William Mathias (1934 - 92)

[DracoM]

A fascinating and revelatory week - what a difference in styles, language, idiom.

[makropulos]

The very early 'Prelude, Elegy and Toccata' (1954) is very good, but I've never been able to find a publisher. I suspect it's still in MS, although it is on Richard Lea's recording of the complete organ works from Liverpool Met.
NVV

Yes, it is still unpublished - and I agree it's rather good. The manuscript is in the National Library of Wales:

https://archifau.llyfrgell.cymru/index.php/prelude-elegy-and-toccata-for-organ

[Nevilevelis]

Yes, it is still unpublished - and I agree it's rather good. The manuscript is in the National Library of Wales:
https://archifau.llyfrgell.cymru/ind...cata-for-organ

Thank you!!

[makropulos]

'Lift up your heads, O ye gates' (1973). The latter was published in one of the Anthems for Choirs books and may have been a commission for the collection.
NVV

Why only "may", Nevilevelis? Craggs's catalogue and the National Library of Wales both say it was commissioned for Anthems for Choirs 1. It was finished on 31 May 1969 (date on MS) - 1973 was apparently the date of the first performance and first publication.

By the way, the National Library of Wales collection is a fascinating source for anyone interested in Mathias. Here's the link to the main music mss page - have fun :)

https://archifau.llyfrgell.cymru/index.php/music-manuscripts-3

[Nevilevelis]

Why only "may", Nevilevelis? Craggs's catalogue and the National Library of Wales both say it was commissioned for Anthems for Choirs 1. It was finished on 31 May 1969 (date on MS) - 1973 was apparently the date of the first performance and first publication.

By the way, the National Library of Wales collection is a fascinating source for anyone interested in Mathias. Here's the link to the main music mss page - have fun :)
https://archifau.llyfrgell.cymru/ind...-manuscripts-3

Because it was conjecture on my part; something half-remembered in the back of my mind from years ago. Thanks for confirming it!

[makropulos]

Mathias - and specifically the Toccata giocosa - was one of the first composers I got really excited about as a teenager learning the organ, and I still enjoy the organ music a great deal. That and the shorter choral works that have already been mentioned are - to my ears - anything but "identikit" compositions: in my view they sound like Mathias and not like anybody else. The string quartets are much newer to me and I must say there are fine things there too. He's an uneven composer, maybe, but I think quite a distinctive one, albeit one whose influences (Hindemith, Tippett et al) are easily detected.

[Serial_Apologist]

Mathias - and specifically the Toccata giocosa - was one of the first composers I got really excited about as a teenager learning the organ, and I still enjoy the organ music a great deal. That and the shorter choral works that have already been mentioned are - to my ears - anything but "identikit" compositions: in my view they sound like Mathias and not like anybody else. The string quartets are much newer to me and I must say there are fine things there too. He's an uneven composer, maybe, but I think quite a distinctive one, albeit one whose influences (Hindemith, Tippett et al) are easily detected.

Yes: as an instance of Mathias's eclecticism, at the beginning of the third symphony I thought they'd put on Prokofiev's Scythian Dances by mistake; and the start of that movement's second subject had a strong Malcolm Arnold resemblance in the chromatic brass chords piled up in thirds which was to come through in several places during the symphony's subsequent course. Nothing wrong with any of this, of course; it's just that I would have been far more excited by this and so much of the other music we've heard this week had it been composed in the 1950s, where, like a lot of the music Richar Rodney Bennett composed after abandoning serialism, it seems to belong for the era it strongly evokes, for me at any rate. I just feel that John McCabe covered this sort of ground with greater originality and profundity.

Now, how about Alun Hoddinott for COTW?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Now, how about Alun Hoddinott for COTW?

Well - my vote would be for Daniel Jones (the first British composer to be invited to lecture at the Darnstadt Summer Music Courses - a very highbrow Pub Quiz question). But they'd have to record a many of the works specially for the series.

On my limited experience of Hoddinott, I still prefer Mathais. Mathias' symphonies aim "lower", but reach higher than Hoddinott's - too often in the latter, Christopher Lee emerges from the nighttime graveyard for me to take them seriously. Mathias' genuine good humour and sense of melodic shape I find much, much more attractive.

But I wouldn't (even if I could) "veto" a Hoddinott week - both he and Mathias were very kind and encouraging to me in the early eighties, and I wouldn't wish their works to "disappear" completely.

[Rosie55]

I would like more Hoddinott broadcast. The 6th Symphony, Lanternes des Morts, Sinfonia Fidei and Heaventree of Stars are super scores. Not to mention the chamber music and songs which younger performers seem to be picking up...I enjoy Huw and Paul Watkins performing his cello sonata and Claire Booth, Nicky Spence and Andrew Matthews-Owen on his songs. He is avery colourful composer.