REPERTOIRE: CHOIR AND WIND ORCHESTRA

First appeared in WASBE Newsletter, revised January 2005

MUSIC FOR CHOIRS AND WIND

RECORDS

Gregson’s Missa Brevis Pacem is recorded on DOY CD043

Wilby’s A Passion for Our Time is recorded on DOY CD106

BOOKS

BEST MUSIC FOR CHORUS AND WINDS

Keith Kinder, published by Manhattan Beach Music 2005, edited Bob Margolis

THE WIND AND WIND-CHORUS MUSIC OF ANTON BRUCKNER

Keith Kinder, published by Greenwood Press (ISBN 0-313-30834-9)

The importance of websites for disseminating information was forcibly brought home by an enquiry from a member of the Committee planning WASBE in Ireland for 2007 about choral music. Could I send a copy of my article – I could remember vaguely writing something, but had no idea where it was. A week later, deleting old files, I came across the article, and have updated it a little, since when it has been rendered almost totally obsolete by Keith Kinder’s magnificent new book, Best Music for Chorus and Wind. This is highly recommended for wind and choral conductors.

ATTRACTING BIGGER AUDIENCES

The occasion for the original article was the main work at the BASBWE/RNCM International Festival Gala Concert on Friday 14th April 2000 at Manchester Cathedral. This was A Manchester Mass by Anthony Hedges. This performance started me thinking about the potential of concerts with choirs as a way to drag the wind band into the mainstream of concert music, attracting audiences and building bridges with our very strong choral traditions.

Anthony Hedges was born in 1931, studied at Oxford and was a pianist and arranger with the Royal Signals Band before taking up posts at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama and later at Hull University where he was Senior Lecturer in Music.

A Manchester Mass is about forty minutes long originally commissioned by the Manchester Music Service and premiered by them in 1974, scored for chorus, symphony orchestra and brass band. This new version was performed by Chethams School, Mancunian Winds and the Manchester Music Services conducted by Allan Jones is for four-part choir and wind band with a treble or soprano soloist needed for a setting of "The Lord's Prayer". The idiom is in the "English Cathedral tradition", perhaps reminiscent on occasion of Walton and Britten, but very effective. It would make a marvellous ending to a Festival concert in a church or cathedral setting. It received a strong performance, too strong perhaps, since we were from time to time left wishing for relief from the noise levels, and a more lyrical gentle approach to the quieter sections of the piece would have been welcome.

The mass is available from the composer's publishing house: 

Westfieldmusic, Malt Shovel Cottage, 76 Walkergate, Beverley,

Humberside, HU17 9ER, tel +44 (0)1482 860580, email ahedges@westfieldmusic.karoo.co.uk

2005 - GREGSON AT SIXTY

A similar work, concise and tightly organised and also very "English" in style, is Edward Gregson's Missa Brevis Pacem. It is published by Novello/Music Sales, but does not appear in their wind band catalogues; information at present can only be traced in their choral catalogue, and the band parts and scores are only on hire. It is scored for a boys choir in three parts, SSA, with one movement for baritone soloist, and a moving Benedictus for treble or soprano, which, if marketed, could get into the Top Fifty of the classical charts. Again, the writing for both choir and band is conservative in idiom and difficulty, and like the Hedges is perhaps American Grade 4/5, and it is equally practical as a performing project.

A third work for amateur forces from the end of the last century was a commission from Philip Wilby by Geoff Reed and Sefton Music Services, a setting of the Passion story by which combines with the Eucharist service to make A Passion for our Time. The work is equally effective in concert for narrator, choir, band and organ, but can also performed in its original with a celebrant. The world premiere, in Liverpool Anglican Cathedral, also involved dancers. And the performers and the audience of over 2,000 moved during the performance from the West to the East End, mirroring the journey in Jerusalem. The idiom is uncompromising and suits the tragedy, but the writing is not difficult, although more experienced solo players are required for a chamber ensemble, rather as in Britten's War Requiem. Since then Wilby has written a setting of texts by Archbishop Desmond Tutu called A New World Dancing; on hire, more information is available from the publishers, Maecenas.

One of my favourite choral works with wind is the original version of Honneger's King David; originally written for amateur performers, this is a work, which can really be used to attract an audience, since the Old Testament story is told by a narrator, who can obviously be your local radio or television star of the moment. The scoring of 1921 is for 2121:1210:T 2P: cello, bass, piano and organ, choir and soloists, with a boys choir joining in the final movement. While Honneger's own arrangement for full orchestra is more widely known, the original version with wind ensemble gives an oriental astringency totally in keeping with the subject.

For me, one of the highlights of the WASBE Conference in Lucerne in 2001 was an extraordinary work by Honneger, Nicholas der Flue. There was no programme about the piece, information is scarce, but as I recall it is scored for soloists, choirs with wind band and brass band. It is described in my Grove as a Dramatic Legend, written in 1941.

JOSEPH PHIBBS

When the young Joseph Phibbs had a ten minute orchestral piece played at the BBC Proms it met with critical acclaim and the work was a finalist in the British Academy of Composers awards, alongside another by Birtwistle and the winner, Julian Anderson. Six months earlier, a work by the same composer, Rainland, involving over one thousand high school students, singing or playing, with professional soloists, lasting 30 minutes, was totally ignored by the national press. Not even WINDS, the journal of BASBWE, covered it. This is an epic work, reminiscent, as any work for children’s voices will be of the writing of Britten and occasionally Walton with some marvellously imaginative word painting. Details at present are available from Phillip Scott pscott@pscott.demon.co.uk

A more recent work still was the commission from the North Cheshire Concert Band and Mark Heron of a work for school choir and amateur band called Jonah by Emily Howard, premiered in December 2004. A through composed piece lasting about 13 minutes, this is a miniature dramatic cantata, with modal writing for the choir, not difficult but always interesting. The writing for the band is a little more challenging, but a good school programme could mount this work very effectively. Contact with the composer is via her website www.emilyhoward.com or by email to emilychoward@yahoo.co.uk

MUSIC FOR THE PROFESSIONALS

Back in 1982 I spent a wonderful week with the late great John Paynter, searching through the library of Northwestern, and I remember being particularly impressed with a recording of The Muses of Sicily by Hans Werner Henze, for SATB chorus 2222:4220: T P and 2 pianos.

A piece which I might take to my desert island is the superb Mass No 2 in E minor by Bruckner, scored for double choir and a wind and brass ensemble of 0222:4230, while another setting of the Mass is one of the most powerful works from the Stravinsky canon of masterpieces for wind ensemble. His setting is scored for choir with double reeds and brass, 0302:0230, and it inspired a companion piece by Michael Ball, Pageant, an energetic setting of mediaeval texts requiring virtuoso singing from an SATB choir with a baritone soloist. At the risk of attracting emails complaining about the inclusion of strings, for the sake of completeness I must include Stravinsky’s monumental Symphony of Psalms, and I thoroughly enjoyed a video of the CBDNA commission of Bandanna, an opera by Daron Hagen, with wind orchestra accompaniment and a small off-stage string group. This has a great deal of really powerful music and is well worth exploring by anyone interested in contemporary opera.