Tippett symphonies by The BBCSSO...

[Bryn]

Certainly not, it will remain unpublished and in any case would have to compete with 4 better symphonies by this composer ...and 11 worse symphonies by Philip Glass.

More of the latter to come, I fear.

[Stanfordian]

Well, it's difficult to give an opinion on one hearing but, imho, there WAS a lot of Sibelius in it which is hardly surprising but it still had plenty of Tippett in it. A good symphony but definitely not a great symphony. Will it gain a foothold in the repertoire?

I'll certainly have to catch up with this early Symphony. Some decades ago I was told by one of Tippett's friends that he had physically destroyed all his early works.

[Alison]

One thing I find annoying re. Radio 3 broadcasts of the series is that I can find no accurate reference to a broadcast of the 2nd with the BBCSSO/Brabbins. A Barbican performance by the BBCSO/Brabbins performance was broadcast a couple of years or so back but a search using Google find only the Radio 3 in Concert recording broadcast last February which advertised the 2nd but actually had the 1st. Does anyone here know any better?

I found a concert listing for 9 February with broadcast on St Valentines Day last year. Haydn and Ravel also on the programme.

[Bryn]

I found a concert listing for 9 February with broadcast on St Valentines Day last year. Haydn and Ravel also on the programme.

Yes, but when I checked the recording I have for that date, it turned out to be a repeat of the November concert which had the First Symphony, not the Second. All very strange. Both concerts had the Ravel concerto and the Haydn symphony. I wonder if they got their recordings mixed up. I will check again though.

[Alison]

That is odd!

[Bryn]

That is odd!

Oops, though the First was broadcast in November last year, it was during Afternoon on 3. The concert with the same supporting works as the Second was the previous November:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/events/errwhn

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08dnr4r

[LMcD]

[QUOTE=pastoralguy;662748].... imho, there WAS a lot of Sibelius in it which is hardly surprising but it still had plenty of Tippett in it. A good symphony but definitely not a great symphony. [QUOTE]

[Boilk]

Telegraph review of the Tippett symphony here

[LMcD]

Telegraph review of the Tippett symphony here

Fair comment, I would say.

[ahinton]

Fair comment, I would say.

Yes, I'd agree with that. Brabbins' observation that no one enters the world of composition fully formed is very much to the point; arguably the closest to this that anyone ever became was Mendelssohn, Chopin and Medtner but even that's not very close. Whilst of course Tippett had moved on by the time he decided to withdraw and reject his early symphony, he still wrote "Symphony No. 2" on the score of what we now know as his first symphony and that was at least a dozen years after completing the one that was reveled yesterday evening.

It's perhaps a curious coincidence that he was working on that B flat Symphony at the same time as Elgar was trying to get going on the third symphony that he would never write and then Anthony Payne's realisation of that symphony was premièred within weeks of Tippett's death in 1998.

I did not even know of the work's existence until Humphrey Searle mentioned it to me when I was studying with him. He had attended a performance of it in the 1930s and, coincidentally, made an observation similar to Brabbins' in questioning why Tippett had finally decided to call time on it just because he'd moved on a long way since then, a step which struck HS as less than logical despite Tippett having done just that; I believe that he was right here, especially given that Tippett never turned against his works from the first piano sonata to A Midsummer Marriage and the Piano Concerto just because his works from the 60s and early 70s had "moved on" from them (which indeed they had in many ways).

I have to admit that I was less than convinced by it than some, although pleased that it had at last been given the exposure that it nevertheless deserved. It's certainly accomplished, although the pointers to the later Tippett seemed few and far between, fascinating though they were; I also found almost as much Nielsen in it as I did Sibelius. Although it struck me as a work by someone without an individual voice, it also strongly suggested that its composer was well on his way to finding one, which he did quite soon after completing it. The officially numbered 1, 2 & 4 are far stronger and more convincing symphonies. Discretion persuades me not to mention 3...

I've never forgotten Britten urging me to get to know as many of Tippett's works as I could, adding that, when he (BB) begins work on a piece he always knows what he's doing but, even though when Tippett does so he often seems not to, "just look at the results he gets!". I wonder if Britten ever heard Tippett's B flat Symphony...

[Bryn]

Hurrah! The Second Symphony (BBCSSO, Brabbins) was on Ao3 today. Next in line for audition after the current Le Marteau . . . SACD ends.

[BBMmk2]

Hurrah! The Second Symphony (BBCSSO, Brabbins) was on Ao3 today. Next in line for audition after the current Le Marteau . . . SACD ends.

Thanks Bryn!