Prom 22: A London Symphony – 31.07.18

[Maclintick]

Woth every keystroke. One wonders how much of any contributions from Bax, Butterworth, Beylis Ellis and Francis Toye survived the later revisions?

Fascinating stuff, Pabs. I'd no idea of these collaborations/interventions, but perhaps the fact he needed so much goading reinforces the image of RVW as a great doubter, whether of religious certainties, in the line of his illustrious ancestor Charles Darwin, or his own compositional competence -- "Please have a look at this for me, Gussie, as you know so much more about orchestration than I do" -- to his great friend Holst. The crowd-compositional approach doesn't diminish the work in any way, IMHO. In fact, it's absolutely fitting that the contribution of Butterworth et al should be appreciated.

[Lat-Literal]

Reviews:

https://bachtrack.com/review-prom-22-london-symphonies-manze-bbc-scottish-july-2018

https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/classical/prom-22-bbc-scottish-symphony-orchestra-conductor-andrew-manze-vaughan-williams-haydn-a8473391.html

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2018/aug/01/bbc-scottish-symphony-orchestra-andrew-manze-review-vaughan-williams-haydn-london-symphony-bbc-proms

[edashtav]

Sorry, missed the Prom, But Ed, the coughing that I hear when I am in the arena seems to come mostly from the seated areas, and I'd assume that most bucket list visitors from abroad are in the Arena . The coughing sounds pretty British (oh all right then , English) to me.......

The young one are, ts, but there are many wealthier visitors spread pretty evenly across the RAH, IMHO. It’s thr latter who are the ‘coughers’ and, occasionally, ‘snorers’.

I suppose the point I’ m making is that, in many ways, the Proms are more INTERNATIONAL than the Edinburgh I.F. but, now that memories of William Glock and Pierre Boulez are fading, some of the Prom programmes show an excessive love for Cowpat and Yorkshire Pudding Music. There is a case for transferring some of these to the Cadogan Hall which is not an International Bucket-LIst venue.

[teamsaint]

The young one are, ts, but there are many wealthier visitors spread pretty evenly across the RAH, IMHO. It’s thr latter who are the ‘coughers’ and, occasionally, ‘snorers’.

I suppose the point I’ m making is that, in many ways, the Proms are more INTERNATIONAL than the Edinburgh I.F. but, now that memories of William Glock and Pierre Boulez are fading, some of the Prom programmes show an excessive love for Cowpat and Yorkshire Pudding Music. There is a case for transferring some of these to the Cadogan Hall which is not an International Bucket-LIst venue.

Name names Ed , name names!!

( the inter movement coughers are frequently out in force at other London venues, though the RAH capacity probably enhances the effect. But point taken).

[edashtav]

Name names Ed , name names!!

( the inter movement coughers are frequently out in force at other London venues, though the RAH capacity probably enhances the effect. But point taken).

Reckon you may mean ‘intra’ , ts.������. Sorry my smiley’s people are not congruent with the Forum’s!

[teamsaint]

Reckon you may mean ‘intra’ , ts.������. Sorry my smiley’s people are not congruent with the Forum’s!

I’m talking about the huge volleys of coughing inter movement, or between movements for us non classical scholars.
Which needs stamping out quam celerrime.

Anyway, keep smiling Ed !

[edashtav]

I’m talking about the huge volleys of coughing inter movement, or between movements for us non classical scholars.
Which needs stamping out quam celerrime.

Anyway, keep smiling Ed !

gosh, you set impossibly high standards, ts: I always thought it was a gentleman’s duty to clear his throat inter movements!

[teamsaint]

gosh, you set impossibly high standards, ts: I always thought it was a gentleman’s duty to clear his throat inter movements!

Well of course it is a good time to clear, but it can’t ALL be necessary ? And the more there is, the more intrusive it can become.

But in any case , I am all for lax standards , especially in Latin.

( when a gentleman chooses to clear his throat is of course his own business. I am unable to comment further !!)

[Pabmusic]

Woth every keystroke. One wonders how much of any contributions from Bax, Butterworth, Beylis Ellis and Francis Toye survived the later revisions?

Indeed.RVW said he rewrote the Bax contribution himself beause it sounded too Baxian. I'm less sure about other things though. The revisions came in two phases - 1918-1920, resulting in the first publication, and 1933-1936, resulting in the version we know best. The first phase restructured the symphony (v. 2.0) and made some big changes to layout, mainly of the end of tje Scherzo and the Finale & Epilogue. This was the section Butterworth had said needed revision. Almost the first thing RVW did (Jan or Feb 1918) was sit in Boult's office and excise the third idea from the Finale, which he called a "bad hymn tune". It isn't of course, but it badly interrupts the momentum. It's a very good candidate for the passage Butterworth said "won't do at all". Other than that, RVW wrote a new ending for the Scherzo, to separate it from the Finale.. And the rest was really no more than cutting out extraneous bars, not really thematic or harmonic ideas. In 1936 (v. 2.1) he infamously removed six bars of "horrid modern music" from the slow mvt - was that the Bax passage? But I get the impression that had been changed much earlier. Anyway, the revisions, though substantial, don't exactly suggest the systematic removal of non-RVW material.

When Ellis chose it for the concert, RVW was just leaving for a holiday in Switzerland and Italy. They left in early December and.were due back in April! So he asked Butterworth to 'revise' the score (RVW's word) , produce a short score, and make arrangements for the parts to be produced. George roped in Ellis and the younger Toye brother. Looking at the short score (in the BL) Butterworth concentrated on the Finale & Epilogue (it's In his hand). But that doesn't give a clue what anyone did - for that we'd need the full score. But that disappeared after the first performance (there's room for any conspiracy theorist to enjoy himself! But RVW said he'd sent it to Germany - though he even gave two versions of that story). We do know that GSKB was unhappy with the Finale, but recommended no alterations till after another performance - as it was, nothing could be done till after the fifth in Jan 18, when RVW cut the "bad hymn tune" from the Finale.

It is intriguing as to who did what, though. The 'original score' we have now was done by RVW and Adeline, Denis Browne and E. J. Dent. Cecil Coles might have done some - RVW paid him to make a new score, but relieved him of that when Edward Dent volunteered. That score was done in October and November 1914.

[Pabmusic]

Yes it would have been nice if RVW had left some pencil indications - like the "Ah! ah! ah!"s Mahler scrawled on the score to his Tenth!

I suppose RVW left some written instructions, but they don't survive (and Butterworth didn't keep such things anyway). But there are still some uncatalogued things - but don't get your hopes up.

[Pabmusic]

Fascinating stuff, Pabs. I'd no idea of these collaborations/interventions, but perhaps the fact he needed so much goading reinforces the image of RVW as a great doubter, whether of religious certainties, in the line of his illustrious ancestor Charles Darwin, or his own compositional competence -- "Please have a look at this for me, Gussie, as you know so much more about orchestration than I do" -- to his great friend Holst. The crowd-compositional approach doesn't diminish the work in any way, IMHO. In fact, it's absolutely fitting that the contribution of Butterworth et al should be appreciated.

I think you're right. RVW was very unsure of himself and probably needed guidance from friends. Holst clearly fulfilled that role musically, but I think Butterworth also did, though of course not for long. RVW said some very complimentary things about George's insight into other people's music, and Adeline wrote to her husband once saying "I know how you loved him". Also in 1910-1914 George lived in Cheyne Gdns, very near Cheyne Walk, and he would often dine with Adeline & Ralph - it was after one such that George came out with "You know - you should write a symphony".

[Pabmusic]

Reviews:

https://bachtrack.com/review-prom-22-london-symphonies-manze-bbc-scottish-july-2018

https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/classical/prom-22-bbc-scottish-symphony-orchestra-conductor-andrew-manze-vaughan-williams-haydn-a8473391.html

https://www.theguardian.com/music/20...hony-bbc-proms

Thanks Lat. Good reviews, but let me be picky with the Bachtrack. RVW could not begin any revsions until late in the war. Even though he sat in Boult's office in Jan-Feb "slashing" the score, it was just a temporary expedient until he could rewrite it. That rewriting restructured the symphony and it was published in 1920 (not 1925 as stated). It was performed many times in that guise. Then from 1933-1936 he made more cuts - purely cuts, no restructuring. That was the only version allowed to be performed until very recently. In 10 years or so the 1920 version will be out of copyright.

[Lat-Literal]

Thanks Lat. Good reviews, but let me be picky with the Bachtrack. RVW could not begin any revsions until late in the war. Even though he sat in Boult's office in Jan-Feb "slashing" the score, it was just a temporary expedient until he could rewrite it. That rewriting restructured the symphony and it was published in 1920 (not 1925 as stated). It was performed many times in that guise. Then from 1933-1936 he made more cuts - purely cuts, no restructuring. That was the only version allowed to be performed until very recently. In 10 years or so the 1920 version will be out of copyright.

Thank you Pab for the very interesting information you have provided.

I was a bit disappointed by the reviews. They seemed rather lightweight. I am no great expert but even I attempted more detail in describing the performance and your comprehensive understanding is in an entirely different league. In one of my posts, I referred to 1913, 1919-20, 1933 and 1936 but I am beginning to think that the first of these would be more accurately be described as 1912-14 and the second as 1918-20. Either way, WW1 is bookended and the later dates coincide with momentous events leading towards 1939-1945.

I have found the discussion about others' inputs fascinating but I wondered if you would comment too on earlier comments on this thread - not mine - of other composers' influences? I can see that Cockaigne by Elgar (1903?) was there in parts of Manze's interpretation and I feel that it is also there in the score. It is also fairly easy to agree on Debussy's La Mer (1905-1908) and the Ravel like orchestration. I reckon too that in one part there is even a certain something of Bolero (1928). I suppose if true the question there might be whether that in the symphony came early or during the 1930s revisions. Then, Holst "The Planets" (1914-1916) which on paper at least seems to have been produced in parallel. Were notes exchanged? Plus any jazz elements and the ways in which the symphony created newness? I am inclined to think here of the chord structures while also bearing in mind Bax - eg Tintagel (1917).

[Pabmusic]

Thank you Pab for the very interesting information you have provided.

I was a bit disappointed by the reviews. They seemed rather lightweight. I am no great expert but even I attempted more detail in describing the performance and your comprehensive understanding is in an entirely different league. In one of my posts, I referred to 1913, 1919-20, 1933 and 1936 but I am beginning to think that the first of these would be more accurately be described as 1912-14 and the second as 1918-20. Either way, WW1 is bookended and the later dates coincide with momentous events leading towards 1939-1945.

I have found the discussion about others' inputs fascinating but I wondered if you would comment too on earlier comments on this thread - not mine - of other composers' influences? I can see that Cockaigne by Elgar (1903?) was there in parts of Manze's interpretation and I feel that it is also there in the score. It is also fairly easy to agree on Debussy's La Mer (1905-1908) and the Ravel like orchestration. I reckon too that in one part there is even a certain something of Bolero (1928). I suppose if true the question there might be whether that in the symphony came early or during the 1930s revisions. Then, Holst "The Planets" (1914-1916) which on paper at least seems to have been produced in parallel. Were notes exchanged? Plus any jazz elements and the ways in which the symphony created newness? I am inclined to think here of the chord structures while also bearing in mind Bax - eg Tintagel (1917).

There's a lot here, but I can certainly give some thoughts.

First, reviews. I think the days of lengthy, detailed reviews have gone - online blog-types notwithstanding.

I think the dating should be as you suggest. RVW and Butterworth first talked about a symphony probably in very late 1911, so it's not unreasonable to think RVW began it in early 1912, finishing it in 1913. It was certainly finished by December, because that's when Butterworth was asked to revise it. The postwar revisions (rewriting actually) were probably done in the main in 1919 - RVW was still in France at the beginning of 1919, and the revised symphony was performed in March 1920, prior to publication. The later revisions seem to have begun in 1933 but were not published till 1936. Presumably it took a lot to persuade Stainer & Bell to re-engrave the score and parts. There is one interesting thing about the 1936 edition - it incorporates the 25-bar cut in the Epilogue that Dan Godfrey had made for the 1925 recording. Godfrey was certainly doing it to save an extra side, but perhaps RVW just liked it.

RVW didn't add anything new for the 1936 edition - the exercise was purely one of cutting. That had not been true of the 1920 version. So anything in the version we all know was already in the 1920 version. Indeed, if we're not talking of the end of the Scherzo or start of the Finale, it was probably in the first version as well.

Butterworth was the one most closely connected with it. RVW wrote that he showed George all the sketches as they were finahed. But it's inconceivable that Holst wasn't involved too - Holst certainly attended a rehearsal and made notes.

I shall try to find a letter that Butterworth wrote to RVW the day after the first performance - it's quite illuminating.

[Pabmusic]

I know of the Godfrey (acoustic) recording of the 1920 version, but who else besides he and Yates have recorded it?

[Ah, Brabbins. {probably well worth getting).

Also Eugene Goossens in 1941.