Vaughan Williams, Ralph (1872-1958)

[3rd Viennese School]

No,those 4 individual notes that start mvt 3. These are the same as the tune which is played over and over again on Saturn.

3VS

[Suffolkcoastal]

Do you mean the top voice of each of the first four chords, or the cor anglais theme? That really would be stretching things to the limit I bet I can find the same 4 notes in hundreds of other works in the same order, this is just getting plain silly.

[3rd Viennese School]

The chords! I happen to like them, by the way!

Anyway, I just thought we were giving the thread starter an overview of VW symphonies. Lots to explore...

[JoeG]

Though I haven't posted on this thread for some time - holiday, nice weather and work got in the way - I have picked up the thread with interest and will be reading back through the coments with the CDs of the works concerned to hand when I have a chance. As Mario has mentioned we did meet in Malta and had some very engrossing discussions about life, the universe and Mahler (as well as RVW) which we will be continuing into the future. It is so nice when a forum like this can lead to a friendship and reminds us of the power for good that the internet can be. Thanks to ff for leading us here :-)

[clive heath]

Not a symphony but it hasn't been mentioned

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5JvpL6nyTc

perhaps because I sang it in the choir as a teenager at school, when viewing this just now the first movement turned out to be a spine-tingling moment on a par with Venus/Holst or Dawn/Ravel . VW 6 was in the school library and after the sax-solo we would applaud.

[Auferstehen2]

I'd be interested if you notice any of the supposed Englishness in the music.

Message 19
Don Basilio, the music indeed does take me back to all those wonderful memories of the 35 or so years I spent in London. Autumn's halcyon evenings spent walking through my favourite of all London's parks, St James', recall warm and pleasant feelings.

Symphonies Nos 2 & 5 well-known now, and thoroughly enjoyed. Starting on No 3, only because it's a short one, just over half an hour!

Mario

[Auferstehen2]

Message 19
Don Basilio, the music indeed does take me back to all those wonderful memories of the 35 or so years I spent in London. Autumn's halcyon evenings spent walking through my favourite of all London's parks, St James', recall warm and pleasant feelings.

Symphonies Nos 2 & 5 well-known now, and thoroughly enjoyed. Starting on No 3, only because it's a short one, just over half an hour!

Mario

Oi! Should the next be No 3 or not? Don't forsake me now, please!

Mario

[Ventilhorn]

Oi! Should the next be No 3 or not? Don't forsake me now, please!

Mario

Hello Mario,

Have no fear of Nº 3 (Pastoral Symphony - 1921) but be prepared for a surprise when you hear Nº 4 (1934)
A complete change of direction from the pastoral. Angry, exciting and (with Nº 6) showing a complete contrast in RVW's creative thinking.

Nº 4 is my favourite. I have a great performance by Norman del Mar and the BBCSO off air when they were touring in China. The audience loved it.

Happy listening!

Ventilhorn

[Suffolkcoastal]

No 3 is very deceptive Mario. It is actually the composer's reaction to World War I, he saw the horrors first hand, as he was both an ambulance drive and artillery officer during the conflict. Underneath the apparent calm there is something deeply disturbing and very poignant and the work is actually quite dissonant at times with biting bitonality, but due to its apparent surface calm and generally quiet dynamics you would never necessarily know that this was the case.

[BBMmk2]

I don't know which is my favourite symphony. It's a pity that nos 8 & 9 are not thought of in the same regard?

[JoeG]

I think No 3 is an excellent next step before tackling the challenges, and reaping the rewards, of No 6 and No 4 (in that order I would suggest)

[FoxyTheCat]

A bit late to this thread, I see you have already started your survey so my views are perhaps too late.

I would have advised starting with no 8. the shortest and a gem. It has all the elements of VW's art, the slow movement (cavatina) has a most moving cello solo, it does end in a triumphal blaze of sound and is the only VW symphony apart from no. 4 to end loudly. Thereafter go 2 3 4 5 6 and 7.

Then No 1 (A Sea Symphony) and finally No.9. These two are maybe difficult to "get" until a few hearings but they are linked despite being first and last and nearly 50 years apart in terms of compostion. The link is a very early tone poem called The Solent which although VW discarded he reused themes from it in both his first and last symphonies and so whether consciously or not he returned to the beginning of his symphonic journey at the very end.

I love all his symphonies , they are all so different from one another and the cycle is a true journey and reflection on the troubled history of the first half of the 20th century. The 9th is ultimately my favourite the ending maybe a glimpse of the end of life when the atoms that make us up return to the Cosmos whence they came.

Regards

FTC

[Dave2002]

Then No 1 (A Sea Symphony) and finally No.9. These two are maybe difficult to "get" until a few hearings but they are linked despite being first and last and nearly 50 years apart in terms of compostion. The link is a very early tone poem called The Solent which although VW discarded he reused themes from it in both his first and last symphonies and so whether consciously or not he returned to the beginning of his symphonic journey at the very end.

I love all his symphonies , they are all so different from one another and the cycle is a true journey and reflection on the troubled history of the first half of the 20th century. The 9th is ultimately my favourite the ending maybe a glimpse of the end of life when the atoms that make us up return to the Cosmos whence they came.

Regards

FTC

Foxy

Your comments are interesting. I'm just trying to figure out No 9, and finding it tough, so discovering that perhaps 1 and 9 are based on common themes is of interest. I'll try to find a recording of The Solent - do you know of one?

I also have mixed feelings about number 1, though I think the opening of that is absolutely splendid. I need to spend more time on that one too.

PS: I guess there isn't a recording of The Solent, though there are printed texts about it. Maybe there isn't even a score available.

[Suffolkcoastal]

Foxy

Your comments are interesting. I'm just trying to figure out No 9, and finding it tough, so discovering that perhaps 1 and 9 are based on common themes is of interest. I'll try to find a recording of The Solent - do you know of one?

I also have mixed feelings about number 1, though I think the opening of that is absolutely splendid. I need to spend more time on that one too.

PS: I guess there isn't a recording of The Solent, though there are printed texts about it. Maybe there isn't even a score available.

The Solent has never been recorded or possibly even played for over 100 years. It is one of a number of early Vaughan Williams orchestral works of the period 1898-1906 that have never been recorded or even performed since that time. These works works are in urgent need of unnearthing as they constitute the last real unknown in Vaughan Williams's output. The Heroic Elegy & Triumphal Epilogue of 1901 was finally performed and recorded a couple of years ago, showing the orchestral works of the period may not be as insiginificant as first thought.

[FoxyTheCat]

The Solent was performed once 19/6/1903 (ref. Michael Kennedy)

The theme from it as used in the 1st and 9th symphonies is very haunting. ( It opens the 2nd movement of no.9) Originally I believe the theme was played on clarinet but in no 9 it's on the Flugelhorn and it sounds very mysterious.

Dave 2002, stick with both symphonies, in time they will click. No.1 is long but in the last movement the music from "...Oh Thou transcendant" to the end is spellbinding. The 9th is a vast landscape of the inner(spiritual) and outer(landscape) worlds of existence. If you have ever travelled through Salisbury Plain around Stonehenge you might get a feeling for the brooding and expansive 1st movement. Thereafter the Saxophones and the Flugelhorn really give this symphony a unique and dark timbre. The ending as Percy Grainger remarked after the first US performance is cosmic.

VW 9 is IMHO, as religious a work as Bruckner 9.

regards


FTC