CD/SACD Towards Silence Towards Silence was composed in 2007 and jointly Medici some years earlier, within a couple of days commissioned by The Music Mind Spirit Trust and I none the less found myself undertaking a For Four String Quartets and The Rubin Museum, New York. commission together with a World Premiere arranged for New York (The Rubin Museum) and Large Tibetan Temple Bowl Earlier that same year I was delighted to be invited a UK 1st performance programmed for ‘Art and to publicly interview Sir John both about his musical Mind’ in Winchester Cathedral! Sir John Tavener compositions and his spiritual influences. Working with an inspirational drive and energy During our quite extensive preparation we discovered John immediately set about composing the piece, a mutual interest in the possible relationships of only to collapse, very seriously ill just a few days near-death experience to Spirituality and Creativity. after its completion. Having set up the initial It was therefore entirely natural that I introduced performances and funding a few weeks later I 1 Towards Silence – For Four String Quartets and Large Tibetan Temple Bowl [33.45] him to my friend, eminent neuro-psychiatrist Dr. was also taken gravely ill and so also underwent I Vaishvanara (0.00) Peter Fenwick who is a leading authority on the the horrors of months in intensive care followed II Taijasa (4.59) subject. Our onstage dialogue took place following by an endlessly slow gradual recuperation. Both a particularly stimulating and thought-provoking still desperately weak we only managed to speak III Prajna (11.10) conversation between the three of us. again by phone about 6 months later and agreed, IV Tur ya (19.20) that if God spared us we would try and meet It is perhaps not then so surprising that towards at Winchester. the end of our wide ranging public conversation John suddenly announced his desire to compose Miraculously we did and the Church authorities a work about near-death experience. It was also with great compassion closed the cathedral so immediately clear to me that this represented that we could perform Towards Silence for John a long held aspiration, fully formed and utterly alone on the afternoon of the concert. Medici Quartet internally conceived. Finzi Quartet Professor Paul Robertson Cavaleri Quartet Whilst, quite truthfully, insisting that such a (founder leader of the Medici String Quartet and Fifth Quadrant project (for four quartets and temple bowl) sadly joint ceo of the Music Mind Spirit Trust) could not include me as I had ceased playing in the www.signumrecords.com - 3 - a note from sir john tavener BIOGRAPHies Towards Silence was inspired by reading René Musically I have tried to express these States of SIR JOHN TAVENER once again came firmly into the limelight, when Guéron’s book Man and his becoming according Atma by using four string quartets sounding unseen the Proms premiere of The Protecting Veil to the Vedanta. From an exoteric sense the work from high galleries, with a large Tibetan temple bowl John Tavener first came to public attention in introduced his music to a new audience. The opera may be seen as a meditation on the different sounding every nineteen beats (symbolising the 1968 with the premiere of his oratorio The Whale Mary of Egypt, premiered at the Aldeburgh Festival states of dying, but from an esoteric sense it is a nineteen mouths) in the first three States, and at the inaugural concert of the London Sinfonietta. in 1992. The same year, a major documentary, meditation on the four States of Atma: then pulsing ‘eternally’ in the last, unconditioned The Beatles subsequently recorded this on their ‘Glimpses of Paradise’ was broadcast on BBC2. State. I have used five revolving ideas which start Apple label. His 50th birthday year was marked in 1994 by I Vaishvanara: the Waking State, which has in the first State as the shortest, the most complex the BBC’s Ikons Festival, as well as another knowledge of external objects and which has and the most manifest. In the second, ‘Dream State’ Although Tavener’s avant-garde style of the major Proms commission - The Apocalypse. In nineteen mouths, and is the world of gross the length is increased mathematically and is twice seventies contrasts with the contemplative beauty 1997, the performance of Song for Athene at the manifestation. (Mandakya Upanishad 1.3) the length of the first State, as sound is less complex of his works for which he is best known, the seeds of close of Princess Diana’s funeral showed that and less manifest. The third State (Deep Sleep) is the language he would later adopt were in evidence the profound effect of his music reached far II Taijasa: the Dream State, which has knowledge a kind of ‘halo’ of still sound, and is mathematically from an early stage. Some of his first published beyond just the concert-going public. of inward objects, which has nineteen mouths, and three times the length of the first State. The final compositions, notably Thérèse (1973) commissioned whose domain is the world of subtle manifestation. State is the longest, the quietest and the most by the Royal Opera House and A Gentle Spirit The premiere of A New Beginning played out the (Mandakya Upanishad 1.4) full statement of the five revolving ideas, and it is (1977) after the short story by Dostoyevsky, showed final minutes of 1999 in London’s Millennium played muted, at the very threshold of audibility, that spirituality and mysticism were to be his Dome; on 4 January 2000, Fall and Resurrection III Prajna: the Condition of Deep Sleep. When the which finally leads to silence. primary sources of inspiration. was premiered at St Paul’s Cathedral, broadcast being who is asleep experiences no desire and on both television and radio; he received a is not the subject of any dream, he has become In a sense this is not music that should be heard His conversion to the Orthodox Church in 1977 Knighthood in the Millennium Honours List, and Atma, and is filled with Beatitude (ananda). as concert music, but rather meditated on as a resulted from his growing conviction that Eastern later the same year, London’s South Bank Centre form of ‘liquid’ metaphysics. I offer this musical traditions retained a primordial essence that the presented a major festival of his music. The IV Tur ya: That which is Beyond. The greatest State experiment as a kind of poor man’s mite, and west had lost. Works such as The Lamb (1982), and number of commissions from overseas increased, (Mahattara) is the fourth, totally free from any dedicate it to the memory of that great man, René the large-scale choral work Resurrection (1989) notably with Lamentations and Praises (2000) mode of existence whatever, with fullness of Peace Guénon, who died virtually unknown in Cairo in date from this period. It was in 1989 that Tavener for the San Francisco-based Chanticleer (whose and Beatitude without duality. 1951, and who brought my attention to the Vedanta. - 4 - - 5 - recording of the work secured for Tavener the The Medici Quartet repertoire. It was Curzon who generously took it life & times through the imaginative conjunction Grammy award for Best Classical Contemporary upon himself to help these four young musicians of music and readings were initiated by Paul Composition in 2003) and Ikon of Eros (2001) for Drawing on more than 35 years of world class become something truly artistic. Robertson, ‘The Kingdom of the Spirit’: Beethoven the Minnesota Orchestra. musical performance The Medici Quartet is a through his Letters by John Caird and Michael leading international ensemble with an extensive In 1996 Channel 4 Television broadcast a Kennedy’s programme about Sir Edward and Lady In the first years of the new millennium, Tavener distinguished discography. three-part series entitled Music & the Mind, Elgar at Brinkwells entitled ‘Wood Magic’ have was led to look for inspiration from alternative performed by The Medici Quartet and presented been performed many hundreds of times. sources by his interest in the universalist During their long career they have regularly worked by their leader Paul Robertson; these programmes philosophy of the late Swiss metaphysician with a wide variety of leading composers and combined music and science to explore the power Although the Medici Quartet retired after its final Fritjhof Schuon, which embraces all great performers and created a recorded discography of music in human life, cognitive and emotional performance at the Harrogate International religious traditions. This change in direction is of more than 40 records which includes a highly development and health. Festival in 2007 the same core members have manifest in works written since 2001, such as the regarded Beethoven Quartets Cycle (on Nimbus since reformed, as the Medici Ensemble, in order epic all-night vigil The Veil of the Temple (2002) Records) the seldom heard Saint-Saëns Quartets Renowned for their dramatic programmes for string to explore a wider repertoire and share its which includes Sufi poetry as well as Christian, and many other creative collaborations with quartet and actors which revealed the intimate unique history with young professionals and Islamic and Hindu texts; The Beautiful Names saxophonist Barbara Thompson (Virgin Records), relationship between the composer’s work and his Executive Leaders. (2006) sets the 99 names for Allah from the Sarod player Wajahat Khan, Hymn by Alan Qu’ran; the Requiem (2007) also sets words from Bennet and George Fenton (BBC Records), George the Qu’ran and the Upanishads alongside those Martin Presents, The Mozart and Brahms clarinet of the Roman Catholic requiem mass; and the 5tets with Jack Brymer etc.