The enterprising Hyperion
label is to be heartily congratulated
for continuing to champion Stanford’s
music especially with this adventurous
series of neglected chamber works. On
reviewing
the earlier Hyperion release CDA67434
of world première recordings
of the String Quartets Nos. 1 and 2
with the Fantasy for Horn Quintet,
I stated that, "this is
music that once heard makes one demand
to know why these works have not been
recorded before; such is the quality
of the scores and standard of these
performances from the RTÉ Vanbrugh
Quartet." There is no claim
made that these two chamber works are
première recordings although
that’s what they are. These two Hyperions
have in common that they allow the immense
quality of Stanford’s writing to continue
to shine through like a beacon.
There was clearly a
mutual attraction between the Dublin-born
Stanford and England as the composer
adopted England as his home country.
He was to spend the vast majority of
his life there. He established himself
in England as a leading figure in the
musical life of the country. He was
appointed professor of composition at
the Royal College of Music in London
at its foundation in 1883. Four years
later he was elected to the chair of
music at Cambridge University. Going
by the number of prestigious academic
honours that Stanford received and his
knighthood, the English music establishment
was clearly delighted to accommodate
him.
Stanford and Parry
were major influences in British music
for almost half a century as composers,
conductors, teachers and academics.
Although the prolific Stanford composed
in many genres he is often described
as the ‘father of English Choral Music’
being principally remembered today for
his contribution to sacred music. Stanford
is frequently at his very best in his
liturgical works and his settings of
canticles, hymns, anthems, services
and organ works, composed for the Anglican
Church, are amongst the finest of their
type. They are still frequently performed
in Anglican Cathedrals around the world.
Following the Great
War there was an adverse reaction to
music from composers associated with
the Victorian and Edwardian eras. The
established names now had to compete
with the growing enthusiasm for progressive
composers such as Schoenberg, Berg,
Webern, Stravinsky et al. Music
had rapidly ‘moved forward’ and the
English late-romantics of Stanford’s
generation had become marginalised.
Stanford’s tonal and conservative music
with a well-designed lyricism crammed
with colour, soon became unfashionable;
so too that of his contemporaries Parry,
Elgar, Mackenzie, Sullivan, German and
Bantock. Stanford quickly became a victim
of the ‘new fashion’ as he was still
composing in the manner of an earlier
era. Consequently his music, with the
exception of his liturgical works, moved
into virtual obscurity. After a century
we are now be able to reassess Stanford’s
works for their appeal and innate quality
rather than for the dynamic of the era
in which they were written.
Outside Stanford’s
church music, with the odd exception
such as the popular choral setting The
Blue Bird and some songs, it
is rare to see one of his works appearing
in concert and recital programmes. A
large amount of hsi vast output remains
unavailable in the catalogues and by
my estimation a number of his works
have yet to receive their first recording.
Thanks to enterprising record companies
such as Chandos, Naxos and Hyperion
this deficiency is slowly but surely
being remedied. I believe that the orchestral
score one is most likely to hear in
concert is the Clarinet Concerto
in A minor, Op 80. I have long admired
the 1979 London recording from soloist
Thea King and the Philharmonia under
Alun Francis on Hyperion Helios CDH55101
c/w the Finzi Clarinet Concerto.
review
In recent years Chandos
became vigorous advocates for Stanford’s
music with their groundbreaking series
of recordings under Vernon Handley of
the Seven Symphonies on CHAN 9279
and the Six Irish Rhapsodies,
Piano Concerto No. 2 and Concert Variations
upon an English Theme (Down Among
the Dead Men) on CHAN X10116 review.
Naxos have continued this momentum with
a re-recent release of the première
recording of the wonderful Requiem
on 8.555201-02 (see
my review). My particular favourite
of all Stanford’s records in my collection
are the orchestral song cycles, Songs
of the Sea, Op.91 (1904)
and the Songs of the Fleet, Op.
117 (1910) with baritone, Benjamin Luxon,
the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and
Chorus under Norman Del Mar, This is
on EMI Classics ‘British Composers’
series on 5 65113 2, c/w Delius Sea
Drift.
Overshadowed by the
distinction of his sacred choral works,
Stanford is rarely associated with the
field of chamber music, although he
composed an impressive total of eight
string quartets between 1891 and 1919
and there are several other chamber
scores. He seemed to take the responsibility
of writing for the genre very seriously
as he was almost forty before commencing
work on his First String Quartet,
although he had by this time composed
half a dozen chamber works for a variety
of instrumental combinations.
It is thought that
the major stimulus for Stanford to compose
many of his string quartets and string
quintets et al was the influence
of his friend the legendary Hungarian
virtuoso violinist and composer Joseph
Joachim (1831-1907). It could be said
that Joachim was a personal mentor to
the young Stanford as had been Mendelssohn
to the young Joachim. Stanford undoubtedly
gained considerable inspiration from
the playing of the distinguished Joachim
Quartet, which Joachim had founded in
1869.
Completed in 1886 the
substantial four movement Piano
Quintet in D minor, Op. 25 is
the earliest of the two scores. Described
by musicologist Jeremy Dibble as his,
"grandest chamber work"
the Piano Quintet was dedicated
to Joachim and premièred at the
Cambridge Guildhall with the composer
at the piano. The score is most certainly
influenced by the ambitious scale and
deserved widespread popularity of the
magnificent Piano Quintets of
Schumann and Brahms.
The first two movements,
the allegro and the scherzo,
are in minor keys and the last two,
the adagio and allegro in
major keys. It was said to be Stanford’s
intention to transport his audience
from the bold contrasts of melancholy
introspection to extrovert joy and optimism.
I just love this superb music but I
do at times wonder if Stanford, so steeped
in the world of academia, fought shy
of writing that really ‘big’ tune, or
maybe thought that to do so would be
beneath him.
The Vanbrugh, augmented
by pianist Piers Lane, commence the
proceedings sweetly with a warm and
summery mood. There is plenty of work
for the piano and violin and at 04:55-05:17
a passionate lullaby is given to each
instrument. The booklet refers to the
doom and foreboding of this opening
movement, however, what strikes me is
the substantial amount of Brahmsian
summer optimism radiating from this
busy and eventful movement. It is well-crafted
but the development section does not
especially inspire and it easily loses
momentum.
In the jig-like scherzo
the Vanbrughs expertly take me into
the fantasy sound-world of witchery
and magic. Instead of aping Mendelssohn
as so many late nineteenth-century scherzos
do, the movement is reminiscent of the
Sorcerer’s Apprentice by Dukas
and Saint-Saëns’ Danse Macabre.
I found nothing too darkly unsettling
in this scherzo and certainly
nothing disturbingly demonic as suggested
in the booklet notes. For me Stanford
has his tongue set firmly in his cheek.
The Vanbrughs emphasise the rhythmic
bounce in Stanford’s confident writing
and are especially charming in the folksong-like
trio. Despite the generally fine
performance, I found the playing a touch
untidy for a few bars of the good-humoured
pizzicato section at 05:02-05:11.
The shadows begin to lift in the adagio espressivo
of the Piano Quintet. Highly romantic playing from the Vanbrughs
in this slow movement which is so plentiful in yearning and pleading
with extensive lyrical melody. This gorgeous music is clearly
an outpouring of love and could easily be Stanford’s musical
representation of a passionate love-letter or poem. A stormy and
tense passage from 02:04 that the Vanbrughs successfully increase
in strength and sheer passion before exhaustingly relenting to
comparative calmness at 04:38. Between 07:21-07:49 there is a
return to music of energetic determination. Here I noticed the
use of a brief motif that may be a deliberate quotation from the
Wedding March from Mendelssohn’s incidental music
to the Shakespeare play A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
The Vanbrughs successfully bring the movement to a measured and
peaceful conclusion. Goodness, how Stanford is wearing his heart
on his sleeve in this movement. I cannot agree with the viewpoint
of a friend of mine who feels that this movement is disappointing,
nothing but romantic posturing that goes nowhere; with stilted
piano writing.
The finale of
the Piano Quintet inhabits the
world of Schumann and provides
a grand and radiant conclusion, in D
major, a key that has such strong associations
with joy and elation. The Vanbrughs
impressively display a jagged and relentless
rhythmic drive throughout and at 06:39
they commence the race to the conclusion.
A most impressive facet of this splendid
performance from the Vanbrughs and pianist
Piers Lane is how admirably the five
instruments blend. Stanford adds colour
to the score by using the piano like
a voice with the music not being exclusively
written around the piano part. Consequently,
Piers Lane’s percussion instrument does
not dominate the proceedings at the
expense of the strings.
The three movement
String Quintet No 1 in F major,
Op. 85 was completed in Malvern
in 1903 and given its première
at a Popular Concert at St. James Hall,
London early the next year. In the bright
key of F major this work commences with
a buoyant and exultant allegro,
full of warmth and rich scoring. The
two violas introduce a pleasant Brahmsian
passage at 01:52, and although at 03:48
the wide intervals of new melody point
towards Richard Strauss, the structure
is rhythmically disciplined; we are
still very much in the territory of
Brahms and maybe Dvořák.
The Vanbrughs and Garth Knox
provide a luxuriant autumnal glow to
the ebb and flow of the score. However,
something seems to go awry in the proceedings
for a few bars between 04:03-04:18.
The central movement
andante drew attention in its
day for its assimilation of traditional
Irish music. Unfortunately my ears were
not able to identify this integration
of Irish themes. The slow movement is
a lament demanding considerable rubato
and liberal treatment of the metre.
Stanford agreed "… it gained
by it greatly" if a very ‘free’
performance style was adopted. The unison
opening is almost religioso and
the middle section rouses the players
like a hunting horn (01:45) saying,
‘look not to the past with its sad memories
but look forward’. This is only a brief
interlude as the mood drifts, the opening
religioso returns but it has
changed. Now there is an understanding,
a new outlook. The score ends tenderly
and we move on, wiser, and improved.
I was highly impressed with the dark
and serious playing which gradually
intensifies.
At twelve minutes in
length the extended concluding third
movement is an amalgam of scherzo
and finale. The construction
is governed by an overarching scheme
of theme and expanding variations. An
unremarkable Schubertian melody recurs
in different guises. Stanford’s use
of many pauses has the effect of holding
the attention. There is a scampering
scherzo at 02:54, a dreamlike
Elgarian passage with muted strings
at 03:50 and then the early carefree
and relaxed manner dramatically changes
in mood from 04:43 to one of a much
darker hue. There seems to be a reference
to the end of Smetana’s String Quartet
No.1 ‘From My Life’, but
what does it all mean? A fugato
begun by the viola shakes the music
out of its mood and we move forward.
The tense and short dash to the finishing
line comes as a welcome relief to what
has gone before. I’d love to know what
was the motivating force that drove
Stanford to write this fascinating movement.
The talented Vanbrughs are impressive
throughout this movement and skilfully
provide episodes of an unsettling and
agitated nature.
Jeremy Dibble’s notes
are informative and up to the high standard
we have come to expect. Fine work too
by the Hyperion engineers with a sound
quality that is crisp, clear and well
balanced.
I am at a loss why
anyone would not wish to add this superb
Stanford chamber release to their collection.
Wonderful music and marvellously performed.
Highly recommended.
Michael Cookson
RTÉ Vanbrugh Quartet 
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