SRCD.246 STEREO ADD ERIC COATES (1886-1957) 1 The Merrymakers Overture (1923)*† (4’40”) FREDERICK DELIUS (1862-1924) 11 Marche Caprice* (3’23”) Summer Days Suite (1919)*† BOULT 2 1. In a Country Lane (2’46”) conducts WILLIAM WALTON (1902-1983) 3 2. On the Edge of the Lake (3’49”) 12 Hamlet: Funeral March** (4’44”) 4 3. At the Dance (4’58”) RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS (1872-1958) From Meadow to Mayfair Suite (1931)*† 13 The Wasps: March past of 5 1. In the Country (3’32”) the kitchen utensils* (3’04”) COATES 6 3. Evening in Town (4’47”) The Three Elizabeths Suite (1944)*† GIOACCHINO ROSSINI (1792-1868) The Merrymakers 7 3. March ‘Queen Elizabeth’ (5’12”) (arranged by BENJAMIN BRITTEN) Summer Days Suite In the Country & Evening in Town † 14 Soirées Musicales: March** (1’28”) 8 The Three Bears Phantasy (1927)* (9’44”) The Three Bears 9 March ‘The Dam Busters’ (1954)** (4’02”) GUSTAV HOLST (1874-1934) March ‘Queen Elizabeth’ 15 Suite in E flat Op.28 No.1: March** (3’00”) March ‘The Dam Busters’ PERCY GRAINGER (1882-1961) 10 Children’s March ‘Over the Hills and Marches by (63’08”) and far away’** (3’55”) Rossini/Britten * New Philharmonia Orchestra (leader Carl Pini) Holst/Jacob ** London Philharmonic Orchestra Grainger conducted by Walton Sir Adrian Boult Vaughan Williams Delius The above individual timings will normally each include two pauses. One before the beginning of each movement or work, and one after the end. ൿ 1978 †ൿ 1979 The copyright in these sound recordings is owned by Lyrita Recorded Edition, England. New Philharmonia Orchestra ൿ This compilation and the digital remastering 2007 Lyrita Recorded Edition, England. London Philharmonic Orchestra © 2007 Lyrita Recorded Edition, England. Lyrita is a registered trade mark. Made in the UK LYRITA RECORDED EDITION. Produced under an exclusive license from Lyrita by Wyastone Estate Ltd, PO Box 87, Monmouth, NP25 3WX, UK ric Coates (1886-1957) was a miniaturist who excelled in the field of light music. www.lyrita.co.uk EIn the early 1900s, he was following in the footsteps of Sir Arthur Sullivan and Note © 2007 Lyrita Recorded Edition, England Edward German, showing his melodic gift in a large number of songs. By the 1950s, Copyright Lyrita photo of Sir Adrian Boult by Hans Wild he had written many popular hits both in England and America, including By the Design by Keith Hensby Sleepy Lagoon, best known as the signature tune for the BBC radio programme Recording location: Kingsway Hall, London Desert Island Discs, The Dam Busters’ March, and Knightsbridge March,which was Merrymakers Overture, Summer Days Suite & Queen Elizabeth March also adopted as a signature tune for the radio programme ‘In Town Tonight’. Recorded on November 9th 1976 Eric Coates was born in Hucknall, a small mining town in Nottinghamshire, on The Three Bears, Evening in Town, In the Country 27th August, 1886. He gives a vivid and highly entertaining account of his childhood Recorded on December 6th 1976 Recording Producer: James Walker in his autobiography A Suite in Four Movements. Here he describes how, as a boy, he Recording Engineer: Stanley Goodall cycled the leafy lanes and grew to love the countryside, to which he had a yearning Grainger Children’s March, Holst/Jacob March from Suite in E flat, to return to live for the rest of his life. Some of his music looks back nostalgically to Rossini/Britten March from Soirées Musicales, Walton Funeral March from Hamlet those early days, and draws genuine inspiration from his understanding of the Recorded on November 13th 1973 particular nature of the English countryside - as is the case with so many of his Recording Producer: James Mallinson contemporaries, in particular Elgar, who had a great regard for Coates’s music. Recording Engineer: Kenneth Wilkinson There was an affinity between these two composers: each were masters of writing March ‘The Dam Busters’ Recorded on August 10th 1973 music in a lighter vein which had great popular appeal. Yet it was London and London life which were to excite Coates’s imagination Delius March Caprice Recorded on August 15th 1973 most, and it was here that he came to live permanently. He began his professional Recording Producer: Michael Woolcock career as a viola player. He entered the Royal Academy of Music in 1906 and studied Recording Engineer: Kenneth Wilkinson viola with the legendary Lionel Tertis, whose place he was invited to take in the Vaughan Williams March from The Wasps Hambourg Quartet for a tour of South Africa. He subsequently played in the Recorded on September 19th 1973 Queen’s Hall Orchestra under Sir Henry Wood, who introduced Coates’s Digital Remastering Engineer: Simon Gibson compositions at the Proms. For seven years he was principal viola with the Queen’s Other works by ERIC COATES available on Lyrita: Hall Orchestra, but was finally forced to retire as a result of recurring bouts of Suite:The Three Men, Concert Valse: Dancing Nights,Two Symphonic Rhapsodies neuritis in his left hand. Idyll: Summer Afternoon, Ballet:The Enchanted Garden His compositions quickly achieved popularity and, by all accounts, he was a Concert Valse: Footlights, 20th Century Rhythm, March: London Bridge London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Barry Wordsworth……………………………SRCD.213 good conductor of his own music. At the Royal Academy of Music, he studied composition with Frederick Corder and wrote many songs - his melodic gift was WARNING Copyright subsists in all Lyrita Recordings. Any unauthorised broadcasting. public evident from the outset. At the age of 26 he married Phyllis Black, a young actress performance, copying, rental or re-recording thereof in any manner whatsoever will constitute an infringement of such copyright. In the United Kingdom licences for the use of recordings for public eight years his junior whom he had seen giving a recitation of Tennyson at the Royal performance may be obtained from Phonographic Performance Ltd., 1 Upper James Street, London, Academy of Music: “The music of her voice charmed my senses”, he wrote. It was a W1F 9DE 2 7 Marche Caprice by Delius (1862-1934) is from his Little Suite (1889-90). Its long and happy marriage. Indeed, many would say he had a charmed life: idyllic, complexity is contained in its title. It is not a rousing march, or a march to march youthful days and a long and successful career. to, but a lightly-scored romantic piece with a bohemian flavour.The orchestration is When Eric Coates died on December 21st 1957, at the age of 71, his career had beautiful and sensuous, and as always with Delius, it dies away. spanned two World Wars, and from his early song successes in Edwardian days to those of his last orchestral works (including The Dam Busters’ March) he had There is a marked contrast between our next two marches in the programme. Sir gauged the public taste unerringly. William Walton’s (1902-1983) Funeral March is from the suite adapted from his Sir Adrian Boult (1889-1983) had a gift for conducting music in a lighter vein. incidental music (1947) for Laurence Olivier’s film of Hamlet. Walton’s film music With his understanding of musical structure and his well-judged tempi, he could has an enduring quality. His inspiration in this medium was always at a high level, bring a lightness of touch and an airiness to, for example, Elgar’s Wand of Youth or and even now, fifty years on, its emotional power is undiminished. Dream Children (Coates was a friend of Elgar), which led naturally to him agreeing Vaughan Williams composed incidental music to The Wasps, a play by to record the music of Eric Coates, and the carefully chosen programme of English Aristophanes, in 1909, for a Cambridge Greek Play production. The play is a satire light music on this recording. of the Athenians and their love of lawsuits. The March Past of the Kitchen Utensils The programme opens with The Merrymakers Overture, which dates from is described by Michael Kennedy in his biography of the composer as “a short 1922. Coates writes that at the time they were living in a little flat on the top floor of moment of fun” in which a pot, a pestle, and water-jug are called as witnesses to the a charming house in St. John’s Wood. His wife had recently made a hit in the West good character of a dog accused of stealing a cheese. Out of this intellectual conceit End, “so while she played, I composed”. This was one of two orchestral works that comes a lively piece that fizzes along, the tune for trumpet and piccolo giving it the were “the result of the charming sitting-room which looked down onto the wide road quality of pantomime. A musical tease here: the tune hinted at is a parody of “Here’s with its abundance of trees where the birds sang all day”. It was first performed by a health unto His Majesty”. the New Queen’s Hall Light Orchestra under Alick Maclean, a well-known conductor of the day and champion of Coates’s music, to whom it is dedicated, at a Chappell Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) put together his Soirées Musicales Op. 9 from several Ballad Concert in 1923. It is exuberant, with a hint of exotic colour, and a lovely pieces by Rossini that he had adapted and orchestrated for a documentary film for woodwind melody (oboe and clarinet in unison) that is warmly reiterated by the the GPO Film Unit. This was early in his career when he was 25 years old, and they strings at the end.