Roberto Gerhard (1896-1970)

Although of Swiss parentage, Gerhard was born in Tarragona and saw himself as a Catelonian composer. He studied with Pedrell (celebrated in his work ‘Homage to Pedrell’) and Granados in Barcelona and later with Schoenberg in Vienna, where he was greatly influenced by the then new 12-note system of composing. I have been aware of him from my youngest days and recall the interest aroused by his Spanish-flavoured opera ‘The Duenna’ (1950) and his Concerto for Orchestra (1965). He was one of many artists who left Spain during the civil war, moving to England and settling in Cambridge which became his home. He also had connections in the U.S.A., his fourth symphony being commissioned by New York. During his life his music was played quite often, in company with other contemporary composers of his time. He belongs to our articles and is a sort of bridge between two cultures. Although he retained his Spanish roots, he became a valued part of the English musical scene.

Meirion Bowen and Stephen Kristian have devoted a website produced with the assistance of the Gerhard Estate and give interesting biographical information about his life and his works. Divided into 16 sections, there is information about Gerhard's life, his music, his writings and much else. They hope that following on the renewed interest in his work might enable both aficionados and those new to Gerhard to achieve an overview of his achievement and discover more about individual aspects of his life and work.

He is seen, Bowen and Kristain say, as a cosmopolitan artist and an explorer. His music embraces the folk-culture of his native Catalonia, with the vivid colours and lyricism of late romantic music together with the influence of twelve-tone techniques, and he also made forays into electronic music, still in its earliest days. His impressive output includes the above opera, four symphonies, several ballets, choral works, and a wide range of chamber music and songs.
The Gramophone CD Guide’ (2003) lists two of his symphonies and some of his chamber music. Writing of the fourth symphony, the reviewer says that it might well have been Gerhard’s intention to integrate atonal orchestration with folk music ‘so that they can stand side by side as symbols of a fractured culture and an uprooted life’.

B.R.

Edmund Rubbra (1901-86)

Born in ‘middle’ England ( Northampton), this supremely English composer has never received the recognition and prominence which I believe he deserves. It is generally agreed that his music is difficult, its texture thick and its many melodies hidden in a system of organic and rhapsodic growth, rather than in more traditional forms of development. But there is – for me at least – so much soul! Influenced by eastern mysticism but then in middle years converting to Catholicism, there may be little surface beauty in his eleven symphonies, but there is a depth that not many composers reach. His music demands respect and attention. It is the antithesis of ‘background’ music. There is so much happening that unless you concentrate you lose the flow or fail to follow the argument. His music difficult and different, then, but wonderfully rewarding.

He wrote many choral pieces, songs, chamber music, violin, viola and piano concertos but no work for the theatre. Teaching for many years at the Guildhall College of Music and at Oxford, he was an honoured member of the notable group of English composers of the twentieth century, but never reached the popularity of Walton, Tippett and Britten. I heard his fifth symphony (1949) at a Prom concert conducted by Adrian Boult, and I think it must have been the first performance of what is generally regarded as his best symphonic work ( the 4th, 6th, & the 8th , with its beautiful last movement, are my favourites). There was, for a Prom audience, polite applause. But then he came to the platform, his red hair and beard, sandals and slightly dishevelled appearance appealing to the Promenaders. He looked like a real composer! They cheered.

Norman del Mar conducted many of his symphonies for Lyrita some years ago and some of then are still available I think. Richard Hickox has recorded the whole cycle more recently for Chandos. There are many other recordings of his works currently available. But he needs to be heard in performance and as far as I know his larger works are never heard today. Marin Alsop and her excellent Bournemouth Symphony are just the people to bring him to life again in the concert hall. Please!

There’s an excellent webpage under his name which I recommend, as well as contributions from many other enthusiasts.

B.R.

Sir Adrian Boult (1889-1983)

Every inch the Edwardian gentleman, Adrian Boult was the founder and first conductor and Music Director of the B.B.C. Symphony Orchestra in the early 1930’s, and continued to be so until the B.B.C. forced him to retire from that post because he was 60 years old - the B.B.C.’s official retirement age -the matter being very badly handled, with suspicions that there were personal reasons for this, and leaving Boult with a lasting bitterness.

I have seen him conduct on several occasions. During the war years the orchestra was moved to Bedford and made many of their broadcasts from there. On one notable afternoon, as a schoolboy travelling home from school on the Bedford line, I sat opposite to him in a railway carriage. He was reading a miniature score and as I stared at him in wonder, he looked up and smiled at me. Seventh heaven! I couldn’t wait to tell the family about it when I got home.

He was singularly undemonstrative on the rostrum. His baton was unusually large but he used it sparingly. There was nothing of the exhibitionist about him. That may be one reason why critics sometimes faulted him for being too cool. He is rightly remembered as an interpreter of English music. Edward Elgar once wrote to him and said the future of his music was safe in his hands. In fact he had a very wide repertoire, premiered many new works and gave first British performances of Mahler symphonies, long before their present popularity.

Boult was a friend to many musicians. He encouraged Simon Rattle at the outset of his career (one can’t imagine two such entirely different conductors) as well as Vernon Handley, who in many ways has continued Boult’s self-effacing attitude to his work. He became the chief conductor of the London Philharmonic after the B.B.C. debacle, brought it to a new level of excellence and made many recordings, some of which are still available. He enjoyed an Indian summer, working when he wanted to, re-recording many of the works that he loved. He was last seen on the rostrum, at the age of 87, in the pit of the Royal Opera House, conducting five performances of a ballet using the music of Elgar’s ‘Enigma Variations. By then he was known in the profession as ‘The Old Man’.

After his death in 1983, the composer Robert Simpson wrote ‘He had a goodness, a kindness, rare among the dangerous breed of conductors; he had so gentle and unassuming a nature that it was hard to believe that he could ever have had the urge to be a conductor…he could bark if he liked – though it never lasted long, and there was no malice in him..’

B.R.

What Music Does to You

Trying to ‘describe’ music; the feel of it and the effect particular composers have on you isn’t easy. Those who have kindly been reading these articles may well agree. I was reading an interview with the distinguished (and very modest) pianist Mitsuko Uchida the other day. Clearly she knows how to represent the essence of music in words as brilliantly as she does on the keyboard.

‘I want to play more and more Mozart, Schubert, and Beethoven – and I shall slowly, slowly invade the world with my Bach’ she says. ‘I’m more and more drawn to those fundamental four composers. It’s almost frightening: there is something about them growing so big in my life that I feel I almost have to fight against them not to get completely consumed’

For her it was Schubert who ’was the one among all the great composers that I felt close to, even as a kid. I didn’t think I was close to Mozart at all. And I was right – you can’t get close to Mozart! You can get closer and closer to what he is doing, and you can hit him for a hundredth of a second now and then – but then he goes, and you have to let him go. But Schubert I felt was a kindred soul of mine. He can be alone with you. Mozart is running around, conversing with you, chasing you – there’s always something happening. But Schubert is a loner – so every lonely soul is touched by him’.

I know exactly what she means. I would go further in comparing the two composers; certainly more than I imagine Uchida would. In the end Mozart for me is glitteringly brilliant, whereas Schubert is a constant source of fascination and delight. Subjective of course, but however knowledgeable the experts may be, in the end there are no absolutes about musical appreciation.

What music does to you can be a shared experience, but in the end is personal to you alone.

B.R.