THE BIRMINGHAM ORCHESTRA
Conducted by JOSEPH LEWIS
WYNNE AJELLO (Soprano)
WALTER HEARD (Flute)
WELL known as a song, whose wistful melody is admirably wedded to the plaintive words, this forms also the last piece in the second Suite made from the music to Ibsen's Peer Gynt. At the end of his wanderings Peer Gynt comes home, to find the sweetheart of his youth still faithful to him, and in her lap the weary head of the traveller at last finds rest. Then she sings to him of her constancy and her belief that he would return.
Music for Shakespeare plays has been given us in recent years in such profusion, and in an order which suits the plays so aptly, that we are apt to take it for granted. Sullivan's incidental music for The Tempest was among his earliest work, composed in his student days, but it was never actually given along with the play until 1903, when it was heard at the Court Theatre. That was after Sullivan's death. The dances are typical of his music in its brightest and most wholesome vein, as wholeheartedly English as Shakespeare himself.
IN these days when youth is at the helm in music as in so many other directions, Sinigaglia is no doubt well content to count himself as among the older Italian composers, although he is still active. He has long been enthusiastic in the collection and propagation of the folk music of his native Piedmont; it may well have been Dvorak, whoso pupil he was, who infected him with an enthusiasm like his own. There is a brightness and energy about these folk-tunes, embodied as they are in Sinigaglia's orchestral arrangements, which makes them as inevitably popular as all national songs and dances are when fittingly presented.
BIZET, known and loved the wide world over as the composer of Carmen, had, among his many great gifts, a particularly happy knack of lending his music what is called 'local colour.' The warm, sensuous Southern atmosphere which pervades Carmen unmistakably can be felt no less surely in the music which he wrote for Daudet's play L'Arlesienne, music which, in the form of two Suites, is now so much better known than the play itself.
The Second begins with a Pastorale, the Oboe having the tune to begin with, a real shepherd's pipe tune. Other instruments take it up, and there is a vigorous middle section throughout which the tambourine plays one rhythmic figure.
A short Intermezzo comes next, beginning with a sturdy tune in unison on strings and winds, and as third movement there is a very interesting Menuett. It begins, and finishes, as a duet for flute and harp, the rest of the orchestra joining forces to furnish a more boisterous middle section.
The last movement is a Farandole, in a vigorous march rhythm, built up on the same tune which was Hsod in the prelude of the first Suite; listeners who knew Carmen will here recognize another tune which appears in the opera.
(For 5.15-8.45 Programme see opposite page)