Classical Works Spotlight #344--Vaughan Williams

[erik]

One of England's greatest composers, Ralph Vaughan Williams, is in the Classical Works Spotlight with a choral work written in between the two most brutal wars in human history, the suffering in the first of which inspired the work in question.

Vaughan Williams: DONA NOBIS PACEM

One of England’s most pre-eminent composers, Ralph Vaughan Williams, by the mid-1930s, had seen the worst of everything in the world, from World War I to the Great Depression that was casting a dark shadow over his country. War in particular was the focus of his 1936 English-language cantata “Dona Nobis Pacem”, which, despite taking its title from part of the Latin Mass, only uses just that one section as a prayer for peace (the title is Latin for “Give Us Peace”). He composed this work on a commission to mark the 100th anniversary of the Huddersfield Choral Society, and in it referred to recent wars as the shadows of a new and much deadlier war loomed on the horizon. The work is divided into six sections: (1) Agnus Dei (a movement from the Latin Mass); (2) Beat! Beat! Drums! (based on the first of three Walt Whitman poems the composer utilizes); (3) Reconciliation (which uses the entire Whitman poem with this title); (4) Dirge For Two Veterans (the text derived from the third Whitman poem utilized); (5) The Angel Of Death (based on a speech by John Bright in his failed effort to prevent the Crimean War); and (6) Gloria, in a setting in English, which concludes with a quiet coda of “Dona Nobis Pacem” (although that phrase is utilized throughout the entire piece at various points). The work finally saw its first performance being given by the Huddersfield Choral Society in November 1936; and it remained a fixture in the English choral repertoire of the 20th century, eventually finding its way to America with help of champions such as Leopold Stokowski, Eugene Ormandy, and Andre Previn.



Soprano: SARAH FOX
Baritone: CHRISTOPHER MALTMAN

Colorado Symphony Chorus

Colorado Symphony Orchestra/ANDREW LITTON (Hyperion)

Included:
Stephen Hough: MISSA MIRABILIS

[egoodstein]

This sounds an interesting recording (also with the Hough-- a terrific classical pianist & yes sometime composer. Didn't know he composed this though). I need to check out. I also like Litton as conductor in general, and the Colorado Symphony. This work is a little unusual in Vaughn Williams's oeuvre, though interesting for the pacifist elements of course, and doubtless influential on Tippett's Child of Our Time (from just before WWII), and later Britten's War Requiem. So an interesting 'thread' of sorts for British music. I've never quite enjoyed it as much as some of his other works, but been quite awhile since I heard, so def. should revisit. In general, however, I do very much like VW as composer, and good reminder of the overall excellence of English choral works and composers in the 20th century.

[erik]

I think there had been for many decades to find any 20 century English choral music, after what Handel had done two centuries previously, to be rather, well, stodgy. It takes some getting used to (oddly but precisely because it is in English), but if it is a good conductor, as Litton is, then the results can be fairly impressive.

This recording of Vaughan Williams and Stephen Hough, incidentally, is a new release, also marking Litton's first as the Colorado Symphony's music director (he still holds the position of Conductor Laureate in Dallas, as well).