ROBERT EDWARDS (Pianoforte)
THE B.B.C. ORCHESTRA
(Section D)
Conducted by B. WALTON O'DONNELL
SUSAN SPAIN DUNK is one of the small group of British women composers who are steadily gaining wider recognition, and she enjoys tho distinction of having figured for four years running in the programmes of the London Promenades, each time with a new piece which she has herself conducted. Of this symphonic poem she tells us that the opening suggests on the one hand, bleak, open upland, and, on the other, singleness of purpose and stern resolve in those who embarked on a task demanding the utmost courage. The development of these first themes-not on conventional lines-is meant to depict the heroic temper of the early builders of a temple so splendid, to emphasize their faith and zon). A second suggests achievement, and beauty wrested from surrounding savagery, but. the mood of the music is tumultuous rather than placid. Sacrificial rites are not left out of account, though they have not the importance of Stonehengo itself; a short section like a triumphal march is, technically, a development of the principal subject, and then a coda combines all the themes already heard. Towards its close, it suggests, in the composer's words, ' the soul's haven of beauty achieved, or, outwardly, the grandeur of the temple illumined by the rays of the setting sun, standing lonely and serene throughout the ages.'