Tim Woodall, Programme Notes written by...
Tim Woodall explores the art of writing interesting and informative programme notes
In the accompanying notes of a recording of Sibelius' Kullervo on Virgin Classics, Anthony Short analyses the context of the Finnish composer's first mature composition. Juxtaposing anecdotal evidence with snippets of pertinent musical analysis, the easy prose of Short's note neatly sets the music on the disc in perspective
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Considering that the emergence of Sibelius' music in the 1890s has been so frequently written about, how did Short approach the subject to produce a fresh and innovative angle that would neither be cast aside by an expert nor alienate a relative newcomer to Sibelius' music? It is thorny paths like these that programme note writers tread, required as they are to either cast familiar works in a new light, or convey the essence of lesser known music to the listener
There is an awful lot of commercial writing to be done in classical music. Literally hundreds of commissions each year come from recordings and concerts that require accompanying text. There are also online journals, industry magazines and broadcasting copy, all of which need a specialised guiding hand. Programme note writing is not just handled by fulltime journalists: academics, musicians and enthusiasts write commercially in addition to other work. Indeed several Morgensterns clients have successful writing careers that run in tandem to busy performing schedules.
Anthony Short, Shostakovich programme note sample
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Anthony Short has written programme notes and CD articles on repertoire ranging from the Baroque period to the present day. Recently he has discussed works as disparate as Reynaldo Hahn's songs and Haydn's piano trios, and his monograph on Prokofiev (written under the pseudonym of Gregory Hart) has received high critical praise. He tailors his work to meet the requirements of different readerships, but he always aims to produce material that is both informative and engaging. For a list of some of Anthony Short's CD notes, please visit Dilettante Music.
Shostakovich There are some ensembles that shape the course of music history. One such group was the Beethoven Quartet, which for half a century played an indispensable artistic role within the Soviet Union. Since it was responsible for giving the world premieres of all but two of Shostakovich's fifteen string quartets, one can safely say that Russian chamber music would have been very different had the players never got together. In the summer of 1940, Shostakovich was approached by the Beethoven Quartet with a request to write 'something we can play together '. The composer duly obliged, and the Piano Quintet was first performed on 23 November that year. It was an instant success and almost single-handedly broke the Soviet taboo surrounding chamber music, which had hitherto been considered a bourgeois idiom that was not to be encouraged. The work is notable for its economical scoring and spareness of texture, and only in the tempestuous Scherzo does Shostakovich allow himself to give rein to the full weight of the five instruments. Elsewhere, he often tends towards using the extreme ends of the piano keyboard in order to minimise the risk of clogging the sonority of the string instruments. The resulting clarity commended itself to the authorities, and earned Shostakovich a Stalin Prize. In moods ranging from the dramatically rhetorical to the intensely lyrical, the Prelude subtly introduces all the main themes of the entire piece in embryonic form. The second movement, which shows Shostakovich quite at ease with the scholarly aspects of fugue, is worlds away from the Scherzo whose innocent tempo marking, Allegretto, belies the movement's biting satire and downright bad manners. As many commentators have pointed out, it goes far beyond mere harmless mischievousness; it is loutish and brutal. Ian MacDonald has remarked that it is 'another allusion to the "revolt against intelligence" ì Stalin's generation of cultureless country bullies.' Following this display of bitter sarcasm, the 'normality' of the ensuing Intermezzo comes as something of a shock, though the sinister staccato of the piano's bass-line ensures that the music remains highly charged. The Finale, which has been likened to a babushka murmuring 'never mind, never mind', is a perplexing mix of the clownish and the disjunctive, despite being constructed in sonata form. Together with the composer, the first violinist and cellist of the Beethoven Quartet were also involved in the first performance of Shostakovich's Second Piano Trio, which they gave in Leningrad on 14 November 1944 on the same occasion as they premiered the Second String Quartet. The Trio is dedicated to the memory of the musicologist Ivan Sollertinsky, an intellectual soulmate of Shostakovich and one of the very few people to whom he could speak his mind without fearing that his opinions might land him in trouble. It was on 11 February that Shostakovich learnt of his friend's untimely death, and within days he had penned the weeping, disembodied opening bars for muted cello playing high harmonics. After such a rapid start, progress was slow by Shostakovich's standards and it was a good six months before the piece was completed. The delay may be attributed to his heavy academic commitments, the demands of a film score, and to preliminary deliberations on the Second Quartet and Ninth Symphony. There is a retrospective flavour to the Trio's first movement, as if the composer is retreating into the lost world of his childhood, and there might even be a reference to one of his long-destroyed teenage pieces. The Scherzo, like that of the Piano Quintet, has an insistent feel to it and might well be yet another sly dig at the anti-intellectualism of the Soviet authorities. The main theme of the third movement, a passacaglia, owes something to the Finale of Mahler's Ninth Symphony. There is also a simplicity about its material that has led writers to speculate that Shostakovich might have been studying the score of Nielsen's Sixth Symphony (Sinfonia semplice). The Finale, which Shostakovich was stimulated to compose after reading of the Red Army's liberation of the Nazi death camps in Poland, is his first overtly 'Jewish' piece. Intending the movement to be a harsh impression of exhausted prisoners stumbling around, doomed to die, he creates a sepulchral atmosphere that is both chilling and harrowing. The four waltzes in this compilation were collected and arranged in 1955 by Shostakovich's colleague Lev Atoumyan from ballet and film scores, which, in contrast to the private and subversive Quintet and Trio, represent the composer in an official state capacity. The first waltz is from the 1948 score to Life in Bloom, an early colour feature about the Soviet botanist Ivan Michurin. This is followed by a number from the 1931 'industrial ballet' The Bolt. The third piece comes from The Return of Max, a 1937 film concerned with workers' demonstrations in the dying days of tsarist Russia, and the sequence ends with an extract from the 1955 film The Gadfly, about the struggles of a revolutionary against Austrian domination of Italy in the 1840s. |
How easy is it for a musician to juggle working as a performer and a writer?
Well, quite naturally it seems. 'I balance work as performer with work as musicologist' says Malcolm Miller, pianist, and writer for a range of publications, from musical dictionaries to International Piano Magazine. 'My performing is often linked to research, for example, recitals of special repertoire, for which I also write about.'
There are also similarities between the two disciplines - self promotion for example, which is vital for freelancers of any trade. 'Self promotion is clearly important when it comes to writing' says Anthony Short, who is a violinist as well as a writer for concert promoters and record companies that also include EMI Classics, Decca and Harmonia Mundi, 'but in many ways writing is not as competitive as playing. It is a less subjective form of creativity.'
Sali-Wyn Ryan, violinist and freelance music producer for Classic FM radio station since 1999, agrees: 'The same concept of self promotion applies - making contacts and in particular being able to provide a consistently high quality product that people can rely on. Writing is however a skill that doesn't quite demand as much maintenance as playing the violin!'
Anthony Short, who also works as a commissioning and copy editor as well, perhaps sums up the essential difference between performing and writing professionally - writing can be presented when the writer is happy with their work, but musicians have to perform on cue: 'Clients can judge a piece of written work far more accurately than audition panels can judge someone's playing abilities.'
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Sali-Wyn's work at Classic FM
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Sali-Wyn has been a freelance music producer for Classic FM radio station since 1999. As a music producer, Sali-Wyn assists in the structuring of radio programmes; specifically in the design of the musical content and in the liaison with presenters, such as Simon Bates, Jane Jones, John Brunning and Katie Derham. She has detailed knowledge of the music scheduling software, 'Selector' and has some experience of studio production and editing. She also has worked as a music researcher and script writer for various shows. Her work contributed to the following nominations at the prestigious Sony Radio Awards of 2004 and 2005.
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'A good programme note should make anyone, informed or not, a little more interested in the piece of music than they were before' says Sali-Wyn Ryan. To achieve that is no mean feat however. When writing any commentary on music, a writer can not possibly engage every reader because the range of knowledge of any readership will be wide.
Anthony Short is also aware of the importance of pitching programme notes in the correct way: 'When writing CD notes, I try to find the right tone by examining the potential market for the disc' he says. 'With well-known performers I tend to include little or no biographical information on the assumption that listeners are already familiar with them. Instead, I will concentrate more on the nature of the music, especially if there is any discernible unifying theme running through the recorded repertoire.'
For Malcolm Miller, reaching out to the audience is a question of balance: 'I always aim to have a balance of historical context about the significance of the composer and the work, with as much documentary evidence as possible, and then a listening guide which highlights points of interest. I do not aim for a full analysis, but try to say what is unique - perhaps structurally or sonorously - about a piece, and also to help the reader enter into the mood required for the music.'
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Malcolm Miller York Bowen programme note sample
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Malcolm Miller's programme notes are customised in length, content and style for the client, and may be produced at short notice when required. He produces fresh research, especially so with unfamiliar or contemporary repertoire, such as York Bowen, and aim to be topical, highlighting why the composer is significant, in the stylistic context of composers more familiar to the reader. His aim is to provide, in as lively a language as possible, an accessible guide to the audible landmarks, to eliciting the spirit of the musical experience. Please visit MV Daily to read more articles by Malcolm Miller.
Preludes Op. 102, York Bowen (1884-1961)
York Bowen is one of those curiously neglected figures in English musical history whose works, like those of Frank Bridge or Gerald Finzi, deserve far greater recognition than they have received. Happily some recent recordings show welcome indications of a revival and rediscovery of his prolific oeuvre. Saints-Saens and Sorabji admired Bowen's achievements as a composer particularly in the first quarter of the century. His style, like that of Rachmaninov to whom he is often compared, is rooted in late-Romanticism yet shows a profoundly imaginative sensibility fully aware of the rich harmonic possibilities in the twilight transition from Impressionism and Modernism in the 1920s and 30s. A child prodigy, Bowen studied piano from the age of fifteen at the Royal Academy of Music, where he was a fellow student of Bax, and where he was made a Professor in 1909. A renowned virtuoso who fortunately left a legacy of recordings and broadcasts, Bowen performed at the Queens Hall in three of his piano concertos (1904-8) under Hans Richter, and was soloist in his Viola Concerto (he was also a professional violist and horn player); several of his symphonies achieved popularity during his lifetime. Of his prolific output for piano, spanning from Op.1 to Op. 160, the 24 Preludes Op. 102 (1938) represent Bowen's finest inspiration. The collection covers all major and minor keys in rising chromatic sequence, a pattern based on Bach's 48 rather than the Preludes of Chopin and Shostakovich, which move through the cycle of fifths. While the chief influences are of the Russians Rachmaninov and Medtner, one can also trace echoes of Ravel and Delius in the fluid textures, chromatic harmony and melodic freedom. Indeed Delius comes to mind in the Prelude No.6 in D minor, a broad ternary form that sustains a mood of calm reverie yet tinged with pathos. In the outer sections, a delicately undulating melody unfolds gently over a calmly pulsating chordal cushion of sound, spiced with subtle harmonic echoes of Musorgsky and Faure. Soon the melody appears in duet with the bass, then the texture intensifies to a climax, at which point a new, brighter melody appears with richer harmony, leading back smoothly to the initial melody. The Prelude No.7 in E flat bears the imprint of Rachmaninov in its sumptuously harmonized melody set over rippling left hand passagework, welling towards intense climaxes. There are passing hints of Ravel, Strauss and perhaps even Gershwin, but the elfin conclusion is pure Bowenesque Rachmaninov! The Toccata Op. 155 is an exhilarating 'moto perpetuo' which sweeps up and down the whole range of the keyboard like a daredevil big dipper ride. The panoply of pianistic pyrotechnics includes wildly leaping chords, arpeggios in contrary motion, cross hands technique, rapid repeated notes and the like. A bold rhythmic motto at the start reappears intermittently amidst the driving momentum, announcing the exciting climactic conclusion, which rises to a peak then dives chromatically, with a thrilling glissando before the emphatic close. © Malcolm Miller, 2009 |
Perhaps, though, it is not so important for a writer to have a direct line to each individual reader, but to have a more general skill for presenting music in its context. As a writer of scripts for radio presenters, Sali-Wyn Ryan supports this view: 'I think my experience working for Classic FM has made me aware that people like to be able to 'place' music and find it reassuring if they can relate to anything recognisable.'
Anthony Short also points out that there are different constraints for different mediums of note writing. For CD notes 'one can safely assume a limited technical knowledge on the part of most readers' while for the concert programme, Short believes a writer can afford to be more 'quirky' as he goes on to explain: 'Concert notes are only likely to be read once and they do not have the permanence of a CD booklet. Here, one can be more daring, even provocative. If one entertains people on the train home, then one has succeeded.'
Malcolm Miller is also aware of the challenge in hitting the right note with a wide-ranging audience: 'One has to be flexible but certainly not 'talk down' to any potential reader.'
These are all skills that a writer must mobilise to add another level to the insight of the listener, whatever the angle from which they are approaching the music. Good programme notes are a fitting accompaniment to the music they are placing in context and as everyone who has sat through new commissions at the Proms knows, they can mean the difference between a painful half an hour and genuine engagement with the music.
Tim works in Artist Management and is also a regular contributor to a variety of publications, including Classical Music Magazine. Before joining Intermusica as their Marketing and Promotions Co-Ordinator, Tim was a member of Morgensterns Teleteam. For more articles by Tim please click here.
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