Holst, Imogen (1907 - 1984)

[smittims]

I urge anyone looking for the sort of thing Radio 3 used to so well, to listen to this week's Composer of the Week. I'd heard some of Imogen Holst's music but the chance to hear an extended selection from her whole output shows her to have been a more original and diverse composer than I had thought. And if you're new to her music, don' t be misled by the surname. The music is much more than a copy of her Dad's.

It struck me that the format of this programme : a few minutes of narrative alternating with few minutes of music, is best suited to composers who wrote works of short duration, and this suits IH very well as hardly any of ther works are much more than 15 minutes in length.

Donald is doing well so far this week, in my opinion. And well done Alice Farnham and the BBC Concert Orchestra, who it seems have recorded much of the music specially.

The reason her music is so little-known is part due to her extreme modesty. What seems to have been her longest work, a one-act opera written for Dartington, was performed once, Christopher Grogan's excellent book telling us that 'IH was adamant it should not be played again' . And there are other works of hers which she withdrew after one hearing.

[Master Jacques]

She was equally protective of her father's legacy and reputation, to the detriment of both of them, I feel. A lot of Gustav Holst's early works which have leapt back into the world since her death have proved eminently able to stand on their feet, without any apology.

As for Imogen's own music, she would have intensely disliked the idea of a week's programmes devoted to her work. Quite wrongly so. It's not earth-shaking, but it is well-crafted, intelligent and imaginative.

[Serial_Apologist]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0026wst

[Serial_Apologist]

I would say Imogen's music owed more to her father's than Smittims argues. That small snippett at the beginning of the first programme of this week's series betrayed a strong pull from the end of "Saturn" as that ominous bass line emerges from under Daphnis's Daybreak duvet, but it was the later, austerer Phrygian Gustav whose modalities echoed on through a lot of her own less folk-influenced work. I've always felt sadness that she would become prime (as well as prim!) amanuensis for Britten - whose music, for all its showiness, lacked both the musical integrity and follow-through of hers - as well as in the tragedy of her clearly unrequited love for her younger champion.

[smittims]

Apparently she gave up composition during her 'Britten ' years, and these would probably have been the best years of her creativity. The String Quartet, whch will be played about 1630 GMT today, is the most original of her works I've heard.

[Pulcinella]

Her Mass setting is in the minster's repertoire here.

[Master Jacques]

I've always felt sadness that she would become prime (as well as prim!) amanuensis for Britten - whose music, for all its showiness, lacked both the musical integrity and follow-through of hers - as well as in the tragedy of her clearly unrequited love for her younger champion.

I suppose that Imogen Holst herself (though fully aware of the compositional debt to her father which you outline) would disagree vehemently with the mosaic of "sadness", "lack of musical integrity" and "tragedy of unrequited love" which you present. If anyone was pretty clearly having a ball with life, it was Miss Holst. From what little I've read, I doubt she saw any heavenly prospect in the idea of a nice, cosy marriage and three kiddies - though I'm open to correction.

[smittims]

I think Dr. Freud would have summed her up quicky. I think she had a fear of physical contact (i.e. sex) and chose people who were not likely to want it from her (Britten , Arthur Caton). But her suppression of her own compositional gift is possibly due to fear of rejection or criticism. She had plenty of opportunities to get her music performed.

[mopsus]

She was equally protective of her father's legacy and reputation, to the detriment of both of them, I feel.

Was she responsible for the long delay before his Nunc Dimittis was published? (She edited it for publication.) I have been surprised that it had to wait some 60 years for a second performance, but I suppose that Westminster Cathedral had other things to think about in 1915, and they probably didn't do choral settings of the Nunc very often.

I have sung a couple of psalm settings by her and in both cases I felt she would have done better not to set the psalm in its entirety as the material was stretched a little too thin.

[Master Jacques]

I think Dr. Freud would have summed her up quicky. I think she had a fear of physical contact (i.e. sex) and chose people who were not likely to want it from her (Britten , Arthur Caton). But her suppression of her own compositional gift is possibly due to fear of rejection or criticism. She had plenty of opportunities to get her music performed.

Self-limitation needn't be caused by fear. In her case, perfectionism seems to enter into it. And there are composers (male and female) who simply don't see themselves as players on the "big stage", but as William Morris-style artisans, tailoring music for small, local often amateur groups as they need it. This isn't a lack of ambition, so much as a different (socialistic or Christian) aim: to serve society usefully, rather than exploiting it for fame and money.

[Master Jacques]

Was she responsible for the long delay before his Nunc Dimittis was published? (She edited it for publication.) I have been surprised that it had to wait some 60 years for a second performance, but I suppose that Westminster Cathedral had other things to think about in 1915, and they probably didn't do choral settings of the Nunc very often.

I don't know: the fact that she edited it for publication (eventually) tells us that by her final years at least - by which time she'd relaxed her standards as to which of her father's works she considered worthy of preserving - she must have believed it was worth performing again.

There were certainly published works which she actively discouraged groups from programming. The Cloud Messenger, for example, which she thought "incurably dull ... the work as a whole is not a success. It is no wonder he was more depressed after the first performance than he had ever been in his life". And she convinced Leslie Head, enthusiastic to give the ultra-Wagnerian Sita a full London production with his Opera Viva, to only do the opera's final scene, in concert.

(Talking of Sita, it received its first ever complete performances last month, at the Saarländisches Staatstheater in Saarbrücken - we're back to English opera premieres in Germany, now! - but I haven't read any reports. English press simply not interested?)

[mopsus]

she must have believed [the Nunc Dimittis] was worth performing again.

It is much more than 'worth performing again' - it's now a standard repertoire piece for most Cathedral choirs, particularly useful for pairing with a stand-alone Latin Magnificat. The number of recordings also testifies to its quality.

Maybe only Westminster Cathedral had a copy and it was they who unearthed it for editing. R R Terry had commissioned Nuncs from four other composers the previous year, and Howells' at least was also undiscovered for many years. (I owe much of this information to online Hyperion liner notes,)

[Master Jacques]

Maybe only Westminster Cathedral had a copy and it was they who unearthed it for editing. R R Terry had commissioned Nuncs from four other composers the previous year, and Howells' at least was also undiscovered for many years. (I owe much of this information to online Hyperion liner notes,)

The final (3rd) edition of her book on her father's music only lists it as "recently published" by Novello, modestly not mentioning her own involvement. Nor does she tell us whether she worked from a copy at Westminster Cathedral, or her father's own manuscript. Her Thematic Catalogue (Faber, 1974) would tell us where the M/S is held. Perhaps some other Forumite owns a copy of the catalogue??

[Master Jacques]

MS Autograph, whereabouts unknown.
Partly autograph, in author's collection. See Facsimile VI
Unpublished.
First performance liturgically, 4 April 1915 (Easter Sunday) at Westminster Cathedral, London. The choir of Westminster Cathedral under the direction of Richard Terry.

This was probably written at Terry's request.

So there we are: in 1974 the full M/S was "whereabouts unknown", strongly suggesting mopsus's suggestion that the complete fair-copy original was located in Westminster Cathedral, sometime between then and the publication a few years later. Doubtless IH worked from that, plus the partial autograph, which was in her own hands. Thank you, Internet Archive!

[Roslynmuse]

The final (3rd) edition of her book on her father's music only lists it as "recently published" by Novello, modestly not mentioning her own involvement. Nor does she tell us whether she worked from a copy at Westminster Cathedral, or her father's own manuscript. Her Thematic Catalogue (Faber, 1974) would tell us where the M/S is held. Perhaps some other Forumite owns a copy of the catalogue??

I have just looked up my copy of the catalogue - it says Autograph - whereabouts unknown; partly autograph ms in IH's collection; in 1974 it is described as unpublished - is there a later edition of the catalogue?