Arthur Butterworth (1923-2014) : Symphony No. 6 (2006)

Arthur Eckersley Butterworth, MBE (4 August 1923, New Moston – 20 November 2014, Embsay)

Butterworth was an English composer, conductor, trumpeter and teacher. The Symphony number 6 was completed in 2006 and premiered at the St Petersburg British Music Festival in 2009 by the St. Petersburg State Academic Capella Orchestra conducted by Matthew Taylor.

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Lennox Berkeley: Divertimento in B Flat Major, Op. 18

Sir Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley (12 May 1903 – 26 December 1989) was an English composer. The Divertimento for orchestra in B Flat Major Op 18 of Lennox Berkeley was commissioned by the BBC and dedicated to Nadia Boulanger. First performance was on October 1st in 1943 by the BBC Orchestra conducted by Clarence Raybould.

  WIKIPEDIA

VIDEO: Lennox Berkeley: Divertimento in B Flat Major, Op. 18 [Igor Buketoff-Royal Philharmonic Orchestra]. LP

Sir Arnold Bax - Symphony No. 7 (1939)

The Symphony No. 7 in A-flat major by Arnold Bax was completed in 1939 and dedicated to "The People of America". The work received its first performance in Carnegie Hall, New York City, by the New York Philharmonic on 10 June 1939 under the baton of Sir Adrian Boult. It was commissioned by the British Council to be played at the 1939 New York World's Fair, along with Arthur Bliss's Piano Concerto in B-flat, and Ralph Vaughan Williams' Five Variants of Dives and Lazarus.
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  BAX BIO

  VIDEO: London Philharmonic, Raymond Leppard

Arthur Butterworth "Symphony No.1"

Arthur Eckersley Butterworth's Symphony No. 1, Op. 15 was completed in 1957. Manchester-born Butterworth enjoyed a stint as an orchestral musician, playing the trumpet in both the Scottish National and Halle orchestras. The First of his four symphonies was first heard at the 1957 Cheltenham Festival under Sir John Barbirolli, though the composer traces its origins back to 1947 when he heard a radio broadcast of Sibelius’s Sixth Symphony. Butterworth candidly admits that the latter piece’s magical opening bars are echoed at the outset of his own symphony. WIKIPEDIA

 VIDEO: Munich Symphony Orchestra, Douglas Bostock (Conductor) This is a hard-to-obtain Classico recording by Douglas Bostock and the Munich Symphony Orchestra of Butterworth's Symphony No.1

Arthur Bliss: Christopher Columbus Suite arr: Adriano

Sir Arthur Edward Drummond Bliss, photo left. (2 August 1891 – 27 March 1975) was an English composer and conductor. BLISS BIO WIKIPEDIA Arthur Bliss' Christopher Columbus, Suite from film score (1949) (arr. Swiss-born conductor-composer Adriano, photo above.  BIO) Christopher Columbus (Suite): Overture 2. Christopher Columbus (Suite):

The Commission 3. Christopher Columbus (Suite): Do€a Beatriz 4. Christopher Columbus (Suite): Struggles 5. Christopher Columbus (Suite): The Messenger 6. Christopher Columbus (Suite): The Voyage begins 7. Christopher Columbus (Suite): Mutiny 8. Christopher Columbus (Suite): Land at last! 9. Christopher Columbus (Suite): Columbus put into chains 10. Christopher Columbus (Suite): Return to Spain

 In the November/December 1949 issue of Film Music, the composer revealed in a more serious vein that he found the film extremely interesting from the musical standpoint, but that it was "difficult with American and English actors to suggest the atmosphere of Spain - that is what the music has to do - so I have tried using Spanish idioms, and tunes akin to those of Spain which convey the feeling and atmosphere of the age in which Columbus set forth from Spain". Bliss himself never made a suite of Columbus, though he allowed the Rank Organisation to issue a promotional 10" 78 rpm disc of The Voyage Begins and Return to Spain.

VIDEO: "Christopher Columbus - Suite: I. Alla polacca" by City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra/Marcus Dods
 

Lennox Berkeley: Symphony No.2 (1958)

Lennox Berkeley composed his Symphony No. 2 in 1958. The work was commissioned by the City of Birmingham Symphony, who premiered it under Andrzej Panufnik in February 1959. Berkeley revised the symphony in 1976 for its first recording, by the London Philharmonic under Nicholas Braithwaite.

 VIDEO: BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Richard Hickox

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Bax - Symphony No. 1

The Symphony No. 1 by Arnold Bax was completed in 1922 and dedicated to John Ireland. Its outer movements were based on a Piano Sonata in E-flat that Bax subsequently orchestrated, while the central movement was newly composed for the symphony. The work is in many ways autobiographical with some music critics suggesting they could find references within the work to the Great War.

  WIKIPEDIA | BAX BIO

VIDEO: Royal Scottish National Orchestra - David-Lloyd Jones conductor

Arthur Butterworth (1923-2014) : Symphony No. 4 (1986)

Arthur Butterworth was born in Manchester, UK, in 1923. From early on he was attracted to the sound of the brass band and later entered the Royal Manchester College of Music to study both trumpet and composition. On leaving the college in 1949 he joined the Scottish National Orchestra where he doubled as trumpeter and unofficial assistant conductor. In 1955 he joined the Hallé Orchestra, and in 1962 finally gave up professional playing. His next move was to Skipton in the Yorkshire Dales where he got involved in local musical life. From 1964 to 1993 he conducted the Huddersfield Philharmonic Society, and also forged relationships with some of the BBC orchestras. He died in November 2014. The initial sketches for the Symphony No. 4 Op. 72 were made as early as 1970, but it was a decade before Butterworth got down to serious work on it. Completed in 1986, the performance here with the BBC Northern Symphony Orchestra and Bryden Thomson was the premiere. The Dutton release I mentioned above contains the recording premiere made in 2008 with Butterworth himself conducting the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. Interestingly, MusicWeb International arranged for a public performance of the work at Warwick Arts Centre in 1998 at the suggestion of Len Mullenger to celebrate the composer’s 75th birthday; the conductor was Colin Touchin (review). ---Stephen Greenbank 


 VIDEO: Symphony No. 4 (1986) Dir : Bryden Thomson BBC Philharmonic Orchestra

Arnold Bax - Symphony No. 2 (1926)

Sir Arnold Edward Trevor Bax 

(8 November 1883 - 3 October 1953) 

....was an English composer, poet, and author. His prolific output includes songs, choral music, chamber pieces, and solo piano works, but he is best known for his orchestral music. In addition to a series of symphonic poems he wrote seven symphonies and was for a time widely regarded as the leading British symphonist. Bax completed his Symphony No. 2 in E minor and C major in 1926, after intermittent work for the previous two years. It was dedicated to Sergey Koussevitzky who, after protracted negotiations with Bax, conducted the first two performances in Boston with the Boston Symphony Orchestra on 13th and 14th December 1929. Eugene Gooseens conducted the first London performance with the Queen's Hall Orchestra on 20th May 1930. WIKIPEDIA

VIDEO: Conducted by David Lloyd-Jones with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra.
 

Arthur Bliss: Cello Concerto (1970)

Sir Arthur Edward Drummond Bliss CH KCVO (2 August 1891 – 27 March 1975) was an English composer and conductor. Bliss's musical training was cut short by the First World War, in which he served with distinction in the army. In the post-war years he quickly became known as an unconventional and modernist composer, but within the decade he began to display a more traditional and romantic side in his music. In the 1920s and 1930s he composed extensively not only for the concert hall, but also for films and ballet. Bliss continued to compose into his eighth and ninth decades, in which his works included the Cello Concerto (1970) for Mstislav Rostropovich.

 VIDEO: Tim Hugh, violoncello English Northern Philharmonia diretta da David Lloyd Jones.

 

Nino Rota, Dances from The Leopard film

The Leopard (Italian: Il Gattopardo, "The Serval"; alternative title: Le Guépard) is a 1963 Italian film by director Luchino Visconti, based on Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa's novel of the same name. The Dances are loosely based on the music of Giuseppe Verdi, yet the freedom of the musical lines and light, intelligent orchestration allows us to witness the true genius of Nino Rota.
 VIDEO: Nino Rota, Dances from The Leopard film, Chamber Orchestra of New York - Salvatore Di Vittorio Nino Rota, Dances from the film The Leopard (Ballabili del film Il Gattopardo). Chamber Orchestra of New York; Salvatore Di Vittorio, Music Director. Adelphi University Performing Arts Center. April 16, 2016; Souvenirs from Films concert.

Lennox Berkeley Sonatina for guitar op.52

Sir Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley (12 May 1903 – 26 December 1989) was an English composer. This Sonatina op 52 is a work which is highly regarded by guitarists, and has become one of the most recorded of Berkeley’s works. Composed in 1957, the Sonatina was dedicated to Julian Bream, who gave its first performance at Morley College, London, on March 9 1958.

  WIKIPEDIA

VIDEO: From a recording session in the studio of Mozarteum University Salzburg, 21.9.2012 Tal Hurwitz, guitarist

Granville Bantock,The Witch of Atlas.

The Witch of Atlas, Bantock's Tone Poem No 5,

is a particularly effective example of his preoccupation with the interpretation of unusual subjects. It was composed in 1902 and first performed on 10 September at the Worcester meeting of the Three Choirs Festival; the composer himself conducted. The subject is derived from Shelley's poem of the same name.

 VIDEO: London Philharmonic/Vladimir Jurowski.

Arthur Butterworth (1923-2014) : Viola Concerto (1992)

Arthur Eckersley Butterworth, MBE (4 August 1923, New Moston – 20 November 2014, Embsay) was an English composer, conductor, trumpeter and teacher. Butterworth was born in New Moston, near Manchester. His father was secretary of the local church choir. His mother played the piano and Butterworth himself sang in the choir. For the grand entrance fee of sixpence, young Butterworth attended Hallé concerts and volunteered for the village brass band who allocated him the trombone. While still a teenager he played with the noted band at Besses o' th' Barn and started taking conducting lessons. While playing with the band, he caught his trombone in tram tracks and, discouraged by the accident, changed to the trumpet.
His works include seven symphonies, eight concertos, several other large orchestral scores and a considerable amount of 'serious' music for brass (almost totally neglected by the brass band movement). In the summer of 2008 Butterworth returned to the Royal Scottish National Orchestra to conduct a recording of his Fourth Symphony (1986) and his Concerto for viola and orchestra, Op. 82 (1988–1992) for the English viola player, Sarah-Jane Bradley. As of age 87, he was still active as a composer and an occasional conductor. He passed away in November 2014. WIKIPEDIA

 VIDEO: Arthur Butterworth (1923-2014) (GB) Viola Concerto (1992) Viola : Peter Lale Dir : Barry Wordsworth BBC Philharmonic Orchestra 1- Con moto (12.55) 2- Adagio – Cadenza (11.50) 3- Allegro molto, quasi presto (10.42)
 

Sir Arnold Bax - Spring Fire (1913)

Written in 1913 for the 1914 Norwich Festival, Spring Fire is one of the first real program works from Bax's pen. It was dedicated to Henry Wood and although the première was postponed mainly because of the extreme technical difficulty of the piece, it was rescheduled for 1916, only to be cancelled due to a certain unpleasantness then taking place in Europe. Eventually, it was December 1970 before the first performance took place, under the auspices of the Bax Society. It is scored for a typically large orchestra and in the words of the composer's own program note is intended to evoke "...the first uprush and impulse of Spring in the woods."---Description by Tim Mahon

VIDEO: Royal Philharmonic Orchestra & Vernon Handley
 I. The Forest Before Dawn - 00:00 II. Daybreak and Sunrise - 3:28 III. Full Day - 7:12 IV. Woodland Love - Romance - 14:37 V. Maenads - 22:57

Things To Come - Sir Arthur Bliss

Things to Come (also known in promotional material as H. G. Wells' Things to Come) is a 1936 British black-and-white science fiction film from United Artists, produced by Alexander Korda, directed by William Cameron Menzies, and written by H. G. Wells. Score composed by Arthur Bliss. The film stars Raymond Massey, Ralph Richardson, Cedric Hardwicke, Pearl Argyle, and Margaretta Scott. Things to Come sets out a future history from 1940 to 2036. In the screenplay, or "treatment" that H G Wells published in 1935, before the film was released, the story ends in the year "A.D. 2054". They originally wanted the music to be recorded in advance, and have the film constructed around the music, but this was considered too radical and so the score, by Arthur Bliss, was fitted to the film afterwards in a more conventional way. A concert suite drawn from the film has remained popular and there are numerous recordings of it in print. WIKIPEDIA

VIDEO: This suite is derived from the music which Bliss wrote for the film of the same name. There are six movements: 1. Ballet 2. Attack 3. Pestilence 4. Reconstruction 5. Machines 6. March Performed by the London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by the composer, Arthur Bliss.

 

Lennox Berkeley: Symphony No.4

British composer Lennox Berkeley was born in 1903 and died in 1989. A contemporary of Walton and Tippett, Lennox Berkeley initially studied modern languages at Oxford University before studying composition with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. There he met and was influenced by Ravel, Poulenc and Stravinsky, and much of his work has a refinement and precision that is distinctly French in flavour. In 1928 he joined the Roman Catholic Church which was to inspire much of his vocal music. He enjoyed a long association with Benjamin Britten, with whom he collaborated on a number of works. In later years, his adoption of serialism marked a darker and more brooding style. His fourth symphony, composed in 1978, was commissioned by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.

  WIKIPEDIA                             

VIDEO: BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Richard Hickox.
 

Arthur Butterworth Symphony No 2

Arthur Eckersley Butterworth, MBE (4 August 1923, New Moston – 20 November 2014, Embsay) was an English composer, conductor, trumpeter and teacher. Butterworth was born in New Moston, near Manchester. His father was secretary of the local church choir. His mother played the piano and Butterworth himself sang in the choir. For the grand entrance fee of sixpence, young Butterworth attended Hallé concerts and volunteered for the village brass band who allocated him the trombone. While still a teenager he played with the noted band at Besses o' th' Barn and started taking conducting lessons. While playing with the band, he caught his trombone in tram tracks and, discouraged by the accident, changed to the trumpet. WIKIPEDIA When Hallé Orchestra and was planning the celebration of its centenary he was to write a new Symphony for that centenary. Butterworth had almost eight years, 1957 to 1965, to write this work. He noted, I had not realised at that time that the forthcoming 100th season would begin in October 1964 (not 1965!) so I had to get a move on and make sure it was ready in time. The premiere of his Second Symphony was given at Bradford’s St. George’s Hall on Friday October 30 1964. VIDEO: Arthur Butterworth (1923-2014) (GB) Symphony No. 2 (1964) Dir : Arthur Butterworth BBC Scottish Orchestra

BLISS Music For Strings

Music for Strings is a romantic work, and it received its first performance in a romantic setting, the summer Salzberg Festival of 1935, when Adrian Boult conducted the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra in a concert of British music. It is one of Bliss's finest works, as is Elgar's Introduction and Allegro which may have influenced his starting work on it only weeks after the death of Elgar, a composer with whom he had a long, close, relationship, professionally and as a friend.

Sir Arthur Edward Drummond Bliss, (2 August 1891 – 27 March 1975) was an English composer and conductor. Bliss's musical training was cut short by the First World War, in which he served with distinction in the army. In the post-war years he quickly became known as an unconventional and modernist composer, but within the decade he began to display a more traditional and romantic side in his music. In the 1920s and 1930s he composed extensively not only for the concert hall, but also for films and ballet. In the Second World War, Bliss returned to England from the US to work for the BBC and became its director of music. After the war he resumed his work as a composer, and was appointed Master of the Queen's Music. In Bliss's later years, his work was respected but was thought old-fashioned, and it was eclipsed by the music of younger colleagues such as William Walton and Benjamin Britten. Since his death, his compositions have been well represented on record, and many of his better-known works remain in the repertoire of British orchestras. WIKIPEDIA

VIDEO: English Northern Philharmonia, David Lloyd-Jones.

November Woods is a tone poem by Arnold Bax

November Woods is a tone poem by Arnold Bax, written in 1917. Ostensibly a musical depiction of nature, the work conveys something of the composer's turbulent emotional state arising from the disintegration of his marriage and his love affair with the pianist Harriet Cohen. According to the composer, the piece is not programmatic, but evokes mood rather than painting a picture or telling a story. The work was completed in November 1917, and received its first performance in Manchester, on 18 November 1920, given by the Hallé Orchestra conducted by Hamilton Harty. In The Manchester Guardian, Samuel Langford remarked on the "grandeur and singleness of conception" of the piece; he noted the influence of Wagner, but felt that the piece lacked the primeval sense of Wagner's music and instead had an appeal that was "intensely human". The work was given the following month at a Royal Philharmonic Society concert at the Queen's Hall, conducted by Harty. The anonymous critic in The Times wrote, "The whole thing impressed us by a skilful and rather stagey picture of 'the woods so wild' and rather too drawn out for the actual value of its musical ideas. WIKIPEDIA

 VIDEO: National Children's Orchestra - Main Orchestra - Winter Concert 2007 

Franz Ignaz Beck (Mannheim, February 20, 1734 – Bordeaux, December 31, 1809) Symphonies, Op 1

Franz Ignaz Beck was a German violinist, composer, conductor and music teacher who spent the greater part of his life in France, where he became director of the Bordeaux Grand Théâtre. Possibly the most talented pupil of Johann Stamitz, Beck is an important representative of the second generation of the so-called Mannheim school. His fame rests on his 24 symphonies that are among the most original and striking of the pre-Classical period. He was one of the first composers to introduce the regular use of wind instruments in slow movements and put an increasing emphasis on thematic development. His taut, dramatic style is also remarkable for its employment of bold harmonic progressions, flexible rhythms and highly independent part writing. Six Symphonies Op. 1 (Callen 1-6; publ. Paris 1758) WIKIPEDIA BIO

 VIDEO: Franz Ignaz Beck (1734~1809) Sinfonia in E-flat major, Op. 1 No. 4 00:00 I. Allegro assai 02:49 II. Andante 07:02 III. Presto New Zealand Chamber Orchestra / Donald Armstrong 

Dussek Piano Concerto in Bb Op 22

After fleeing the French Revolution in 1789, Bohemian born Jan Ladislav Dussek (1760-1812) spent 10 years in London. In the words of Haydn, "the most honest, politest, and the most excellent man among all composers" became renowned as a concert pianist and as a composer. The first performer to sit with his profile to the audience, he developed a fruitful friendship with the piano builder John Broadwood, receiving one of the very first 5½ octave instruments ever made. He was a piano virtuoso and a highly popular composer, although his music rapidly fell into obscurity. But was somewhat revived in the late nineteenth century. WIKIPEDIA

 VIDEO: Jan ladislav Dusík (Dussek) Piano Concerto in B flat major Op.22, Andreas Staier
 

MOZART Symphony No 34, K 338

Symphony No. 34 in C major, K. 338, was written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1780, and completed on 29 August. The work is scored for 2 oboes, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani and strings. Composed in Salzburg and dated August 29, 1780. A second movement - Minuet - was torn from the manuscript.Alfred Einstein advanced a theory in the third edition of the Köchel catalogue that the Minuet K. 409 was written at a later date by the composer for this work. However, there is no proof in the sources to support his thesis

WIKIPEDIA

VIDEO: Performers: The Academy of Ancient Music, conducted by Christopher Hogwood. 

IRELAND Symphonic Studies

John Nicholson Ireland (13 August 1879 – 12 June 1962) was an English composer and teacher of classical music. The majority of his output consists of piano miniatures and of songs with piano. John Ireland's 2 Symphonic Studies were arranged for orchestra by by G. Bush, No. 1. Fugue: Pesante No. 2. Toccata: Lento

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W. A. Mozart - KV 199 (161b/162a) - Symphony No. 27 in G major ...

Symphony No. 27 in G major, K. 199/161b, is a symphony composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in April, 1773 at the age of 17. The symphony is scored for 2 flutes, 2 horns, and strings. Mozart and his father returned from their last stay in Italy in March, 1773...during the time of this composition. 

 VIDEO: National Chamber Orchestra of Moldova Silvia Tabor, conductor.