flames after Elgar’s demise, the and had since made radio programmes on the Concerto and Elgar pulled-out all of the stops in a Bernard Shaw, then in his pomp as the grand old composer’s daughter, Carice, together with the available material and his commitment to the brilliant orchestration, dedicating it to his good man of English letters. A year older than Elgar and BBC, prevented access for anybody seeking to piece was such that he had even completed the friend, the organist Percy Hull. It is clear that a recent recipient of the Nobel Prize for literature, complete the work in any form or manner. Before opening movement prior to any thought of a Elgar intended to write a set of six marches, but it Shaw was one of the few surviving acquaintances his death in 1942, Reed published a significant commission. Payne’s elaboration is most likely as wasn’t until 2006 that Anthony Payne completed who had the intellectual and artistic heft to hold number of the most important manuscript pages close to a true Elgar Symphony No.3 as we could the Pomp & Circumstance March No.6 in fine the grand old man of English music in his thrall. in magazine and book form with remarks ever hope to experience. It is immediately style. Percy Hull was later to hear, in his own In May 1930, thanking Elgar for the dedication of suggesting where each sketch might fit into an recognisable as Elgarian in style, length, breadth words, ‘quite a lot of’ the Third Symphony, with the the Severn Suite, Shaw, a bit tongue-in-cheek and overall symphonic scheme. Whatever Reed’s of utterance and purposeful progress. Working composer at the piano. And he was far from the a little peeved, continues, ‘I am really not worth a intentions, such publications could only serve to with 130 pages of, at times, quite disparate only personal friend to have been treated to symphony; but a Serenade, say ... that would be whet the appetite of budding completists sketches, Payne has delved deep, through his own extensive portions of the work. William Reed, a about my size’. Within two years, it was a everywhere. In the decades following Reed’s death, compositional style to seek out a possible outcome long time companion of the composer, and the forgiving, generous and persuasive Shaw who the BBC had already dabbled in radio programmes of the material and in doing so has produced a much-esteemed leader of the London Symphony had sparked the BBC into life, Reith into detailing other reconstructions, such as the remarkable work. A great success at the premiere Orchestra, worked on the sketches on numerous a commission. partial performing version of Mahler’s Tenth at the Royal Festival Hall, London, in 1998, with occasions with Elgar accompanying Reed’s violin. Symphony by Deryck Cooke in 1960. Such items the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Andrew - 4 - - 5 - 118Booklet 24/1/08 21:11 Page 7 Davis’s baton, the work has gone on to immense BIOGRAPHies international acclaim and is gradually assuming a well-deserved place in the symphonic repertoire of orchestras the world over. Sapporo Symphony Symphony No. 3 (Eroica) among other works, and Orchestra the first overseas concerts in the U.S. and © M. Ross Germany that he led during his tenure were also Tadaaki Otaka, Music Director highly commended. Hiroyuki Iwaki (1932 - 2006) Ken Takaseki, Permanent Conductor served as Permanent Conductor from 1975, Music Director and Permanent Conductor from 1978 and The Sapporo Symphony Orchestra, one of the finest Conductor Laureate from 1988 until he passed orchestras in Japan, was originally founded on July away in 2006.