Relayed from the Promenade Concert at
Queen's Hall, London
(Sole Lessees, Messrs. Chappell and Co., Ltd.)
MAY BLYTH (soprano)
ARTHUR CATTERALL (violin)
THE B.B.C. SYMPHONY
ORCHESTRA
Principal Violin, CHARLES WOODHOUSE
Conducted by Sir HENRY WOOD
Part I
ORCHESTRA
8.0 Overture, Egmont
Beethoven's Overture and incidental music of Goethe's ' Egmont' were completed in 1810, and therefore represent the composer at the height of his powers. As a piece of dramatic writing in terms of ' pure ' music and for fertility of invention and imaginative treatment, this overture has few, if any, equals outside perhaps one or two other similar works by Beethoven himself. *
Indeed, Beethoven's music perfectly expresses Motley's description of Egmont in his ' Rise of the Dutch Republic ' : ' terrible and sudden in wrath ... a splendid soldier, whose evil star destined him to tread, as a politician, a dark and dangerous path, in which not even genius, caution, and integrity could ensure success, but in which rashness, alternating with hesitation, could not fail to bring ruin '. The music also depicts the final tragedy of Kginont when he meets death on the scaffold.
MAY BLYTH AND ORCHESTRA
8.9 Recit. and Aria, Thou monstrous fiend (Fidelio)
Florestan, a political prisoner in a Spanish fortress, is being slowly starved to death by his implacable enemy Pizarro, the prison governor. He is reported as dead to his wife, Leonora. She doubts the reports and has taken service, disguised as a boy, with Rocco, a gaoler of the prison. Pizarro has decided, however, to make sure of Florestan's death and orders Rocco to kill him. Leonora overhears their plans. It is at this point that she sings this great operatic aria. She declaims against Pizarro, the monstrous fiend, tiger-like, utterly inhuman, but even in the midst of her horror she will not harbour despair and apostrophising Hope, she implores some succour to support her in her terrible trial.
ARTHUR CATTERALL AND ORCHESTRA
8.19 Concerto in D
1. Allegro ma non troppo; 2. Larghetto; 3. Rondo, Allegro
ORCHESTRA
9.4 Symphony No. 5, in C minor
1. Allegro con brio; 2. Andante con moto ; 3. Allegro, Allegro
Tickets can be obtained from [address removed]; and usual agents. Prices (including Entertainments Tax) : 7s. 6d., 6s., 5s. (reserved), 3s. (unreserved), Promenade (payment at doors only), 2S.