Our November concert, The British Have Come!
features very different works by important British composers, from the baroque music of William Boyce, to the evocative of Benjamin Britten, and the majestic 5th symphony of Ralph Vaughan Williams.
William Boyce (1711-1779) began his musical career as a choirboy at St. Paul's Cathedral. He became an organist, holding several important posts, culminating with his appointment as Master of the King's Musick in 1757. One of the obligations of that post is to compose works for royal events, and so Boyce's compositions are used to this day, most recently at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in 2018, and at the coronation of Charles III in 2023.
Boyce's church choral music has had lasting popularity, but there was little interest in his secular music after his death until composer, conductor, and author Constant Lambert championed his William Boyce in the 1920s. Lambert notes that his instrumental works "rank among the finest compositions of their time, not only in England but in Europe. The 8 Symphonies (a word which Boyce uses to describe what would nowadays be considered a concerto grosso) ... have a vigor and charm that are rarely found together." His 4th Symphony (in F) is a wonderful example of the light, yet satisfying, music.
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Edward Benjamin Britten (1913 - 1976) was a central figure of 20th-century British
music, with a range of works including opera, vocal music, and orchestral and chamber pieces. His best-known works include the opera Peter Grimes (1945), the War Requiem (1962) and the orchestral showpiece The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra (1945).
His Four Sea Interludes are from the opera Peter Grimes, completed in 1943. This opera, adapted from George Crabbe's long narrative poem The Borough, tells the story of a troubled fisherman and his tumultuous relationship with his fellow villagers. The opera gained immediate and lasting success, bringing Britten international fame.
The Four Sea Interludes are four of the six interludes from the opera.
Dawn, with the sea as the constant background to life in the fishing village
Sunday Morning, heralding a bright and sparking sunny day.
Moonlight, a pleasant summer night, tough all is not well in the village.
Storm, from the first act of the opera, as Grimes aims to make his fortune with a "good catch" while the rest of the village takes shelter.
These evocative works showcase Britten's abilities as a master of orchestration, bringing sea-side life into the concert hall.
This work premiered in the United States at Tanglewood, conducted by Leonard Bernstein, in 1946. (There's a terrific recording if Bernstein and the BSO performing this, again at Tanglewood, in 1990 -- Bernstein: The Final Concert)
Our concert ends with Ralph Vaughan Williams acclaimed Symphony No. 5.
A prolific composer, Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) was one of the great symphonists of the 20th century, drawing upon the early music of Britain and Ireland and English folk music to break away from the German-dominated style of British classical music of the time. He was influenced by the poetry of Walt Whitman, whose "structural and metrical freedom, his open-air style and spiritual intensity liberated Vaughan Williams’ musical imagination."
Around 1910, after his study with Maurice Ravel, Vaughan Williams was a significant figure in British music. His Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis and A Sea Symphony placed him "in the first rank of our English composers."
Vaughan Williams' Fifth Symphony, dedicated to Jean Sibelius, was completed and premiered in 1943 at a BBC Prom concert, and in each of the following four seasons, with eighteen further performances in subsequent Prom seasons between 1949 and 2020. A reviewer in the London Times of the premier wrote that this work "belongs to that small body of music that, outside of late Beethoven, can properly be described as transcendental." And, further, with the horrors of WW2 all around them, it was said that this work's "serene loveliness is completely satisfying in these times and shows, as only music can, what we must work for when this madness is over."
We hope you join us to share in the respite from the day to day, with the chance to join us in performance of these three marvelous works. The concert will be at MassBay Community College in Wellesley with a reception after. MassBay is minutes from Rt 95, easy to get to with free parking. Great dining and shopping is minutes away in nearby Wellesley Square. Tickets are pay-what-you-can. We hope to see you there!
Sources: Wikipedia, BSO Program Notes
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