Percy GRAINGER (1882-1961)
Works for Large Chorus and Orchestra
King Solomon's Espousals (1920s?) [8:52]
Danny Deever (1903-4) [4:03]
Marching Song of Democracy (1901-17) [7:02]
The Wraith of Odin (1920s?) [5:10]
The Hunter in His Career (1929) [1:40]
Sir Eglamore (1904-12) [3:56]
The Lads of Wamphray (1904) [7:03]
The Bride's Tragedy (1908-9) [10:10]
Tribute to Foster (1914-31) [10:27]
Thanksgiving Song (1945) [13:22]
Andrew Morton (tenor); Alexander Knight (baritone); José
Carbó
(baritone); Jessica Aszodi (soprano); Victoria Lambourn (mezzo);
Ben
Namdarian (tenor); Timothy Reynolds (tenor); Nicholas Dinopoulos
(bass-baritone)
Sydney Chamber Choir and
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra Chorus
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and Chorus/Sir Andrew Davis
rec. Hamer Hall, The Arts Centre, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
30
August-1 September 2012 (live: Danny Deever, Marching Song of
Democracy,
The Bride's Tragedy, Tribute to Foster), 3-5, 8 September 2012
(other
works)
premiere recordings and premiere recordings in these versions
CHANDOS CHSA5121 
[72.39]
Percy Grainger was certainly one of the most eccentric
and individualistic composers ever. He preferred to plough his own
furrow.
Who else could have composed a piece with such a bizarre name as,
Arrival
Platform Humlet (
In a Nutshell Suite - 1916).
Nevertheless,
Grainger had a strong streak of practicality in his make-up.
Always
one to maximise his potential income he would set and reset his
compositions
for any number and variety of instruments to optimise the number
of
their performances.
I had the great fortune to review much of Chandos’s 19-disc
survey
of the works of Percy Grainger (
Grainger
Edition) as they appeared through the 1990s, many conducted by
the
late Richard Hickox. It was therefore with great anticipation that
I
sought this new pendant Chandos release of mostly premiere
recordings
of more Grainger eccentricities - this time performed
appropriately
by Australian choruses and orchestra under Sir Andrew Davis.
The ten works that comprise this collection are all colourful and
larger
than life but it has to be said that some are more successful than
others.
The one piece that sticks in my mind, and worth the price of this
album
alone, is his joyous
Tribute to Foster, considered by many
to
be one of his finest compositions. It was composed as a birthday
gift
to his mother who had sung Foster’s
Camptown Races to
him
as an infant. This is an enthusiastic, affectionate tribute with
Grainger
treating the well-known tune very freely especially in the
sentimental
middle lullaby section and using some very colourful
orchestrations
including xylophone, bells and piano. We also hear some
extraordinarily
complex but effective and affecting choral writing.
King Solomon’s Espousals to biblical texts from
‘Song
of Solomon’ opens the programme. It is an early work from an
18-year
old Grainger who still had to find his voice. There are overt
influences
of Elgar and Parry in ceremonial dress here. Yet the Grainger
individuality
is present too. Closely related to this work in its ceremonial
orchestral
dress, is Grainger’s
Marching Song of Destiny
although
the wordless chorus at times sounds rather at odds. It is supposed
to
suggest a breezy universalism, a spirit of optimistic humanitarian
democracy
but the occasional banalities deride any such objective.
Nevertheless
it’s an interesting exercise.
Much more interesting and effective is
Danny Deever,
Grainger’s
take on Rudyard Kipling’s sombre view of a military
execution
from
Barrack-Room Ballads. The choral part, in cockney
vernacular,
is well drawn, both darkly comic and sinister.
The Wraith of Odin with imaginative and challenging vocal
writing,
is a setting of Longfellow’s text from his
The Saga of
King
Olaf that had previously preoccupied Elgar. This is about the
spectral
appearance of the ghost of Sir Morten of Fogelsang.
The very brief
The Hunter in His Career is a rollicking
hearty
out-of-door tune. Its heartiness is continued in
Sir
Eglamore
Grainger’s enthusiastic take on the heroics of a
14
th
century knight and dragon-slayer with the choir relishing their
many
“Fa, la, las lanky down dillys”.
The Lads of
Wamphray,
from material by Sir Walter Scott, is a boast of masculine
virility
and fighting prowess, the male chorus battling with a well-nigh
impenetrable
Scottish dialect.
Swinburne’s
The Bride’s Tragedy is more
memorable.
A hero snatches his sweetheart away from the man she is forced to
marry.
They are chased by the outraged usurped bridegroom and his
followers
as far as a swollen river where the hapless couple are swept away
to
oblivion. Grainger vividly depicts the chill winds that snatch at
the
fleeing couple and the swirling waters. The elegiac ending is
particularly
moving.
Grainger’s
Thanksgiving Song that ends the programme
has
a wordless chorus. It was one of his last original large-scale
compositions
and was meant to be the final movement of a three-part work.
It’s
intent was to be a paean to womanhood “in praise of all my
life’s
sweethearts”, as he commented. It’s an affectionate
romp
with some odd touches including an insistent hopping rhythm as
though
some kangaroo is hopping across the score. This stops abruptly
before
the choir enters from “off-stage” as they will
eventually
leave. Their melody, when it appears, is simple, sincere and
touching,
endlessly repeated with subtle variations. Again, exotic
orchestral
colourings are used but sparingly.
Extrovert Grainger, writ large and in brilliant colours.
Ian Lace
