Michael Tippett (1905 - 98)

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

A serendipitous subject for me this week - since the beginning of January, I've been reading Thomas Schuttenhelm's book on the composer's orchestral Music, and listening to a lot of his work; a wonderful experience to reacquaint myself with this marvellous Music (and to confirm that the Piano Concerto is one of my favourite examples of the genre - it just gets better and better with every new hearing).

Lunchtimes this week are going to be a particular treat (although I thought some of the soloists in the Hickox recording of A Child of Our Time not so pleasurable - and I've never been less convinced by the composer's libretto than when listening to this performance).

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00028hc

[Serial_Apologist]

A serendipitous subject for me this week - since the beginning of January, I've been reading Thomas Schuttenhelm's book on the composer's orchestral Music, and listening to a lot of his work; a wonderful experience to reacquaint myself with this marvellous Music (and to confirm that the Piano Concerto is one of my favourite examples of the genre - it just gets better and better with every new hearing).

Lunchtimes this week are going to be a particular treat (although I thought some of the soloists in the Hickox recording of A Child of Our Time not so pleasurable - and I've never been less convinced by the composer's libretto than when listening to this performance).

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00028hc

So (as everybody now seems to be saying), this week gives me a chance to reassess this composer, and Byzantium, which I had not heard previously, proved an excellent starting point. More than a bit of Messiaen in among the many influences at work in it, I detected. Even though I've always felt ambivalent about his work from the second symphony onwards, I've long held Tippett in great respect - not least for the fact (if I am correct) that he was the first well-known composer to have "come out" and that for a generation that was rarely given to even thinking about, let alone openly talking about matters of sexuality. I shall be tuning in every day.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

So (as everybody now seems to be saying), this week gives me a chance to reassess this composer, and Byzantium, which I had not heard previously, proved an excellent starting point. More than a bit of Messiaen in among the many influences at work in it, I detected. Even though I've always felt ambivalent about his work from the second symphony onwards, I've long held Tippett in great respect - not least for the fact (if I am correct) that he was the first well-known composer to have "come out" and that for a generation that was rarely given to even thinking about, let alone openly talking about matters of sexuality. I shall be tuning in every day.

Messiaen - yes, perhaps, but I think more a case of Tippett's parallel development of a harmonic and structural language from the mutual influence of Stravinsky: following the evolution of Tippett's expressive techniques from King Priam onward, I hear an independent train of thought from Messiaen's. Byzantium continues the Tippett style quite smoothly from his previous work - but I speak as someone who would far rather listen to Tippett than to Messiaen. (And would St Olivier have countenanced the jazz and rock elements that are part of Sir Michael's rich, generous, and vital Music?)

Byzantium impressed me much more than I remember it doing before - but I do have a problem with Tippett's vocal melismas: that "yo-ho-he-ho -- heho-heho-heho" stuff does get in the way for me.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Thanks for that - I wasn't aware of Thomas Schuttenhelm's book, but it's on the shortlist now. The Piano Concerto has been somewhat bashed in the past for being "not very pianistic" which I take to mean not falling easily under the fingers for pianists of a certain generation. Hopefully that is now a thing of the past. As an undergraduate I once payed (not very well) his very original Sonata No.2; yes it was different to anything else I'd learned at the keyboard, but at the same time a very liberating pianistic experience and it made 'perfect sense' for me, from start to finish.

Hope you enjoy the Schuttenhelm - it's full of useful biographical material (I didn't know that Barbirolli assisted Tippett in notating the violin parts of the Second Symphony - suggestions brusquely rejected by BBCSO Leader Paul Beard, and resulting in the first performance breakdown) and corrects many erroneous statements in earlier sources (such as Ian Kemp's superb biography, which Schuttenhelm rightly praises and quotes from generously). I'm finding it less useful for analytical insights - and there are one or two curious turns of phrase that might have benefited from a little more editing; nothing extreme, but sentences that need a second reading to click into place ("Tippett ... arranged to have additional lessons with noted Sixteenth-century contrapuntalist, R. O. Morris" - not "wrong", of course, but clumsy in that the flow of the information got held up as I rearranged the statement in my mind. I found I had to do this quite a few times throughout the book.)

The Second Piano Sonata was one of the very first pieces that I ever taught to "A"-level students back in 1985. It was wonderful to see the students' progression from bafflement to appreciation over the weeks - and overhearing a couple of them experimenting with the opening chord one lunchtime, and coming to the conclusion that there was no substitute for what the composer had written. (I used to be able to play the opening section from memory - not any more.)

[Richard Barrett]

Good to have a recommendation for the Schuttenhelm book, I shall be acquiring that forthwith. Looking forward to Oliver Soden's biography due out in April as well.

Conversely to S_A's experience, the Second Symphony is where Tippett's music begins for me. He was certainly aware of Messiaen's work and kept up with the latest developments in music for some time (the first movement of his Third Symphony began as a response to Boulez, for example), and actually I've always heard at least as much Hindemith as Stravinsky in Tippett's work. Anyway I'm sure everyone here has heard me banging on about Tippett quite sufficiently for now.

[ardcarp]

I see that a forthcoming Tales from the Stave on BBC Radio 4 will be about A Child of Our Time. I was present at a recording made by the BBC in Birmingham Town Hall c.1960s. (I can't remember who was conducting the CBSO and the choir...except that it wasn't Hugo Rignold.) There wasn't a very large audience, and most of those present didn't seem to be enjoying it very much. I was blown away by it...having only previously heard/sung the Sprituals.

Edit: Oops. I see the Tales from the Stave programme was broadcast in 2009. Why the programme's website says 'it will be available soon' I really don't know.

[BBMmk2]

A serendipitous subject for me this week - since the beginning of January, I've been reading Thomas Schuttenhelm's book on the composer's orchestral Music, and listening to a lot of his work; a wonderful experience to reacquaint myself with this marvellous Music (and to confirm that the Piano Concerto is one of my favourite examples of the genre - it just gets better and better with every new hearing).

Lunchtimes this week are going to be a particular treat (although I thought some of the soloists in the Hickox recording of A Child of Our Time not so pleasurable - and I've never been less convinced by the composer's libretto than when listening to this performance).

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00028hc

Oh, that does surprise me Ferney. I find this a most immersive listen.

[ahinton]

Conversely to S_A's experience, the Second Symphony is where Tippett's music begins for me

It begins considerably earlier for me but that symphony is one of Tippett's outstanding works, to my mind.

He was certainly aware of Messiaen's work and kept up with the latest developments in music for some time (the first movement of his Third Symphony began as a response to Boulez, for example), and actually I've always heard at least as much Hindemith as Stravinsky in Tippett's work

As indeed have I. Carter's Piano Sonata seems at times to rub shoulders with Tippet but that's surely coincidental.

Anyway I'm sure everyone here has heard me banging on about Tippett quite sufficiently for now.

Not so; I haven't for starters but I'm quite sure that plenty of others here haven't either.

[Bella Kemp]

This is a wonderful article for anyone interested in Tippet:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/feb/07/how-king-priam-saved-michael-tippett

[Richard Barrett]

This is a wonderful article for anyone interested in Tippet:
https://www.theguardian.com/music/20...ichael-tippett

Thanks Bella, that's very interesting indeed.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

This is a wonderful article for anyone interested in Tippet:
https://www.theguardian.com/music/20...ichael-tippett

It is good - but I think that there is an error; Bowen writes

It often takes some time for new music to gain the kind of understanding it deserves, but Tippett was lucky in that a decade later a recording of King Priam, with the London Sinfonietta, conducted by David Atherton, became an international bestseller.

- the premiere of King Priam was in 1962 - the recording was released in 1980, nearly two decades later.

[ahinton]

It is good - but I think that there is an error; Bowen writes - the premiere of King Priam was in 1962 - the recording was released in 1980, nearly two decades later.

True indeed - but what really was the supposed problem with some of Tippett's earler work (i.e. pre the wonderful Second Symphony), including (but not necessarily limited to) the first piano sonata, the first three string quartets, the first symphony, The Midsummer Marriage and the piano concerto?

[Bryn]

It is good - but I think that there is an error; Bowen writes - the premiere of King Priam was in 1962 - the recording was released in 1980, nearly two decades later.

The Atherton was recorded in 1980 but not released until 1981, I think you will find. I, of course, only have the Norrington DVD or 1985.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

True indeed - but what really was the supposed problem with some of Tippett's earler work (i.e. pre the wonderful Second Symphony), including (but not necessarily limited to) the first piano sonata, the first three string quartets, the first symphony, The Midsummer Marriage and the piano concerto?

The Schuttenhelm book is useful in aspects about this; the "problem" for the British critics at the time came to a head around The Midsummer Marriage (mainly because of its libretto - but some reviews made much of the "necessity" of cuts that Pritchard had made in the score) and the Second Symphony - the breakdown in which gave critics "permission" to complain about the composer's "over-intellectualising" in his Music and his technical incompetence. Before that, works like the Concerto for Double String Orchestra had been fairly received (as had the earlier works, including the pre-First Symphony in Bb) although it had taken a performance in London by Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt and members of the Hamburg SO to convince some critics that it was a "truly English" piece. (Tippett's work in the '40s & '50s was also much appreciated by Paul Sacher, who performed it and commissioned the "Sellinger's Round" Divertimento.)

Following the first performance of the Second Symphony, Reginald Howgill, the then-controller of Music at the Beeb, undertook a damage-limitation exercise to protect the reputation of the BBCSO, in which he attacked some critics who had (rightly) blamed the orchestra for the collapse - how could they know better than the performers what had gone wrong, he demanded, and concluded "The comprehensive technique of the BBCSO is equal to all reasonable demands" - clearly implying that Tippett's demands were "unreasonable", and setting the idea in the air that Tippett was some sort of amateur. So; an over-intellectual composer with an amateur technique became a lazy reputation that some commentators picked up on.

But I don't think that this was universal, and the situation might have been exaggerated by Tippett's later supporters, wishing to depict him as the genius whose message finally broke through critical disdain to reach and touch the wider audience. In fact, Tippett's Music was always held in high esteem by many Musicians, impresarios, and commentators - he would never have received so many high-level commissions if it had not.

(But, as a little personal end-note, it always amuses me when I see the comments about the "impracticality" of the Second Symphony by Howgill and Beard; the first time I heard the work Live, it was at a concert given by the Leicester Schools Symphony Orchestra - who performed it magnificently.)

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

The Atherton was recorded in 1980 but not released until 1981, I think you will find.

- receiving the Gramophone award for "Best Contemporary" in that year, too.

I, of course, only have the Norrington DVD or 1985.

I have the Video of that performance. An improvement on the Atherton in that Hecuba is accompanied by the whole violin section, rather than the solo (Nona Liddell?) of the Sinfonietta, IIRC. (Another of those "it can't be done" passages that later performers disproved.) I remember the Covent Garden revival from c1984 (?Sam Wanamaker?) - where the men all wore what looked like bath mats draped over their shoulders.