booklet pdf template - Naxos Music Library - Invaluable ... Agatha Christie’s short story Philomel Cottage. Starring Ann Harding and Basil Rathbone (and featuring – in a minor

LOVE FROM A STRANGER

FOUR BRITISH FILM SCORES BY BENJAMIN BRITTEN • ROBERTO GERHARD • ELISABETH LUTYENS • RICHARD RODNEY BENNETTBBC SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA • JAC VAN STEEN CONDUCTOR

booklet pdf template.qxd 30/04/2008 16:55 Page 1

LOVE FROM A STRANGER

FOUR BRITISH FILM SCORES BY BENJAMIN BRITTEN • ROBERTO GERHARD • ELISABETH LUTYENS • RICHARD RODNEY BENNETTBBC SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA • JAC VAN STEEN CONDUCTOR


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With his ability to work rapidly and to order, hisseemingly effortless technical assurance, and hisbelief that a composer should fulfil a ‘useful’ functionin society, it is hardly surprising that Benjamin Britten(1913-76) had some involvement with the filmindustry. What does give one pause is to find that hescored his first film, The King’s Stamp (1935), at theage of only 21 – and went on to produce music foraround two dozen others in the space of the next 18months.

This was not, however, the glamorous andremunerative world of the full-scale feature film, butthe more sober (and perhaps more idealistic) domainof the documentary short. Budgets were tiny at theGeneral Post Office Film Unit and the BritishCommercial Gas Association, and Britten foundhimself challenged to do a lot with decidedly little. Ontop of that, the subject-matter of the films was notalways artistically auspicious: while Coal Face (1935)and Night Mail (1936) – with their Auden verses –have attained the status of ‘classics’, other projectsincluded the more prosaic Men Behind the Meters(1936) and How the Dial Works (1937).

Britten’s opportunity to work for the commercialcinema came in July 1936 when Trafalgar Films

offered him the job of scoring Love from a Stranger(1937, dir. Rowland V. Lee) – an entertaining‘thriller’ with a plot somewhat in the Bluebeardmould, and adapted from the play by Frank Vosperafter Agatha Christie’s short story Philomel Cottage.Starring Ann Harding and Basil Rathbone (andfeaturing – in a minor role – the same Joan Hicksonwho, decades later, would famously portray Christie’sMiss Jane Marple), the film may well have appealedto the young Britten, who was a devotee of thecinema and not entirely averse to the novels ofDorothy L. Sayers. In the event, though, things didnot go smoothly. The composer had expected tobegin work in September of that year (following thepremiere of Our Hunting Fathers, Op.8), but variousdelays on the part of the studio meant that the entirescore had to be written in a few days – with GraceWilliams acting as amanuensis – at the end ofNovember. Still more frustratingly, Britten then foundthat some parts of his score were cut, and othersomitted altogether; his reaction was to swear that hewould never again write for the commercial cinema –and indeed he never did. The experience had itspositive aspects, however. For one thing, thecomposer’s fee was a very respectable £200(equivalent to £10,000 in today’s money); for

LOVE FROM A STRANGER : FOUR BRITISH FILM SCORES

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BENJAMIN BRITTEN LOVE FROM A STRANGERTitle Music 1’12Traffic Music 1’32Brighton 0’43Love Music 2’47Channel Crossing 3’15End Titles 0’52

ROBERTO GERHARDTHIS SPORTING LIFEI 2’23II 1’12III 2’12IV 2’06V 1’26VI 1’00VII 3’45VIII 1’17

ELISABETH LUTYENSTHE SKULLI Title music 1’41II 1’33III 3’04IV 1’09V 4’44VI 2’26VII End titles 2’27

RICHARD RODNEY BENNETTTHE RETURN OF THE SOLDIERMain Title - The Dream 3’22The Hospital 2’52The House 3’23Chris and Margaret 1’55Chris at the Window 1’31Hallucinations 1’56The Lake - The Letters 1’10Chris Returns 4’27

Total timing: 63’22

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FOUR BRITISH FILM SCORES


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With his ability to work rapidly and to order, hisseemingly effortless technical assurance, and hisbelief that a composer should fulfil a ‘useful’ functionin society, it is hardly surprising that Benjamin Britten(1913-76) had some involvement with the filmindustry. What does give one pause is to find that hescored his first film, The King’s Stamp (1935), at theage of only 21 – and went on to produce music foraround two dozen others in the space of the next 18months.

This was not, however, the glamorous andremunerative world of the full-scale feature film, butthe more sober (and perhaps more idealistic) domainof the documentary short. Budgets were tiny at theGeneral Post Office Film Unit and the BritishCommercial Gas Association, and Britten foundhimself challenged to do a lot with decidedly little. Ontop of that, the subject-matter of the films was notalways artistically auspicious: while Coal Face (1935)and Night Mail (1936) – with their Auden verses –have attained the status of ‘classics’, other projectsincluded the more prosaic Men Behind the Meters(1936) and How the Dial Works (1937).

Britten’s opportunity to work for the commercialcinema came in July 1936 when Trafalgar Films

offered him the job of scoring Love from a Stranger(1937, dir. Rowland V. Lee) – an entertaining‘thriller’ with a plot somewhat in the Bluebeardmould, and adapted from the play by Frank Vosperafter Agatha Christie’s short story Philomel Cottage.Starring Ann Harding and Basil Rathbone (andfeaturing – in a minor role – the same Joan Hicksonwho, decades later, would famously portray Christie’sMiss Jane Marple), the film may well have appealedto the young Britten, who was a devotee of thecinema and not entirely averse to the novels ofDorothy L. Sayers. In the event, though, things didnot go smoothly. The composer had expected tobegin work in September of that year (following thepremiere of Our Hunting Fathers, Op.8), but variousdelays on the part of the studio meant that the entirescore had to be written in a few days – with GraceWilliams acting as amanuensis – at the end ofNovember. Still more frustratingly, Britten then foundthat some parts of his score were cut, and othersomitted altogether; his reaction was to swear that hewould never again write for the commercial cinema –and indeed he never did. The experience had itspositive aspects, however. For one thing, thecomposer’s fee was a very respectable £200(equivalent to £10,000 in today’s money); for

LOVE FROM A STRANGER : FOUR BRITISH FILM SCORES

2

BENJAMIN BRITTEN LOVE FROM A STRANGERTitle Music 1’12Traffic Music 1’32Brighton 0’43Love Music 2’47Channel Crossing 3’15End Titles 0’52

ROBERTO GERHARDTHIS SPORTING LIFEI 2’23II 1’12III 2’12IV 2’06V 1’26VI 1’00VII 3’45VIII 1’17

ELISABETH LUTYENSTHE SKULLI Title music 1’41II 1’33III 3’04IV 1’09V 4’44VI 2’26VII End titles 2’27

RICHARD RODNEY BENNETTTHE RETURN OF THE SOLDIERMain Title - The Dream 3’22The Hospital 2’52The House 3’23Chris and Margaret 1’55Chris at the Window 1’31Hallucinations 1’56The Lake - The Letters 1’10Chris Returns 4’27

Total timing: 63’22

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FOUR BRITISH FILM SCORES


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another, the film’s Musical Director was a certain BoydNeel – at whose behest the composer went on to writethe Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge (1937), thework that secured his international reputation.

International renown, of course, does not guaranteethat a film company will preserve or return one’smanuscript materials; and Love from a Stranger is oneof a number of Britten film scores that are lost. Thesix items on this disc have been reconstructed by ColinMatthews (an assistant to Britten from 1970-76) onthe basis of the sketches preserved in the Britten-Pears Library and the often indistinct audio track onthe film itself. The reconstruction represents almost allof Britten’s score.

S

In contrast to Britten, Roberto Gerhard (1896-1970)met with little in the way of wide acclaim: only in thelast years of his life did the most important Spanishcomposer after Falla begin to enjoy anything likesignificant recognition.

Like Schoenberg – with whom he studied in Viennaand Berlin between 1923 and 1928 – Gerhard wasforced into exile by the convulsions of the 1930s.Having left Spain from Barcelona a few days before it

(and Catalonia) capitulated to Franco’s forces in theCivil War (1936-39), he made a home in Cambridgeand spent three decades living the precarious life of afreelance composer. For many of those years, Englandhardly constituted a natural habitat for a figure inwhose output an authentic vein of Spanish nationalstyle (he had been a piano pupil of Granados and thelast composition pupil of Felipe Pedrell) rubbedshoulders with a Central-European modernism thatemployed a range of serial and serial-inspiredtechniques; and it was largely through the speedyproduction of incidental music for stage, radio, cinemaand television that the composer made his living.

The first of Gerhard’s two feature-film scores was thatfor the crime story Secret People (1952); it wasapparently during the production of ThoroldDickinson’s film that Gerhard came into contact withthe iconoclastic young director Lindsay Anderson –who, ten years later, chose him as the composer forhis own first feature-film, the intense ‘kitchen sink’drama This Sporting Life (1963). With a screenplayby David Storey after his own autobiographically-flavoured novel, the film – which starred RichardHarris, Rachel Roberts and Alan Badel – centred on anangry, impulsive Yorkshire coal miner’s acquisition of

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wealth and regional fame as a rugby league player,and explored his tragically unfulfilled love for a miner’swidow emotionally imprisoned by her painful past.

The action, in fact, is so deeply rooted in ‘home-grown’working-class attitudes and culture – even featuringwell-known players of the Wakefield Trinity team – thatone feels inclined to wonder how the job of scoring itcan have fallen to the Catalonian son of a German-Swiss wine-exporter. In an essay written in 1981,however, the director provided an answer – and in theprocess revealed something of the extraordinary way inwhich film-musical decisions can be made.

Anderson’s choice, it seems, was mostly influenced bya horror of the “sentimentally melodic”; an ‘intuitive’insight into Gerhard’s “powerfully romanticsensibility”; and the notion that what he calls “theaverage British ‘quality’ film score” (Lennox Berkeleyand Alan Rawsthorne are named as purveyors) was“lacking in emotion or poetry”: of Gerhard’s actualmusic he knew “almost nothing […] except hiscontribution to Secret People”. Small wonder, then,that when he finally heard the finished score hedecided that “certain sections did not work as well as[he] had hoped”, and duly dropped them – with thetitle music (rejected as ‘inappropriate’, ‘eccentric’,

‘bizarre’, and suggestive of science fiction) evenbeing replaced by an assemblage of fragments derivedfrom elsewhere in the score. The result was a filmcontaining less than 18 minutes of music; a breachbetween Gerhard and Anderson that was neverproperly healed, and a score that was never permittedto do what its composer intended it to do. Gerharddid, however, re-use some of the music in hisorchestral Epithalamion of 1965-6.

For this recording David Matthews has organised themost substantial sections of the score into an 8-movement suite which incorporates around two-thirdsof the total music composed; the selected cues arepresented unaltered and in their original order.

S

In spite of her being English-born and even possessingan ‘establishment’ background (her parents were thefamed architect Sir Edwin Lutyens, and the sister ofthe 2nd Earl of Lytton), the career of ElisabethLutyens (1906-1983) was at least as rich inobstacles as that of Gerhard. Success and acclaimwere hard-won and slow in arriving; and the usualdifficulties faced by an up-and-coming creator wereimmeasurably intensified by her adoption, at the end


4

another, the film’s Musical Director was a certain BoydNeel – at whose behest the composer went on to writethe Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge (1937), thework that secured his international reputation.

International renown, of course, does not guaranteethat a film company will preserve or return one’smanuscript materials; and Love from a Stranger is oneof a number of Britten film scores that are lost. Thesix items on this disc have been reconstructed by ColinMatthews (an assistant to Britten from 1970-76) onthe basis of the sketches preserved in the Britten-Pears Library and the often indistinct audio track onthe film itself. The reconstruction represents almost allof Britten’s score.

S

In contrast to Britten, Roberto Gerhard (1896-1970)met with little in the way of wide acclaim: only in thelast years of his life did the most important Spanishcomposer after Falla begin to enjoy anything likesignificant recognition.

Like Schoenberg – with whom he studied in Viennaand Berlin between 1923 and 1928 – Gerhard wasforced into exile by the convulsions of the 1930s.Having left Spain from Barcelona a few days before it

(and Catalonia) capitulated to Franco’s forces in theCivil War (1936-39), he made a home in Cambridgeand spent three decades living the precarious life of afreelance composer. For many of those years, Englandhardly constituted a natural habitat for a figure inwhose output an authentic vein of Spanish nationalstyle (he had been a piano pupil of Granados and thelast composition pupil of Felipe Pedrell) rubbedshoulders with a Central-European modernism thatemployed a range of serial and serial-inspiredtechniques; and it was largely through the speedyproduction of incidental music for stage, radio, cinemaand television that the composer made his living.

The first of Gerhard’s two feature-film scores was thatfor the crime story Secret People (1952); it wasapparently during the production of ThoroldDickinson’s film that Gerhard came into contact withthe iconoclastic young director Lindsay Anderson –who, ten years later, chose him as the composer forhis own first feature-film, the intense ‘kitchen sink’drama This Sporting Life (1963). With a screenplayby David Storey after his own autobiographically-flavoured novel, the film – which starred RichardHarris, Rachel Roberts and Alan Badel – centred on anangry, impulsive Yorkshire coal miner’s acquisition of

5

wealth and regional fame as a rugby league player,and explored his tragically unfulfilled love for a miner’swidow emotionally imprisoned by her painful past.

The action, in fact, is so deeply rooted in ‘home-grown’working-class attitudes and culture – even featuringwell-known players of the Wakefield Trinity team – thatone feels inclined to wonder how the job of scoring itcan have fallen to the Catalonian son of a German-Swiss wine-exporter. In an essay written in 1981,however, the director provided an answer – and in theprocess revealed something of the extraordinary way inwhich film-musical decisions can be made.

Anderson’s choice, it seems, was mostly influenced bya horror of the “sentimentally melodic”; an ‘intuitive’insight into Gerhard’s “powerfully romanticsensibility”; and the notion that what he calls “theaverage British ‘quality’ film score” (Lennox Berkeleyand Alan Rawsthorne are named as purveyors) was“lacking in emotion or poetry”: of Gerhard’s actualmusic he knew “almost nothing […] except hiscontribution to Secret People”. Small wonder, then,that when he finally heard the finished score hedecided that “certain sections did not work as well as[he] had hoped”, and duly dropped them – with thetitle music (rejected as ‘inappropriate’, ‘eccentric’,

‘bizarre’, and suggestive of science fiction) evenbeing replaced by an assemblage of fragments derivedfrom elsewhere in the score. The result was a filmcontaining less than 18 minutes of music; a breachbetween Gerhard and Anderson that was neverproperly healed, and a score that was never permittedto do what its composer intended it to do. Gerharddid, however, re-use some of the music in hisorchestral Epithalamion of 1965-6.

For this recording David Matthews has organised themost substantial sections of the score into an 8-movement suite which incorporates around two-thirdsof the total music composed; the selected cues arepresented unaltered and in their original order.

S

In spite of her being English-born and even possessingan ‘establishment’ background (her parents were thefamed architect Sir Edwin Lutyens, and the sister ofthe 2nd Earl of Lytton), the career of ElisabethLutyens (1906-1983) was at least as rich inobstacles as that of Gerhard. Success and acclaimwere hard-won and slow in arriving; and the usualdifficulties faced by an up-and-coming creator wereimmeasurably intensified by her adoption, at the end


7

Lutyens seems never to have made great claims forher commercial work, though of course it brought atleast some aspects of her musical thinking to millionsof people across the globe who would otherwise neverhave encountered it. And there was, of course, thefinancial aspect: the endless late-night TV screeningsof films like The Skull would eventually bring inannual fees totalling up to £10,000 – helping tosubsidise the sometimes startling drinks bills of herlater years.

Many of the cues for The Skull are quite extended;this, together with the fact that the score was one ofwhich Lutyens was fond, makes it an obvious choicefor performance away from the film. By its verynature, however, such a score does not define a wideexpressive range, and includes a deal of sectionalrepetition and ‘recycling’. For this CD, therefore,Bayan Northcott has selected and ordered seven ofthe more substantial cues into the most variedsequence the material allows.

S

One composer who happily acknowledges the musicaland personal influence of Lutyens is Richard RodneyBennett (b.1936), who first encountered her while

still a schoolboy and, though never a formal pupil,benefited from their contacts and became somethingof a protégé.

An ‘early starter’ like Britten, Bennett was composingwith 12-note rows at the age of 16, and made hisentry into the world of film music only three yearslater with The World Assured (1956), a 20-minutedocumentary about insurance. As he later explained,“I never saw what I was writing for: I just wrote to alist of timings. And I only saw the finished result 30years later!”

Rapidly establishing himself as a prolific and successfulcontemporary composer active in every genre of‘concert’ music, Bennett also found that his talentsappealed to the film industry: besides the necessarycreative flexibility (“You have to go along with whatthey want…”), he possessed great facility and theability to work in whatever stylistic category wasrequired. With more than 50 film and TV scores underhis belt, he has not so far been ‘Oscarred’ (to useHans Keller’s wry coinage), but has received AcademyAward nominations for three films – Far From theMadding Crowd (1967), Nicholas and Alexandra(1971) and Murder on the Orient Express (1974) –as well as BAFTA and other awards.

6

of the 1930s, of a sui generis serial method – arrivedat, she would insist, without reference to radicaldevelopments on the Continent – that set her apartfrom almost every other English composer of the time.

Her autobiography, A Goldfish Bowl (1972), paints avivid picture of artistic isolation amid public andprofessional indifference – a situation which scarcelyimproved before the 1960s, and was surely not madeany easier by a turbulent domestic and personal life; agenerous but combative nature, and what seems tohave been an almost perpetual state of dire financialdifficulty.

For a time, Lutyens – who from 1934 had toshoulder a mother’s responsibilities as well as anartist’s – was obliged to earn money by working as amusic copyist (“at 10d. per page!”, she laterrecalled). Film work (when at last she was able tobreak into that male-dominated industry) enabled herto give up this drudgery – and offered other rewardsin addition: a circle of colleagues and collaborators; achance to build technical skill and fluency by workingto unalterable timings and strict deadlines; and thevaluable experience of hearing what she had writtenbeing performed by professional musicians almost assoon as the ink was dry.

Her film work, ultimately totalling more than 90 scores,began with newsreels and documentaries – the first ofthese being Jungle Mariners (1944), a propaganda‘short’ for the Crown Film Unit that concerned itselfwith, inter alia, booby-traps, beatings, and aquaticblood-sucking parasites. At a later stage she graduated,via ‘B movies’, to what are often collectively referred toas ‘Hammer Horrors’ – though it should be noted thatsuch luridly titled offerings as Dr. Terror’s House ofHorrors (1965), The Skull (1965), The Psychopath(1966), and The Terrornauts (1967) were actuallyproduced by rival company Amicus.

The Skull is a tale of obsession and demonicpossession, derived from a novel (The Skull of theMarquis de Sade) by Psycho author Robert Bloch anddirected by horror veteran Freddie Francis. StarringPeter Cushing, Patrick Wymark and Jill Bennett (andwith Christopher Lee curiously billed as ‘guest star’),the film is remarkable for the inclusion, in its laterstages, of a 20-minute sequence almost entirelywithout dialogue – a structural feature which givesthe score a quite unusual responsibility andprominence. Other interesting details include the useof a cimbalom and two bass clarinets, and thecomplete absence of violins.


7

Lutyens seems never to have made great claims forher commercial work, though of course it brought atleast some aspects of her musical thinking to millionsof people across the globe who would otherwise neverhave encountered it. And there was, of course, thefinancial aspect: the endless late-night TV screeningsof films like The Skull would eventually bring inannual fees totalling up to £10,000 – helping tosubsidise the sometimes startling drinks bills of herlater years.

Many of the cues for The Skull are quite extended;this, together with the fact that the score was one ofwhich Lutyens was fond, makes it an obvious choicefor performance away from the film. By its verynature, however, such a score does not define a wideexpressive range, and includes a deal of sectionalrepetition and ‘recycling’. For this CD, therefore,Bayan Northcott has selected and ordered seven ofthe more substantial cues into the most variedsequence the material allows.

S

One composer who happily acknowledges the musicaland personal influence of Lutyens is Richard RodneyBennett (b.1936), who first encountered her while

still a schoolboy and, though never a formal pupil,benefited from their contacts and became somethingof a protégé.

An ‘early starter’ like Britten, Bennett was composingwith 12-note rows at the age of 16, and made hisentry into the world of film music only three yearslater with The World Assured (1956), a 20-minutedocumentary about insurance. As he later explained,“I never saw what I was writing for: I just wrote to alist of timings. And I only saw the finished result 30years later!”

Rapidly establishing himself as a prolific and successfulcontemporary composer active in every genre of‘concert’ music, Bennett also found that his talentsappealed to the film industry: besides the necessarycreative flexibility (“You have to go along with whatthey want…”), he possessed great facility and theability to work in whatever stylistic category wasrequired. With more than 50 film and TV scores underhis belt, he has not so far been ‘Oscarred’ (to useHans Keller’s wry coinage), but has received AcademyAward nominations for three films – Far From theMadding Crowd (1967), Nicholas and Alexandra(1971) and Murder on the Orient Express (1974) –as well as BAFTA and other awards.

6

of the 1930s, of a sui generis serial method – arrivedat, she would insist, without reference to radicaldevelopments on the Continent – that set her apartfrom almost every other English composer of the time.

Her autobiography, A Goldfish Bowl (1972), paints avivid picture of artistic isolation amid public andprofessional indifference – a situation which scarcelyimproved before the 1960s, and was surely not madeany easier by a turbulent domestic and personal life; agenerous but combative nature, and what seems tohave been an almost perpetual state of dire financialdifficulty.

For a time, Lutyens – who from 1934 had toshoulder a mother’s responsibilities as well as anartist’s – was obliged to earn money by working as amusic copyist (“at 10d. per page!”, she laterrecalled). Film work (when at last she was able tobreak into that male-dominated industry) enabled herto give up this drudgery – and offered other rewardsin addition: a circle of colleagues and collaborators; achance to build technical skill and fluency by workingto unalterable timings and strict deadlines; and thevaluable experience of hearing what she had writtenbeing performed by professional musicians almost assoon as the ink was dry.

Her film work, ultimately totalling more than 90 scores,began with newsreels and documentaries – the first ofthese being Jungle Mariners (1944), a propaganda‘short’ for the Crown Film Unit that concerned itselfwith, inter alia, booby-traps, beatings, and aquaticblood-sucking parasites. At a later stage she graduated,via ‘B movies’, to what are often collectively referred toas ‘Hammer Horrors’ – though it should be noted thatsuch luridly titled offerings as Dr. Terror’s House ofHorrors (1965), The Skull (1965), The Psychopath(1966), and The Terrornauts (1967) were actuallyproduced by rival company Amicus.

The Skull is a tale of obsession and demonicpossession, derived from a novel (The Skull of theMarquis de Sade) by Psycho author Robert Bloch anddirected by horror veteran Freddie Francis. StarringPeter Cushing, Patrick Wymark and Jill Bennett (andwith Christopher Lee curiously billed as ‘guest star’),the film is remarkable for the inclusion, in its laterstages, of a 20-minute sequence almost entirelywithout dialogue – a structural feature which givesthe score a quite unusual responsibility andprominence. Other interesting details include the useof a cimbalom and two bass clarinets, and thecomplete absence of violins.


8

The Return of the Soldier (1982, dir. Alan Bridges)marked a significant point in the ‘filmic’ side ofBennett’s career, since it came at the end of the erain which his commercial work was almost exclusivelyfor the cinema, and was followed by a period inwhich he has been employed principally on televisionproductions such as Tender is the Night (1985) andGormenghast (2000). Though the switch was notdeliberate – “I just got lots of TV work all of asudden” – it provided a welcome alternative to a filmindustry increasingly concentrating, thanks to effects-led hits like Star Wars (1977), upon ‘blockbuster’movies with wall-to-wall music and ‘big’, sometimesbombastic, scores. The composer for televisionfeatures and mini-series is, it seems, “not so shackledby commercial considerations”.

Based on the 1918 novel by Rebecca West, TheReturn of the Soldier tells the story of a shell-shockedofficer who returns from the trenches with severe butselective amnesia: he can remember his first lover, butnot the life and marriage he went on to make withanother, very different woman.

Despite fine performances from Alan Bates, JulieChristie, Glenda Jackson and Ann-Margret, the filmnever recovered from the effects of a low-key release,

and it remains remarkably little-known – a situationnot helped by what is widely regarded as a ‘let-down’ending; director Alan Bridges went on to achievegreater critical and commercial success with TheShooting Party (1984). From the composer’s point ofview, however, there was little to complain about: thefilm itself provided “a lovely chance for music”, andthe director and producers “treated the score withrespect, not as disposable garbage”. The selection onthis CD presents a straight run-though of all the majorsections: the only significant omissions are somedance music, and the end titles which reprise materialalready heard in a more through-composed form.

© 2004 Mark Doran

As a first step towards placingNMC Recordings on asustainable long-term financialfooting, we have launchedNMC Friends. We very muchhope that you will want to joinus, and take this opportunityto support our continuing andcentral role in the future ofBritish contemporary music.

By becoming a Friend of NMC,your donation will help us torecord new and recent worksby primarily British composers,giving you the opportunity toplay a vital role in contributingto the development andrealisation of our futureactivities. For more details,please contact us at theaddress opposite.

FOUNDER MEMBERSW M Colleran • Richard Fries • Penny & Clive Gillinson • Elaine GouldJeremy Marchant • Belinda Matthews • Colin Matthews • Neale OsborneGraham Williams • Vukutu Ltd

BENEFACTORSTim Frost • Andrew Lockyer • Stephen Newbould • Jane Manning & Anthony Payne • Julian Porter • Mr James Rodley

FRIENDSDavid Aldous • Raymond Ayriss • Peter Baldwin • Stephen BarberSebastian Bell • Sir Alan Bowness • Martyn Brabbins • Joan BrooksGavin Bullock • Rebecca Dawson • David Mark Evans • Anthony GilbertIan Gordon • Cathy Graham • David Gutman • Matthew HarrisDr Anthony Henfrey • Dr Trevor Jarvis • Gerry Mattock • David H J MorganCathy Nelson • Stephen Plaistow • Keith Purser • Clark RundellBernard Samuels • Howard Skempton • Ian Smith • Roger StevensE S Thomas • Janet Waterhouse • Richard J Wildash • David Wordsworth

DONATIONSW T L Farwell • K J Salway • Anonymous donations

If you would like to help NMC to release more of the best of British contemporarymusic, please contact us for details at:

NMC Friends, NMC Recordings Ltd18-20 Southwark Street, London SE1 1TJ • Tel 020 7403 9445E-mail [email protected] • Web www.nmcrec.co.uk/friendsReg. Charity No. 328052

NMC FRIENDS This disc has been released with the generous support of NMC Friends


8

The Return of the Soldier (1982, dir. Alan Bridges)marked a significant point in the ‘filmic’ side ofBennett’s career, since it came at the end of the erain which his commercial work was almost exclusivelyfor the cinema, and was followed by a period inwhich he has been employed principally on televisionproductions such as Tender is the Night (1985) andGormenghast (2000). Though the switch was notdeliberate – “I just got lots of TV work all of asudden” – it provided a welcome alternative to a filmindustry increasingly concentrating, thanks to effects-led hits like Star Wars (1977), upon ‘blockbuster’movies with wall-to-wall music and ‘big’, sometimesbombastic, scores. The composer for televisionfeatures and mini-series is, it seems, “not so shackledby commercial considerations”.

Based on the 1918 novel by Rebecca West, TheReturn of the Soldier tells the story of a shell-shockedofficer who returns from the trenches with severe butselective amnesia: he can remember his first lover, butnot the life and marriage he went on to make withanother, very different woman.

Despite fine performances from Alan Bates, JulieChristie, Glenda Jackson and Ann-Margret, the filmnever recovered from the effects of a low-key release,

and it remains remarkably little-known – a situationnot helped by what is widely regarded as a ‘let-down’ending; director Alan Bridges went on to achievegreater critical and commercial success with TheShooting Party (1984). From the composer’s point ofview, however, there was little to complain about: thefilm itself provided “a lovely chance for music”, andthe director and producers “treated the score withrespect, not as disposable garbage”. The selection onthis CD presents a straight run-though of all the majorsections: the only significant omissions are somedance music, and the end titles which reprise materialalready heard in a more through-composed form.

© 2004 Mark Doran

As a first step towards placingNMC Recordings on asustainable long-term financialfooting, we have launchedNMC Friends. We very muchhope that you will want to joinus, and take this opportunityto support our continuing andcentral role in the future ofBritish contemporary music.

By becoming a Friend of NMC,your donation will help us torecord new and recent worksby primarily British composers,giving you the opportunity toplay a vital role in contributingto the development andrealisation of our futureactivities. For more details,please contact us at theaddress opposite.

FOUNDER MEMBERSW M Colleran • Richard Fries • Penny & Clive Gillinson • Elaine GouldJeremy Marchant • Belinda Matthews • Colin Matthews • Neale OsborneGraham Williams • Vukutu Ltd

BENEFACTORSTim Frost • Andrew Lockyer • Stephen Newbould • Jane Manning & Anthony Payne • Julian Porter • Mr James Rodley

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NMC FRIENDS This disc has been released with the generous support of NMC Friends


10

BENJAMIN BRITTEN

Benjamin Britten was born inLowestoft, Suffolk, in 1913. Alreadycomposing as a child, he began tostudy with Frank Bridge in 1928,afterwards attending the RoyalCollege of Music, where his teachersincluded Arthur Benjamin and JohnIreland. While still a student, hewrote his ‘official’ Op. 1, theSinfonietta for chamber ensemble,and the Phantasy Quartet for oboeand strings, followed in 1936 by thesong-cycle Our Hunting Fathers . Hewas already earning his living as acomposer, having joined the GPO(Post Office) Film Unit the previousyear, and the collaboration he beganthere with the poet W. H. Audenwas to prove an important onethroughout his career.

Britten spent three years in theUnited States at the outset of WorldWar Two; there he composed theSinfonia da Requiem, the song-cycleLes Illuminations, the Violin Concerto,and the operetta Paul Bunyan. Backin Britain, where as a conscientiousobjector he was excused militaryservice, he began work on the piecethat would establish him beyondquestion as the pre-eminent Britishcomposer of his generation – theopera Peter Grimes . The YoungPerson’s Guide to the Orchestrafollowed; and Britten now composedone major work after another,including the operas The Rape ofLucretia (1946), Billy Budd

phot

o: E

dith

Slate

r11

(1951), Gloriana (1953), The Turn ofthe Screw (1954), A MidsummerNight’s Dream (1960) and Death inVenice (1971–73), as well as the WarRequiem (1961–62).

Britten’s importance in postwarBritish cultural life was enhanced byhis founding of the English OperaGroup in 1946, and the AldeburghFestival two years later. His careeras a composer was matched by hisoutstanding ability as a performer,as both a refined pianist and fluentconductor. Britten died in 1976, afew months after being appointed alife peer – the first composer ever toreceive that honour.

Reprinted by kind permission of Boosey & Hawkes

ROBERTO GERHARD

Roberto Gerhard was born on 25September 1896 in Valls, Catalonia.After studying piano with Granadosand composition with Pedrell, he wasa pupil of Schoenberg’s in Viennaand Berlin from 1923 until 1928. Itwas during this time thatSchoenberg was developing his ownmethod of composition with twelvetones, a technique which wasinevitably to affect Gerhard’s own. In1931 Gerhard took up the post ofProfessor of Music at the EscolaNormal de la Generalitat inBarcelona, and served as head of themusic department of the CatalanLibrary. After the defeat of the

Republic in the Civil War he leftSpain to settle in Cambridge, onbeing offered a research studentshipat King’s College. He spent sometime teaching in America, in 1960 atthe University of Michigan, and againin 1961 at the Berkshire MusicCenter, Tanglewood, before returningto Cambridge where he worked untilhis death as a freelance composer,no longer attached to the University.

In the sixties he received manycommissions, notably from the BBC

(Symphony No.2, Hymnody, ThePlague and Libra), and in Americafrom the Koussevitzky Foundation(Symphony No.3), the New YorkPhilharmonic Orchestra (SymphonyNo.4), and the Hopkins Center,Dartmouth (Leo). With an increase incommercial recordings and concertperformances, Gerhard’s musicbecame more widely known, bringinghim the rewards denied to him fornearly half a century. He died in1970, at the age of seventy-three.


10

BENJAMIN BRITTEN

Benjamin Britten was born inLowestoft, Suffolk, in 1913. Alreadycomposing as a child, he began tostudy with Frank Bridge in 1928,afterwards attending the RoyalCollege of Music, where his teachersincluded Arthur Benjamin and JohnIreland. While still a student, hewrote his ‘official’ Op. 1, theSinfonietta for chamber ensemble,and the Phantasy Quartet for oboeand strings, followed in 1936 by thesong-cycle Our Hunting Fathers . Hewas already earning his living as acomposer, having joined the GPO(Post Office) Film Unit the previousyear, and the collaboration he beganthere with the poet W. H. Audenwas to prove an important onethroughout his career.

Britten spent three years in theUnited States at the outset of WorldWar Two; there he composed theSinfonia da Requiem, the song-cycleLes Illuminations, the Violin Concerto,and the operetta Paul Bunyan. Backin Britain, where as a conscientiousobjector he was excused militaryservice, he began work on the piecethat would establish him beyondquestion as the pre-eminent Britishcomposer of his generation – theopera Peter Grimes . The YoungPerson’s Guide to the Orchestrafollowed; and Britten now composedone major work after another,including the operas The Rape ofLucretia (1946), Billy Budd

phot

o: E

dith

Slate

r

11

(1951), Gloriana (1953), The Turn ofthe Screw (1954), A MidsummerNight’s Dream (1960) and Death inVenice (1971–73), as well as the WarRequiem (1961–62).

Britten’s importance in postwarBritish cultural life was enhanced byhis founding of the English OperaGroup in 1946, and the AldeburghFestival two years later. His careeras a composer was matched by hisoutstanding ability as a performer,as both a refined pianist and fluentconductor. Britten died in 1976, afew months after being appointed alife peer – the first composer ever toreceive that honour.

Reprinted by kind permission of Boosey & Hawkes

ROBERTO GERHARD

Roberto Gerhard was born on 25September 1896 in Valls, Catalonia.After studying piano with Granadosand composition with Pedrell, he wasa pupil of Schoenberg’s in Viennaand Berlin from 1923 until 1928. Itwas during this time thatSchoenberg was developing his ownmethod of composition with twelvetones, a technique which wasinevitably to affect Gerhard’s own. In1931 Gerhard took up the post ofProfessor of Music at the EscolaNormal de la Generalitat inBarcelona, and served as head of themusic department of the CatalanLibrary. After the defeat of the

Republic in the Civil War he leftSpain to settle in Cambridge, onbeing offered a research studentshipat King’s College. He spent sometime teaching in America, in 1960 atthe University of Michigan, and againin 1961 at the Berkshire MusicCenter, Tanglewood, before returningto Cambridge where he worked untilhis death as a freelance composer,no longer attached to the University.

In the sixties he received manycommissions, notably from the BBC

(Symphony No.2, Hymnody, ThePlague and Libra), and in Americafrom the Koussevitzky Foundation(Symphony No.3), the New YorkPhilharmonic Orchestra (SymphonyNo.4), and the Hopkins Center,Dartmouth (Leo). With an increase incommercial recordings and concertperformances, Gerhard’s musicbecame more widely known, bringinghim the rewards denied to him fornearly half a century. He died in1970, at the age of seventy-three.


12

ELISABETH LUTYENS

When Elisabeth Lutyens (1906-83)looked in on Stravinsky during aBBC rehearsal at Maida Vale in 1959,the great composer rose andembraced her. Someone had senthim a score of her 6 Tempi for 10Instruments. “That”, he exclaimed,“is the music I like!”

It must have come as a confirmationindeed after much of a lifetimebattling against odds of sex andcircumstance. Her upbringing wasmore privileged than encouraging,with a famous father, Sir EdwinLutyens, preoccupied by hisarchitectural projects and her motherwith her Theosophy. Afterconventional training in Paris and atthe Royal College of Music in London,she threw herself into the new musicscene, co-founding a contemporaryconcert series. Yet only with thepioneering of an idiosyncraticserialism first deployed in herChamber Concerto No.1 (1940) didshe begin to realise her radical vision.

This hardly endeared her to aconservative British musicalestablishment; over the next coupleof decades she had to earn most ofher income from scores for radiofeatures and films, while raising fourchildren. But with 6 Tempi (1957)she felt she had at last brokenthrough to a new integration oftechnique and expression. Meanwhile,her uncompromising stance, together

with the purity and professionalismof her scores, had begun to influencea younger generation of composers,including Alexander Goehr andRichard Rodney Bennett.

In the 1970s her reputation as ateacher of pupils including AlisonBauld, Brian Elias and RobertSaxton and her notoriety as anoutspoken eccentric began toovershadow her creative

achievement. Yet since her death shehas been commemorated in anextensively researched biography, APilgrim Soul by Meirion and SusanHarries (1989). And despite theretrogressive fashions for minimalismand neo-tonality of the last decade,the best of her vast output hascontinued to command devoted, andnow growing interest.

© 2004 Bayan Northcottph

oto: M

ayot

te M

agnu

s13

RICHARD RODNEYBENNETT

Richard Rodney Bennett is one ofthe most versatile musicians of ourtime: a prolific and highly respectedcomposer of operas, a ballet, andorchestral, vocal, chamber andeducational music; an accomplishedpianist in contemporary music; a jazzpianist and composer; even, thesedays, a solo cabaret performer. Andall this in addition to his parallelcareer as a composer of film scores,which began when he was nineteen,and has won him international fameand numerous awards. Born in 1936in Broadstairs, in south-east England,Bennett began composing as a child,

and from the age of eleven hadinformal consultations with thepioneering modernist (and expertfilm composer) Elisabeth Lutyens. Helater studied at the Royal Academyof Music in London with LennoxBerkeley and Howard Ferguson, andin Paris with Pierre Boulez. Themusic which he composed after hisreturn to Britain, although hardlyadhering to the Boulezian avant-garde, was in a mainstream modernidiom employing serial techniques.But just as this modernistbackground has given underlyingcoherence to his film scores, so tooin recent years his experience inpopular idioms has refreshed thelanguage of his concert works. Aresident of New York since 1979,Bennett remains a British citizen,and was knighted in 1998.

© 2004 Anthony Burton

JAC VAN STEENCONDUCTOR

Jac van Steen was born in theNetherlands in 1956 and studiedconducting and music theory at theBrabants Conservatory of Music,after which he was appointedconductor of the Student Orchestraof the University of Leiden and theNational Youth Orchestra.

From 1986-90 he was the conductorand music director of the Bach Choirin Nijmegen and, until 1994, Music

Director of the National BalletAmsterdam. He has conducted widelyin the Netherlands, appearingregularly with orchestras includingthe Residentie Orchestra of TheHague, the Rotterdam Philharmonic,and the Netherlands Philharmonicand Radio Philharmonic Orchestras.

His work overseas includes regularguest appearances with the BerlinSymphony Orchestra, theJohannesburg Symphony Orchestra,the Slovak Philharmonic, the BBCPhilharmonic Orchestra, and the BBCSymphony Orchestra – with whichhe has recorded Themes andVariations for NMC (on NMC D062)and works by David Matthews (NMCD067). From 1997- 2002 he held thepost of Music Director of theNurnberger Symphoniker, and fromph

oto: K

atie V

andy

ck


12

ELISABETH LUTYENS

When Elisabeth Lutyens (1906-83)looked in on Stravinsky during aBBC rehearsal at Maida Vale in 1959,the great composer rose andembraced her. Someone had senthim a score of her 6 Tempi for 10Instruments. “That”, he exclaimed,“is the music I like!”

It must have come as a confirmationindeed after much of a lifetimebattling against odds of sex andcircumstance. Her upbringing wasmore privileged than encouraging,with a famous father, Sir EdwinLutyens, preoccupied by hisarchitectural projects and her motherwith her Theosophy. Afterconventional training in Paris and atthe Royal College of Music in London,she threw herself into the new musicscene, co-founding a contemporaryconcert series. Yet only with thepioneering of an idiosyncraticserialism first deployed in herChamber Concerto No.1 (1940) didshe begin to realise her radical vision.

This hardly endeared her to aconservative British musicalestablishment; over the next coupleof decades she had to earn most ofher income from scores for radiofeatures and films, while raising fourchildren. But with 6 Tempi (1957)she felt she had at last brokenthrough to a new integration oftechnique and expression. Meanwhile,her uncompromising stance, together

with the purity and professionalismof her scores, had begun to influencea younger generation of composers,including Alexander Goehr andRichard Rodney Bennett.

In the 1970s her reputation as ateacher of pupils including AlisonBauld, Brian Elias and RobertSaxton and her notoriety as anoutspoken eccentric began toovershadow her creative

achievement. Yet since her death shehas been commemorated in anextensively researched biography, APilgrim Soul by Meirion and SusanHarries (1989). And despite theretrogressive fashions for minimalismand neo-tonality of the last decade,the best of her vast output hascontinued to command devoted, andnow growing interest.

© 2004 Bayan Northcott

phot

o: M

ayot

te M

agnu

s

13

RICHARD RODNEYBENNETT

Richard Rodney Bennett is one ofthe most versatile musicians of ourtime: a prolific and highly respectedcomposer of operas, a ballet, andorchestral, vocal, chamber andeducational music; an accomplishedpianist in contemporary music; a jazzpianist and composer; even, thesedays, a solo cabaret performer. Andall this in addition to his parallelcareer as a composer of film scores,which began when he was nineteen,and has won him international fameand numerous awards. Born in 1936in Broadstairs, in south-east England,Bennett began composing as a child,

and from the age of eleven hadinformal consultations with thepioneering modernist (and expertfilm composer) Elisabeth Lutyens. Helater studied at the Royal Academyof Music in London with LennoxBerkeley and Howard Ferguson, andin Paris with Pierre Boulez. Themusic which he composed after hisreturn to Britain, although hardlyadhering to the Boulezian avant-garde, was in a mainstream modernidiom employing serial techniques.But just as this modernistbackground has given underlyingcoherence to his film scores, so tooin recent years his experience inpopular idioms has refreshed thelanguage of his concert works. Aresident of New York since 1979,Bennett remains a British citizen,and was knighted in 1998.

© 2004 Anthony Burton

JAC VAN STEENCONDUCTOR

Jac van Steen was born in theNetherlands in 1956 and studiedconducting and music theory at theBrabants Conservatory of Music,after which he was appointedconductor of the Student Orchestraof the University of Leiden and theNational Youth Orchestra.

From 1986-90 he was the conductorand music director of the Bach Choirin Nijmegen and, until 1994, Music

Director of the National BalletAmsterdam. He has conducted widelyin the Netherlands, appearingregularly with orchestras includingthe Residentie Orchestra of TheHague, the Rotterdam Philharmonic,and the Netherlands Philharmonicand Radio Philharmonic Orchestras.

His work overseas includes regularguest appearances with the BerlinSymphony Orchestra, theJohannesburg Symphony Orchestra,the Slovak Philharmonic, the BBCPhilharmonic Orchestra, and the BBCSymphony Orchestra – with whichhe has recorded Themes andVariations for NMC (on NMC D062)and works by David Matthews (NMCD067). From 1997- 2002 he held thepost of Music Director of theNurnberger Symphoniker, and fromph

oto: K

atie V

andy

ck


14

1999-2002 he has been MusicDirector of the Neues BerlinerKammerorchester. At present he isMusic Director of the DeutschesNational Theater and ChiefConductor of the StaatskapelleWeimar as well as Chief Conductorof the Musikkollegium Winterthur,Switzerland.

In addition to his work as aninternational conductor, Jac vanSteen also teaches conducting at theConservatory of Music in The Hague.

BBC SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

The BBC Symphony Orchestra wasfounded by Sir Adrian Boult in 1930.Since then, its Chief Conductorshave included Antal Dorati, PierreBoulez, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, SirColin Davis and Sir John Pritchard;the Orchestra has worked closelywith a number of great composers,including Bartók, Henze, Lutoslawski,Pärt, Prokofiev, Strauss andStravinsky. The Orchestra’scommitment to new music hasresulted in its giving the premieresof over 1,100 works, many of whichwere commissioned by the BBC andhave since become establishedclassics. In 2000 Leonard Slatkinbecame the Orchestra’s 11th ChiefConductor, succeeding Sir AndrewDavis, who became its firstConductor Laureate. In another first,Mark-Anthony Turnage held the post

of Associate Composer from 2000-2003. In January 2003 the highly-acclaimed Finnish conductor Jukka-Pekka Saraste was appointed to theposition of Principal GuestConductor, while in June 2003 JohnAdams became Artist in Association.

As the flagship orchestra of theBBC, the Orchestra provides thebackbone of the Proms, with morethan a dozen appearances eachsummer, including the First and LastNights. The Orchestra’s scheduleincludes an annual concert season atthe Barbican and regional UKconcerts alongside internationaltouring. Every January the BBC SOcelebrates the work of a twentieth-century or contemporary composerwith a weekend festival.

The BBC Symphony Orchestrarecords for many of the majorrecording labels – this is its 28thdisc for NMC – and appearsregularly on television. Its concert atBuckingham Palace as part of theQueen’s Golden Jubilee celebrationswas seen by an audience of millionsaround the world. Every performanceby the BBC Symphony Orchestra isbroadcast on BBC Radio 3 and onthe BBC Radio 3 website.

15

Love from a Stranger was recorded at Studio 1, BBC Maida Vale, London on 2nd March 1999. The other works on this disc were recorded on 7-9 October 2002. For technical reasons track 29 was recorded on 21 November 2003 and conducted by Martyn Brabbins.

Recording EngineersTRYGG TRYGGVASON and ANDREW HALLIFAX for MODUS MUSICRecording Producer COLIN MATTHEWSEditingMARIAN TRYGGVASON for MODUS MUSICDAVID LEFEBER for METIERGraphic designFRANÇOIS HALLCover photo: The Davis Cinema Croydon © The Ronald Grant ArchiveLove from a Stranger is published by Chester Music, and was recorded with financial assistance from the Britten Estate.

The other works on this disc are unpublished: the manuscript score of Elisabeth Lutyens’ The Skull was made availableby kind permission of the composer’s estate, and NMC is grateful to Christine Banks, Head of Music Collections at theBritish Library, for provision of photocopies of the manuscript. The score was typeset from manuscript by David-McViePaterson.

The manuscript of Roberto Gerhard’s score for This Sporting Life was likewise made available with the generouspermission of the composer’s estate; photocopies were provided by Cambridge University Library with the kind assistance of Richard Andrewes, Head of the Music Department at the library, and the music heard here was assembled by David Matthews.

The score for Richard Rodney Bennett’s The Return of the Soldier was generously loaned by the composer.

NMC Recordings is a charitable company established for the recording of contemporary music by the Holst Foundation.

Executive Producer COLIN MATTHEWSAdministrator HANNAH VLC̆EKAssistant Administrator HANNAH TEALEDISTRIBUTIONNMC recordings are distributed in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Hong Kong, Luxembourg, theNetherlands, New Zealand, Sweden and the United States, and are also available through our website www.nmcrec.co.uk.

For further details please contact: NMC Recordings Ltd. at 18-20 Southwark Street, London SE1 1TJ, UK. Tel: +44 (0)20 7403 9445 Fax: +44 (0)20 7403 9446 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.nmcrec.co.uk

All rights of the manufacturer and owner of the recorded material reserved. Unauthorised public performance, broadcasting and copying of this recording prohibited. © 2004 NMC Recordings Ltd. ® 2004 NMC Recordings Ltd. NMC D073


14

1999-2002 he has been MusicDirector of the Neues BerlinerKammerorchester. At present he isMusic Director of the DeutschesNational Theater and ChiefConductor of the StaatskapelleWeimar as well as Chief Conductorof the Musikkollegium Winterthur,Switzerland.

In addition to his work as aninternational conductor, Jac vanSteen also teaches conducting at theConservatory of Music in The Hague.

BBC SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

The BBC Symphony Orchestra wasfounded by Sir Adrian Boult in 1930.Since then, its Chief Conductorshave included Antal Dorati, PierreBoulez, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, SirColin Davis and Sir John Pritchard;the Orchestra has worked closelywith a number of great composers,including Bartók, Henze, Lutoslawski,Pärt, Prokofiev, Strauss andStravinsky. The Orchestra’scommitment to new music hasresulted in its giving the premieresof over 1,100 works, many of whichwere commissioned by the BBC andhave since become establishedclassics. In 2000 Leonard Slatkinbecame the Orchestra’s 11th ChiefConductor, succeeding Sir AndrewDavis, who became its firstConductor Laureate. In another first,Mark-Anthony Turnage held the post

of Associate Composer from 2000-2003. In January 2003 the highly-acclaimed Finnish conductor Jukka-Pekka Saraste was appointed to theposition of Principal GuestConductor, while in June 2003 JohnAdams became Artist in Association.

As the flagship orchestra of theBBC, the Orchestra provides thebackbone of the Proms, with morethan a dozen appearances eachsummer, including the First and LastNights. The Orchestra’s scheduleincludes an annual concert season atthe Barbican and regional UKconcerts alongside internationaltouring. Every January the BBC SOcelebrates the work of a twentieth-century or contemporary composerwith a weekend festival.

The BBC Symphony Orchestrarecords for many of the majorrecording labels – this is its 28thdisc for NMC – and appearsregularly on television. Its concert atBuckingham Palace as part of theQueen’s Golden Jubilee celebrationswas seen by an audience of millionsaround the world. Every performanceby the BBC Symphony Orchestra isbroadcast on BBC Radio 3 and onthe BBC Radio 3 website.

15

Love from a Stranger was recorded at Studio 1, BBC Maida Vale, London on 2nd March 1999. The other works on this disc were recorded on 7-9 October 2002. For technical reasons track 29 was recorded on 21 November 2003 and conducted by Martyn Brabbins.

Recording EngineersTRYGG TRYGGVASON and ANDREW HALLIFAX for MODUS MUSICRecording Producer COLIN MATTHEWSEditingMARIAN TRYGGVASON for MODUS MUSICDAVID LEFEBER for METIERGraphic designFRANÇOIS HALLCover photo: The Davis Cinema Croydon © The Ronald Grant ArchiveLove from a Stranger is published by Chester Music, and was recorded with financial assistance from the Britten Estate.

The other works on this disc are unpublished: the manuscript score of Elisabeth Lutyens’ The Skull was made availableby kind permission of the composer’s estate, and NMC is grateful to Christine Banks, Head of Music Collections at theBritish Library, for provision of photocopies of the manuscript. The score was typeset from manuscript by David-McViePaterson.

The manuscript of Roberto Gerhard’s score for This Sporting Life was likewise made available with the generouspermission of the composer’s estate; photocopies were provided by Cambridge University Library with the kind assistance of Richard Andrewes, Head of the Music Department at the library, and the music heard here was assembled by David Matthews.

The score for Richard Rodney Bennett’s The Return of the Soldier was generously loaned by the composer.

NMC Recordings is a charitable company established for the recording of contemporary music by the Holst Foundation.

Executive Producer COLIN MATTHEWSAdministrator HANNAH VLC̆EKAssistant Administrator HANNAH TEALEDISTRIBUTIONNMC recordings are distributed in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Hong Kong, Luxembourg, theNetherlands, New Zealand, Sweden and the United States, and are also available through our website www.nmcrec.co.uk.

For further details please contact: NMC Recordings Ltd. at 18-20 Southwark Street, London SE1 1TJ, UK. Tel: +44 (0)20 7403 9445 Fax: +44 (0)20 7403 9446 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.nmcrec.co.uk

All rights of the manufacturer and owner of the recorded material reserved. Unauthorised public performance, broadcasting and copying of this recording prohibited. © 2004 NMC Recordings Ltd. ® 2004 NMC Recordings Ltd. NMC D073




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