The President's Corner
November 2002
[Conference information updated January 28, 2003]
Camilla Reynish
Greetings from Manchester!
Packing up the house and revisiting over forty years of letters and programmes is fascinating....... I wondered what happened to that very beautiful Singhalese 'cellist, after whom I wanted to name my daughter Camilla Reynish......(vetoed by my wife).....did I really conduct that Stravisnky Symphony in C thirty years ago in Bristol?....and wow, I remember that performance of David Bedford's Sun Paints in Estonia in which the timpanist only had 3 instruments, and played the bottom timps part on a piano.
Looking back over forty years of teaching thirty of conducting, and twenty of commissioning wind works makes me realise what a mountain there is still to climb. Recently a magazine came out with a complete listing of International Competitions. There were competitions for conductors, composers and carriloneurs, orchestras, chamber ensembles, soloists but not one single competition listed for anything to do with wind band or ensemble, composing, conducting or even just bands competing. Where are we? Can you hear us out there? Hellooo....
A Time Warp
We are largely stuck in a time-warp at the start of the 20th century. It is interesting that two of my favourite works by Grainger, The Power of Rome and the Christian Heart and Marching Song of Democracy are rarely played. For me, both pieces communicate Grainger's intense beliefs wonderfully. Are we really suggesting that this is "difficult" music, with strange phrase lengths, extraordinary modulations, wild orchestration, passionate emotional harmonies, one hundred and more years ago, our colleagues in orchestra and opera were in the throes of developing similar gestures and processes. It always amuses me that when Jim Cochran brings two piles of our Chandos compact discs recordings of Grainger to a conference, the pile with these two works on stands tall, while that with yet another recording of Lincolnshire Posy and Tune from County Derry sells out.
Communication, Long Hair and Green Goggles
I think the question of communication is important, because one never wants to write down to an audience, but at the same time I personally feel repelled by the intellectual snobbery of some progressive artists...the day that melody is discarded altogether, you may as well pack up music.
Gordon Jacob
Twenty one years ago, Gordon Jacob spoke at the dinner of the gathering in Manchester, UK, of the First Conference for Composers, Conductors and Publishers and entranced us with his lifetime Graingerish love of the noise of wind instruments. We do have a problem – the fact that we are a new genre and that nearly all our repertoire is less than 100 years old means that we must embrace this fact with enthusiasm and confidence. But it is no good making apologies for contemporary music; if it is any good, if it communicates, let's play it. We need to weed out what is good and what is bad, as we do with the 19th and 18th century repertoire. As Sousa puts it: "There is a good deal of hypocrisy in the music profession. Wearing long hair, green goggles and an air of mystery is not always an infallible sign of genius."
John Philip Sousa was a realist, suspicious of phoney pretentious rubbish, while embracing innovations and curious about contemporary trends. He played Wagner throughout the United States before the orchestras had begun to explore this new music.
We Know What We Like, & Like What We Know
I believe that your WASBE Planning Committee have done a great job in working with the conductors of the orchestras for Jönköping in devising programmes which would thrill both Gordon Jacob and Sousa with a sense of adventure end exploration but with a feeling of continuation of traditions. New works then are promised for Jönköping from a number of composers, with or without long hair but certainly without green goggles, composers who have responded emotionally to the wind orchestra, and it is good to explore the statements about and by some of those who are being featured:
Michael Torke
"The idea that rhythm is intrinsically human — not just primitive — that we all have hearts that beat at a steady rate and don't stop...reminds me of life itself. In that sense my music is like certain popular music where the rhythm drives from beginning to end." — Michael Torke
... "some of the most optimistic, joyful and thoroughly uplifting music to appear in recent years" (Gramophone)......"vitally inventive composer" (Financial Times) ...."a master orchestrator whose shimmering timbral palette makes him the Ravel of his generation" (New York Times),
David Del Tredici
.... is recognized as America's foremost exponent of the return to tonality in composition, from his acclaimed works based on Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland to a floodgate of song settings embracing the broad spectrum of recent American poetry. Born in Cloverdale, California in 1937, Del Tredici started out as a piano prodigy, while his composing aspirations were encouraged by Darius Milhaud. His earlier works reflect his serial training, although their humorous allusions and bristling energy foreshadow the tonal pathways to come.
Edwin Roxburgh
...prefacing his new piece "Time's Harvet" meets the dilemma of writing for the 21st century:
"The end of the 20th Century closes a book on conflicts which outstrip any other in history for the inhumanity of man towards man (the gender used is not an oversight). It is remarkable that great achievements have taken place alongside slaughter and brutality.
The title of the work has been chosen as a millennium statement of hope at the outset of 2000. The first section laments what has happened, the second is an affirmation of faith in the younger generation who have the opportunity to foster the creative rather than the destructive aspects of life in the bright new age which space exploration promises. A Fanfare for the Future heralds this hope."
And More...
Michael Finnissy comes to WASBE with a background of work with Ballet Rambert and the London School of Contemporary Dance, and as a past President of the ISCM, he puts us in touch with the cutting edge of contemporary music. In contrast, Rok Golob at only 27 brings a wide experience of rock and pop music, with training at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, in film music with composers such as Elmer Bernstein.
Repertoire
As I write, the final adjustments are being made to the fourteen concert programmes, to be vetted on your behalf by the Planning Committee and the WASBE Council in December. Craig Kirchhoff and his colleagues are exploring the wealth of scores submitted for repertoire sessions and are devising programmes which will give us a feel for the wealth of music not programmed in the main series. At the same time, Rolf Rudin is devising a series of sessions in which composers can meet conductors, explore scores and listen to recordings.
I am not sure what the collective noun is for clinics but I will try this one:
A Wealth Of Clinics
History
Paula Holcomb has a really tough job of getting dozens of offers of lectures and papers into a shape which makes logistic sense. WASBE stalwart Raoul Camus will investigate traditional dances and trace their influence on the way we perform the music today. Robert Garofalo looks at the folk-songs that inspired Milhaud's Suite Française, while Glenn Hemberger will delve in to the Song in Sousa's music, and John Laverty looks at the great repertoire of the 19th century conductor, composer and entrepreneur, Jullien. Special sessions will honour two of WASBE's greatest supporters, and two of the worlds finest composers, Karel Husa and Warren Benson, with lectures on their music by Don McLaurin and Alan Wagner.
Geography
One interesting feature of WASBE 2003 will be the development of a series of discussions on various countries and their place in contemporary wind music in a series of focus meetings. In connection with the concert by the Symphonic Band of Kiskunfelegyhaza (Hungary), the focus will fall on Birthday Celebrations of Kamillo Lendvay and Frigyes Hidas at seventy five, and Laszlo Dubrovay at sixty.
Kari Laitinen will lead a number of Finnish composers in exploring wind music of today in Finland, Frank de Vuyst will chair sessions with Greg Fritze and Scott Cohen on Spanish wind music today, Keith Kinder introduces us to Canadian band repertoire.
The Composer Speaks
Among composers expected to be present to talk about their music and meet delegates formally and informally are the following:
| Sweden | Csaba Deak | Memento Mare |
| Sweden | Britta Byström | New work |
| New Zealand | Christopher Marshall | L'homme Armé |
| USA | Laurence Bitensky | Awake, you Sleepers |
[Editor's Note: Tim informed us in January 2003 that Memento Mare by Csaba Deak would not be performed as originally planned.]
And More...
In my message in the December WASBE Newsletter, I will give details of the military music sessions led by Mick Dowrick, the ethnic sessions led by Ian Kendrick, and a host of research sessions ranging from the physiology of breathing for double reeds to the repertoire of the American Wind Symphony and wind music in the Boston Symphony programmes.
Throughout the week there will be a strong component of schools music, with lectures and discussions each day, while the afternoon will end with a masterclass.
New Music
In the last week, I have heard three "serious" works by "serious" composers which made me think. The first was Ode by Robin Holloway, a luxuriant score, romantic yet contemporary, lyrical and energetic by turns. On the way home from that concert, I heard an incredible piece on the radio, Renewal by Colin Matthews played by the BBC Symphony and Sir Andrew Davies, and last night I went to hear the world premiere of a Piano Concerto by Martin Butler. I read today of another piano concerto by Dominic Muldowney due to be played next week. Here were four composers who are getting platform time and air time, highly regarded in orchestral and chamber circles. Add to them Nicholas Maw, whose new opera Sophie's Dilemma opens at Covent Garden next month.
How many performances since the premieres have been given of Holloway's Entrance; Carousing; Embarcation, of Matthew's Quatrain or Toccata Meccanica, of Butlker's Still Breathing or of Muldowny's1984. Maw's American Games won a Sudler Prize, and so has entered the "core repertoire". Unfortunately there is no reason for these composers to write for us, since we are by and large ignoring their music. Simon Rattle is playing Lindberg's Gran Duo with the Berlin Philharmonic, and my colleague Clark Rundell here in Manchester is performing Harrison Birtwistle's extraordinary Panic for saxophone and kit drummer next year, but we tend to turn to the tried and tested easy listening by our wind band composers – and we don't even need to sell tickets for many of our concerts. I do believe that we could and should in the next fifty years seize our chance to establish what for me is the most attractive of genres of contemporary music, the wind orchestra.
Happy New Ears, once again.....see you all in Sweden.
Tim Reynish