Holst IN THE BLEAK MIDWINTER film

[amateur51]

I felt the same about Imogen Holst. She always looked the same; I imagine that she adopted that appearance when she was reasonably young - and then stuck to it, without apparently changing with age.

It was a wonderful film; fortunately I have recorded it and now I intend to watch it again and make a note of the titles of the works I want to get to know.

Bravo VodkaDilc!

How refreshing to have words of enthusiasm & generosity on this thread

Good luck with your searches - I shall be doing much the same

[Chris Newman]

I thought the film gave a straightforward picture of Holst the man.

I was not too worried about the Egdon Heath "mountains" as they looked just like the Purbeck Hills when you sail in or out of Poole Harbour at about 6 in the morning. Look south and you think you are sailing on a Scottish Loch. It is my favourite entrance or exit to Britain.

Fascinating too to see the Thaxted priest. I had read about him. There were many pieces of music that I must explore. The RCM Orchestra played beautifully under Sian Edwards. Good to see her back in circulation as she is utterly brilliant as a conductor: a friend tells me she took some time off to bring up a family.

I didn't recognize Tamas Vasary as the other conductor. Whatever happened to that little boy who played the piano with such dreamy shyness? In fact until the credits I thought it might be George Hurst: it was the Frankie Howerd wig wot done it

Another friend referred to Imogen Holst as "Aunty Im". To me she always looked and sounded like the Queen Mum with Brylcreamed hair. I shall always remember her now conducting those Guardsmen with that amazing panache and smile that shouted out "My Dad wrote this. It's great, wot? and I'm bloody proud of him".

[greenilex]

It was revelatory to me (although the atmospheric intercutting could irritate, I agree). He made good use of the earlier material and was convincing about Holst's driven, anguished musicianship. I'll certainly listen further.

Good music teachers in school have a lot to answer for.

[Oldcrofter]

Greenilex: "Good music teachers in school have a lot to answer for" (Message 49)

Sorry, but I don't understand this observation, Greenilex. Could you add a little more detail ?

[Uncle Monty]

I've now taken the time (despite competing demands of spouse and labradors) to watch this again, properly.

Well, I enjoyed it very much. But did anyone else feel it was curiously unfocused? I expect TP would say it's a film rather than a tv-bio-documentary, but we didn't get much of a clear sense of his movement or development through the years. And unless I missed it, I don't think his wife was even mentioned! Photos suggest they were a fun couple together: did their relationship have no bearing on his work at all? I wasn't looking for tittle-tattle (and I would be very surprised if there was any!), but I didn't end up with a very clear sense of GH as a living, wheezing human being. Perhaps that was the point, though -- as Livia Gollancz said, you didn't feel you were in the presence of someone obviously great.

Of course, the musical extracts were selective, but how effective they were. A lot of the "best bits", no doubt, but it all sounded great to me -- well, except perhaps Katherine Jenkins et al.! I know she was singing at some open-air fun event, but she was all over the place. I've always hated "I Vow To Thee" anyway because of the way it bottles out of going up the octave, and instead you get a non-climax somewhere down in the dumps.

Does anyone know the hymn sung over the closing credits? It was probably being sung by the Taiwanese choir, and I know it's "Take My Voice and Let Me Sing", but where does it appear in his oeuvre?

Anyone spot some footage recycled from TP's Vaughan Williams film?!

[Chris Newman]

Of course, the musical extracts were selective, but how effective they were. A lot of the "best bits", no doubt, but it all sounded great to me -- well, except perhaps Katherine Jenkins et al.! I know she was singing at some open-air fun event, but she was all over the place.

I thought that was part of the point Tony Palmer was making as he supported the extreme dislike Gustav Holst's had of the words to "I Vow To Thee My Country" and the way it got sung even during as well as after his lifetime.

[Uncle Monty]

I thought that was part of the point Tony Palmer was making as he supported the extreme dislike Gustav Holst's had of the words to "I Vow To Thee My Country" and the way it got sung even during as well as after his lifetime.

Yes, I know, but it wasn't half squirmy having to sit through all the travesties! I'm not good with embarrassment -- any tv programmes where people get doorstepped by tv bullies, and I have to leave the room

[Panjandrum]

Yes, I know, but it wasn't half squirmy having to sit through all the travesties! I'm not good with embarrassment -- any tv programmes where people get doorstepped by tv bullies, and I have to leave the room

Forewarned is forearmed as they say. I have FF-ed through the offending sequence at x32 speed on my VirginMedia HD remote in approx 10 secs!

[Serial_Apologist]

It would have been helpful to have had more on where Holst's musical influences came from. Too much was made of Holst's originality for his time, but only if he is placed beside composers of the Stanford/Parry generation, and Elgar. British composers including Holst, from Vaughan Williams to Delius by way of Scott, Bax and Ireland, were strongly influenced by French Impressionism, which imv impacted as heavily on the music of his generation as folk and Tudor musics, and near-Eastern modes in Holst's case. Much was made of the Mars movement from The planets being written in 5/4 time, and how original this was for its time; but Ravel had already made comparable use of this in the finale of Daphnis, composed 3 years earlier, this passage, I feel, having been a strong influence on Mars. (Stronger than The Rite, which has also been cited; Holst also borrowed heavily from Ravelian harmonic practice - less so Debussy, though one notes Debussyian usage of whole-tone harmony in many passages of Holst). What was not mentioned was that allegedly Holst kept a copy of the score of Schoenberg's Five Orchestral Pieces Op 16 by his side while composing The Planets. Passages in Venus could have been played illustrating Holst's ingenious adaptation of Schoenberg's use in his own Farben of a single sustained note being shifted seamlessly through a succession of orchestral timbres.

It would also have helped to have been informed as to whether or not Holst was a believer, in the Christian sense, given the love many Christians have for The Hymn of Jesus, but also Holst's interest in Hinduism... and astrology. Where, one wanted to find out from the documentary, did these "exotic" influences come from in Holst's case? And, apart from the radical side of Christianity shown in Holst's work at Thaxted, was his attraction to church ceremonial something he had in common with Vaughan Williams's - i.e. more a pretext for community music making than of invocation, per se?

S-A

S-A

[Panjandrum]

a fair chunk of that must have gone on paying for the myriad live performances, which could have been cut by half to the benefit of more biography or commentary. It was admirably demonstrated that Holst was a non-elitist musician happy to write for and be amongst ordinary people, but there was little offered in the way of contemporary opinion on his music.

Actually they used such well known and expensive bands as the Savaria (sic) orchestra (presumably ananagram of Vasary) and the Royal college of Music orchestra; so far from not being in keeping with Holst's "non-elitist" principles", much of this was obviously done on a shoestring; viz, extended footage of Imo. Still, a curate's egg, as others have remarked.

[salymap]

Is there anything about Conrad Noel, the Red Priest, and where roughly does it come [please]? I believe he also preached at All Hallows,Barking by the Tower, a small Church near the Tower of London, which I visited once with a knowledgeable friend. Unfortunately, my memory has let me down on the details of the Church.

[moeranbiogman]

My father was always talking about 'The Red Dean' - was this the same person?

[Uncle Monty]

My father was always talking about 'The Red Dean' - was this the same person?

No, that was the Rev Hewlett Johnson. He was always being reported on the radio when I was a kid, and I remember my parents tut-tutting about his every utterance

This naturally disposed me to find him interesting

[salymap]

Thanks mercia, I stillhave to watch most of the film. Yes, speakers did err.speak somewhere by the Tower.

The Red Dean was a thorn in the flesh at Canterbury Cathedral some years ago.

[rubbernecker]

I wonder if the absence of the Hymn of Jesus, the Choral Fantasia and the Choral Symphony (without which no meaningful appraisal of Holst's work can be made) was due to budgetary constraints ie. we can afford a choir and an orchestra separately, but not together (?). It's the only reason I can think of to account for this unforgiveable lapse.

Apart from the fascinating contributions by Imogen Holst, I don't think I had any fresh or meaningful insight into the man or his work. I felt Palmer lost his way with this programme. At least someone else should have edited it down to two hours.