Here’s a disc I really wanted to like a lot. Algernon Ashton’s
life story reads like a musical ‘boy’s own’ adventure. Born
the youngest of twelve children, father dies, family moves to
Germany, befriended by Clara Schumann, attends soirées together
with Moscheles, Rubinstein, Dvorák and Brahms, studies in Leipzig
with Reinecke and is a major prize-winner, studies some more
with Raff, appointed piano professor at the Royal Academy of
Music at 25 just for starters. As well as teaching composes
massively; 174 opus numbers including 24 string quartets and
24 piano sonatas both in all the keys. Add at least
five symphonies, two concertos, a cantata and songs oh, and
a stream of writing to newspapers which resulted in two published
anthologies of his writings of over 1100 letters and you get
some sense of a man for whom the word ‘productive’ probably
means dashing off fifty bars and a letter to the editor before
breakfast.
So why is it only now, and thanks yet again to those wonderful
resurrectionists at Toccata Classics (acknowledging too a disc
of Sonatas on Dutton) that we have a chance to assess his lasting
worth. The answer is twofold; sadly most of his manuscript works
seem to have been destroyed along with the family house during
the Blitz and that which was published – as evidenced here –
for all its fluency and competence does not demand or command
attention. That said, the positives with this disc are several.
As one has grown to expect the production of this Toccata Classics
disc is first rate. Excellent musical and technical values backed
up by a liner of superb interest written by the ever insightful
and dependable Malcolm MacDonald. I have not encountered the
playing of either cellist Evva Mizerska or pianist Emma Abbate
before. They are an established duo and play with great technical
address and skill – indeed I cannot imagine a more convincing
case being made for this music. The recording is rather close
– but the playing can bear such scrutiny and indeed the transfer
of the disc has been made at a high level, not that there are
any problems caused by that - simply I was aware of the need
to turn my system two or three notches down from my usual listening
volume. That being said, the sound is rich and full with Ashton’s
complex writing registering clearly and with maximum impact.
Which leaves the music itself; “one of the best kept secrets
in British music” states the CD cover of these first recordings.
I would beg to differ. If ever there was a case where fluency
becomes a curse it must surely be here. The mental image I kept
getting was of a tap being turned on or off. Drop into any of
the movements here and the emotional temperature is pretty much
the same defined by the ‘type’ of movement – 1st
movement serious and worked out, 2nd – songlike and
lyrical, 3rd – more light-hearted [MacDonald is certainly
right – the closing movements are without exception the best].
There seems to be little or no emotional arc within movements
let alone works - its Romanticism by the yard. Not once did
I feel any real emotional depth or an imperative artistic need
to create. Well-crafted, workmanlike and not without appeal
but no lost masterpieces. That the second sonata is a considerable
improvement on the first there is little doubt with the distribution
of musical material and its development far more convincingly
handled and shared between the players. This work also contains
the most memorable melodies on the disc – I was rather taken
by the stand-alone Arioso that opens the CD but that
rather outstays its welcome and becomes the victim of its own
note-spinning-too-thick-textured-by-half tendency. For those
who are curious; this score – together with several others by
Ashton - can be viewed on the wonderful IMSLP website – I rather
like the tempo marking; Larghetto generoso.
I am the first to applaud this and other labels’ efforts on
behalf of forgotten composers. Make no mistake, Ashton writes
eminently serviceable music which is perfectly good within its
own conservative remit. The problem is he is no more than that.
Not every forgotten composer can be unjustly forgotten.
In the spirit of fairness I would recommend reading Rutland
Boughton’s highly enthusiastic critique of Ashton’s music which
can be found elsewhere on this site – here are two quotes; “The
more modern music I study - German, English, French, Italian,
Russian the more assured do I feel that in Algernon Ashton we
possess the greatest living composer”
and [referring to the Op.90 Piano Quartet also available to
view on IMSLP] “What music this Finale is! How
the giant rejoices in his strength! This is the music of elemental
humanity, exulting in the open, naked to the sun, to the rains
and to the snows; shouting, aloud to the heavens, glorifying
itself and renewing its glory, - and thus the glory of its first
great cause!” Erm, yes – I think Boughton likes it more
than me.
Admirers of these artists or indeed those with a compulsive
fascination for cello repertoire need not hesitate – this disc
serves those parties very well. There seem to be a total of
four sonatas so I imagine Volume 2 will complete the set. For
the rest, one feels Ashton should be left snoozing away eternity
in the great gentleman’s club in the sky contemplating his next
epistle to the Heavenly Times.
Nick Barnard
See articles by Harold
Truscott and Rutland
Boughton; also list
of works.
Evva Mizerska (cello); Emma Abbate (piano)