This review began life as an article on Discovering Howard
Ferguson. It was suggested by my colleague John Quinn who
was pleased to have discovered a new convert to the cause in my
review of two Chandos recordings by a composer who had previously been known
to me only as a pianist. See my recommendations of The Dream
of the Rood, on CHAN9082 (download only) and Selected Chamber
Works on CHAN9316 (CD and download) in my August,
2009, Download Roundup. The Dream of the Rood is a
powerful poem, to which I return more often than to Beowulf.
Although it loses something in the translation which Ferguson
employs, his setting does the poem justice. If you never download
another recording, thinking it too much trouble, do go for this
one, preferably in one of the lossless formats, though the Chandos mp3s are about as good as that format gets.
I hope that those recommendations will go some
small way to making the tenth anniversary of Ferguson’s death
a little more significant. I say this when the great names
whose anniversaries fall this year seem likely to eclipse
not just the memory of Ferguson, but even that of Martinů fifty years ago. I’ve been trying to do something
about that, too.
I’m also indebted to JQ for loaning me a copy of
a deleted EMI Classics ‘British Composers’ recording of Ferguson’s
Piano Concerto, coupled with another enthralling setting of
medieval poetry, his Amore langueo,
and the marvellous Finzi Eclogue.
Formerly on EMI Classics 7 64738-2, with Howard Shelley, the
City of London Sinfonia and Richard
Hickox, this 1987 recording really does deserve to be reissued.
The deletion of that EMI Classics recording meant
that the only available recording of the Concerto was the Naxos,
a very satisfactory recording but oddly coupled. Rob Barnett recommended
it with enthusiasm – see review
– and I entirely share his enthusiasm for the performances. However,
where he saw the diversity of the four works as an advantage,
I found the contrast between the Ferguson and Gerhard, which together
put the other pieces very much in the shade, a little hard to
digest. Though the Gerhard is a more approachable work than much
of his music, it still sounds somewhat angular alongside the Ferguson.
If the coupling appeals, however, it remains a fine bargain recommendation,
also available in very good mp3 sound from classicsonline.com
and passionato.com and also in lossless
.flac from the latter.
The Finzi Eclogue
makes an ideal partner for the Ferguson Concerto, and it’s
here that the deleted EMI and the new Somm
versions score. This is music to die for. If the performance
on the new Somm recording struck me as an iota less enticing at the beginning
than the EMI, or that by Howard Jones and William Boughton
on Nimbus (NI5665, with the Clarinet Concerto and Love’s
Labour’s Lost – see review),
I was soon almost won over. Rob Barnett thought the pace of
the Nimbus placid and well-judged, noting that some performers
push the music too hard. If I have a criticism of the new
version, it is that it’s just a little too placid – almost
sleepy at times.
This is clearly preferable to the alternative;
Edmund Rubbra was right to call
this a work of ‘untroubled serenity’, but I would have preferred
a tempo a shade faster than that which Bebbington
and Williams adopt; perhaps something closer to the Shelley/Hickox
9:56 or the near-identical 10:01 on Nimbus. After all, Virgil’s
Eclogues may be set in an idyllic rural setting, with
Tityrus lying back in the shade
singing the praise of beautiful Amaryllis at the opening of
the first Eclogue, but his friend Melibœus
lives in the real world, where he is about to be driven off
his land:
Tityre, tu patulæ recubans
sub tegmine fagi
silvestrem tenui musam
meditaris avena;
nos patriæ finis et
dulcia linquimus arva.
nos patriam fugimus:
tu, Tityre, lentus in umbra
formosam resonare
doces Amaryllida
silvas.
The performance of the Finzi
on the new recording is just a little too lentus
in umbra – laid back in that shade.
In the Ferguson Concerto, however, Bebbington and Williams are much closer to the tempi of the
Shelley and Donohoe recordings;
mere seconds apart in every movement from Shelley. Donohoe
is in close agreement in the Finale but slightly faster in
the other two movements. All three performances make perfect
sense in their own contexts; if I prefer the Shelley by a
hair’s breadth, there’s so much to enjoy and admire in the
other two versions that choice between the two may confidently
be settled by the coupling. The work itself was composed in
Festival of Britain year, 1951; its reasonably warm reception
in the UK may have been coloured by the optimism of that time.
It was not well received in the States – most unfairly, as
all three recordings make clear. This is a factor which the
note-writer is doubtless correct in seeing as part of the
reason why Ferguson began to withdraw from composition, feeling
himself out of tune with the times. If you have followed me
to the Chandos recordings of Ferguson
– and even if you haven’t – this concerto should be your next
discovery.
Fortunately, Ferguson did not finally give up composition
until after he had composed The Dream of the Rood in
1958. This is the work which, in its Chandos
performance, first led me to stumble across his music. It
was only his Op.18. At least that recording is still available
to download, but we urgently need a commercially available
recording of Amore langueo.
Perhaps Somm, Hyperion, Chandos or Naxos
would oblige?
Frederic Austin’s Piano Concertino
is here receiving its first recording. Austin was an important
musical figure in the first half of the 20th century
but is now almost totally unknown. As far as I am aware, there
is only one other example of his music in the catalogue, a
recording of Spring (another
world-premiere) on ClassicO (CLASSCD404,
with first recordings of music by Bowen and Bainton
– see review).
The Piano Concertino was commissioned in 1943 by Ernest Irving;
it was probably intended for a film. Somm’s
notes describe it as ‘well crafted’, which sounds a little
like damning with faint praise. In fact, I thought it rather
better than that. I almost found myself enjoying it as much
as the Ferguson. It’s much less out of place in this august
company than the Rowley and Darnton
on Naxos – and it certainly receives strong advocacy here.
Alan Rawsthorne’s First
Piano Concerto is normally performed in the fuller orchestral
scoring of the revised 1942 version, in which form it is available
in good performances on Lyrita (SRCD.255
– see review),
Chandos at lower mid-price (CHAN10339X
– see review)
and Naxos (8.555959 – see review
and review).
Perhaps it’s because I’m a fellow Lancastrian in origin, but
I find the music of Rawthorne very
appealing. Only the lack of space in an over-crowded collection
made me ditch the Naxos when I obtained the Chandos recording. I certainly don’t expect this new Somm recording to be following the Naxos to the charity shop.
The performance makes a strong case for the earlier version.
The scoring for strings and percussion only didn’t leave me
feeling that anything was missing. Indeed, the differences
between the two versions are of nowhere near the magnitude
of the revisions which Sibelius
made to his Violin Concerto or Vaughan Williams to his ‘London’
Symphony. I hardly ever listen to the Haitink
recording of the latter, good though it is, but much prefer
the Chandos/Hickox version of the
original version. In any event I’m pleased that the earlier
version of the Rawsthorne has been
recorded. As the Somm notes aptly put it, ‘Rawsthorne’s
first thoughts on this work allow it to emerge as a much grittier
piece and the percussive nature of much of the piano writing
comes into its own set against the pithier orchestration’.
The recording is truthful throughout and the notes,
by Bruce Phillips and Martin Lee-Browne are very helpful.
The latter is Frederic Austin’s grandson and a strong advocate
of his grandfather’s music. He doesn’t over-egg the pudding;
underselling the Concerto, if anything. Prospective purchasers
need not hesitate. This is a worthy successor to Somm’s recordings of Mark Bebbington
in the music of Frank Bridge (SOMMCD056 – see review),
John Ireland (SOMMCD088 – see review),
Gurney and Ferguson (the Sonata in f and 5 Bagatelles, SOMMCD038
– see review
and review)
and Arnold and Lambert (SOMMCD062 – see review).
I may have come to appreciate this new CD via a route different
from that taken by Rob Barnett – he enjoyed the slow tempo
in the Finzi more than I did (see
review)
– but I can readily echo his overall recommendation.
There remain just a handful of recordings of Howard
Ferguson which I haven’t touched on: his Violin Sonata No.2 on
Guild (GMCD7120, with music by Eugene Goossens
and John Ireland), a performance which I pass over merely for
lack of access and because it is duplicated on the Selected
Chamber Music recording on Chandos to which I have already referred. Nor do I at the
moment have access to the 2-for-1 Hyperion Dyad recording of English
Clarinet Music on which Ferguson’s Four Short Pieces, Op.6 feature
(CDD22027) or Howard Shelley’s performance of the Sonata and Partita
(Hyperion CDA66130 – Archive Service only). The clarinet pieces
are, in any case, also available from Chandos (see below).
His Octet is performed by the aptly named Ensemble
Acht with Jean Francaix’s
Octuor on Thorofon
CTH2249 – available to download from classicsonline.com and emusic.com
– and his Four Short Pieces for Clarinet and Piano, Op.6, are
on Chandos (CHAN9079, CD, mp3 or lossless download).
The Chandos recording
features good performances by Einar
Jóhannesson and Philip Jenkins of music by William Hurlstone, Arthur Bliss (Pastoral), Richard Stoker, Thomas
Dunhill, Charles Villiers Stanford
(Clarinet Sonata) and Malcolm Arnold (Sonatina)
in addition to Ferguson’s Four Short Pieces, wistful and cheerful
by turns. There’s nothing here to set the world alight, apart
from the Arnold Sonatina, but all
the music is attractive and either the CD or the download
is well worth considering. It would, for example, make an
excellent adjunct to the Finzi and Stanford Clarinet Concertos and Chamber Music on
ASV (CDDCA787, Emma Johnson/RPO/Groves – see August,
2009, Download Roundup).
With the deletion of the Nash Ensemble recording
on Hyperion and the Dutton Collectors Edition reissue, the Thorofon
appears to be the only available version of the Octet, Op.4, regarded
by many, with some justification, as his finest composition. Originally
planned as a quintet, then as a septet before taking its final
form, it’s a tuneful but far from superficial work, employing
the same instrumental combination as the Schubert Octet – clarinet,
horn, bassoon, two violins, viola, cello and double bass – and
it receives strong advocacy here: Ferguson himself is on record
as having thought this ‘a beautiful performance’. It’s rather
short value at 40:21 but, with an attractive coupling in Jean
Françaix’s Octuor, it’s well worth downloading
from classicsonline.com or emusic.com, which appears to be the
only way to obtain it in the UK. This recording makes a perfect
complement to the chamber works on CHAN9316.
These, then, are possibilities for the future,
perhaps best considered after obtaining one of the recordings
of the Piano Concerto. You wouldn’t go wrong with either of
them; my own preference for the new Somm is largely dictated by the couplings.
Brian
Wilson
see also Reviews
by Rob
Barnett and Christopher
Howell
Mark 
