Charles Villiers Stanford (1852- 1924) was one of the leading musicians of his generation and had a profound effect on the development and history of English music as a performer, conductor, composer, teacher and writer.
Born in Dublin to a musical family, his musical gifts were recognized early. He studied piano and the violin privately and subsequently the organ with Robert Prescott Stewart at Christchurch and St. Patrick’s Cathedrals in Dublin. Stanford entered Queens’ College Cambridge in 1870 as both an organ and classics scholar. While still an undergraduate he became Assistant Conductor of the Cambridge University Music Society and held the position of Conductor from 1875 to 1893. He became organist at Trinity College Cambridge in 1873 and subsequently studied composition in Germany with Carl Reinecke and Friedrick Kiel.
He was appointed Professor of Composition at the Royal College of Music in London in 1883 (a position that he held for more than forty years) and Professor of Music at Cambridge in 1888. He subsequently held appointments as Conductor of the Bach Choir in London, the Leeds Philharmonic Society and the Leeds Festival.
Stanford was a prolific composer, completing seven symphonies, eight string quartets, nine operas, more than 300 songs, 30 large scale choral works and a large body of chamber music. He also composed a substantial number of works for the organ, as well as anthems and settings of the canticles for the Anglican Church. He wrote extensively on music including three volumes of memoirs and a popular text on composition.
Today he is largely remembered for his songs and religious music as well as his influence on several generations of composition students at the Royal College of Music. These included Sir Arthur Bliss, Frank Bridge, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Rebecca Clarke, Ivor Gurney, Gustav Holst, Herbert Howells, John Ireland, Ralph Vaughan Williams and Charles Wood.
Stanford was knighted in 1902 and in 1904 he became the first British composer to be elected a member of the Royal Academy of Arts in Berlin. His ashes are interred in Westminster Abbey near the remains of Henry Purcell.
There has been a revival of interest in Stanford’s music over the past two decades with performances of some of his neglected works and an increasing number of recordings.
Clarinet Concerto, Op. 80
Stanford first wrote for the clarinet as early as 1880 (Three Intermezzi, Op 13), eleven years before Brahms wrote his four great works for that instrument. His ‘Concerto in one movement’ was written for Richard MühIfeld, who had premiered the Brahms works, but this dedication was later scratched from the autograph full score when Mühlfeld refused to play the work. Its first performance was given at Queen’s Hall in London on 20 June 1904 by Charles Draper for the ‘Philharmonic Society’, conducted by Stanford. Frederick Thurston, a pupil of Draper who was to become Britain’s leading clarinettist for over twenty-five years, played the concerto as a twenty-one-year-old student at the Royal College in 1922, under the watchful eye of the composer. A letter from Stanford to Thurston dated that year attests to the composer’s enthusiasm for the young soloist’s performance; warm words indeed from a man who was grudging in his praise. Thurston went on to give many successful performances during the following decades.
Despite its title, the work is clearly in three movements, the first two linked by a simple two-bar modulation, the second and third movements being bridged by a developed version of the work’s opening theme. Stanford begins the concerto with two strident, almost march-like tuttis, the clarinet answering each with a reflective triplet figure which in the second instance gives way to the buoyant rhythmic first theme. Poignant dialogue between the clarinet and various parts of the orchestra leads to the second theme. This is altogether more peaceful than the restless opening music. The clarinet is in quieter mood, accompanied by ever-present triplet figures. The march-like music reappears only to be guided by the clarinet into the quiet preparation for the second movement. It opens with a glorious (almost Bruckner-like) chorale for horns and strings, which is taken up by the clarinet and woodwinds, moving easily into the veiled colours of the movement’s second theme, a rising figure from the clarinet accompanied by lower strings. The orchestra is allowed to develop this idea while the solo part comments wistfully over the orchestra. Four bars from the opening chorale lead to a dramatic recitative for the clarinet, which finally falls away to the return and reworking of most of the second movement material. Inspired touches such as the clarinet playing the chorale theme over a shifting woodwind triplet figure serve to show Stanford’s complete mastery of orchestration. Just as the slow movement comes to its final resting point the opening music of the concerto re-emerges to take the listener with great force into the Finale.
No more Germanic drama here but a fine, lilting (and surely Irish) rondo-like theme with lots of spring in its heel and plenty of virtuosity for all concerned. One or two darker moments reflecting on the earlier movements fall to change the infectious mood of this Finale, which maintains its high spirits to the end of the concerto.
from notes by Alun Francis © 1986
https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dw.asp?dc=W817_66001
Jack Harrison (clarinet) performed the Australian premiere of the Charles Villiers Stanford Clarinet Concerto Op. 80 on May 9th 1972 with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra conducted by Tibor Paul at Winthrop Hall. The concerto remained entirely unpublished during the Stanford’s lifetime and for decades after his death in 1924. This performance by Jack Harrison alerted Pamela Weston, who edited the very first public release of the piece in any format, published in 1977.
Following Stanford’s death in 1924, the majority of his unprinted compositions, autograph manuscripts, and personal papers were sent to Newcastle University for preservation, where they sat untouched for decades.
Weston’s Research: In the 1960s and 1970s, Pamela Weston undertook exhaustive historical research for her seminal reference books, including Clarinet Virtuosi of the Past. Her investigations into historical British players led her to cross-reference Stanford’s uncatalogued estate papers in Newcastle. [1, 2]
Rescuing the Music: Upon unearthing the complete autograph score, Weston painstakingly transcribed the composer’s handwriting, extracted the individual instrumental parts, and crafted the piano reduction. She brought the completed package to London publisher Cramer Music, successfully rescuing the work from total obscurity
When Weston published her definitive clarinet and piano reduction through Cramer Music in 1977, her editorial acknowledgments focused strictly on the historical preservation and textual accuracy of the score. She credited the Newcastle University Library for granting access to the raw manuscript and focused her commentary on the work’s original 1902–1904 timeline (including the original dedicatee Richard Mühlfeld and the first performer Charles Draper).
MAKE MINE MUSIC
ABC 2nd YOUTH CONCERT
Featuring the West Australian Symphony Orchestra
Conductor Tibor Paul
With soloist Jack Harrison (clarinet)
Winthrop Hall
7pm May 9 1972
Soloist tonight is Mr. Jack Harrison. Mr Harrison is a versatile performer as you will have observed from the biography in your program. We are pleased to have him perform on the clarinet this evening, one of the less frequent of solo instruments of the concert hall platform. Charles Villiers Stanford originally dedicated his Clarinet Concerto to Richard Muhlfield a player who had inspired Brahms to write a clarinet Trio, clarinet Quintet and two sonatas. However, after Stanford had conducted a performance with the clarinettist Frank Thurston, the work was rededicated to Thurston. Jack Harrison heard a BBC transcription of the work about 18 years ago and when in London last year on his Churchill Foundation Scholarship discovered that the work had never been published in a clarinet and piano reduction version. This accounts for the piece being relatively unknown. Mr Harrison approached the publishers of the hire parts, Stainer and Bell, who agreed to give him his own photocopy of the solo clarinet part and when the opportunity arose, he decided to play it for this Youth Concert. Authorities recognise the work as a valuable addition to the clarinet repertoire. Gervaise de Peyer and Jack Brimer both think that it is a good concerto. [1]
Welcome Back to Tibor Paul
By MARY TANNOCK
Tibor Paul, resident conductor of the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, made a welcome return to the dais in last night’s youth concert at Winthrop Hall. With the W.A. Symphony Orchestra, he skilfully directed works by Stravinsky, Stanford and Beethoven amid enthusiastic applause from the audience. The guest artist was the clarinettist Jack Harrison. Stravinsky’s Ballet Suite “The fairy’s Kiss” offered a kaleidoscope of orchestral textures and was a systematic workshop of individual instrumental colour. The stillness of the string playing in the opening scene and their clipped clarity and momentum against burlesque brass effects in the second scene were highlights of the reading. Airy fairy floss dynamics were in character with the allegory and beautifully sustained the mood of each tableau. It was an impressive performance. So too was Jack Harrison’s solo performance in Stanford’s Clarinet Concerto Op. 80. Heavy, nostalgic harmonies, perhaps a trifle solid were given exceptional momentum under Mr Harrison’s deft direction. Orchestral and solo balance was ably sustained. Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony was the final number on the program. This could have been weightier and there were instances of rhythmic and instrumental blemish that were not entirely satisfactory. [2]
Congratulations – we’re lucky to have you, Mr Paul
By Robert Gude
If conductor Tibor Paul thought the rousing ovation he received at this week’s Youth Concert was simply urging him on for an encore, he misjudged his young audience. It is customary for audiences who want more for their money to stomp and holler hoping for a kind of bargain basement addition to the printed program. Such was not the case following the WASO’s fine performance of the titanic Fifth. Every section without exception excelled in alternating dynamics and delicacy, Mr Paul conducting without a score, was in complete command with his subtle sweeping cues and characteristically spare, precise beat. Jack Harrison was heard in a fine reading of Stanford’s Clarinet Concerto. Mr Harrison alone saved this plain, uninteresting work bearing shades of Elgar and a momentary sally in Wagner. For one brief moment, an elegant melody carried by the entire string section could have lent unusual character to this concerto – had Stanford continued variations on this theme for solo clarinet, developing and alternating this material into meaningful music. Mr Stanford chose however to leave this melody suspended in mid-air, a la Bruckner, never to be heard again. Mr. Harrison came upon this work during his recent Churchill Foundation study tour and brought it to us as an example of fine writing for clarinet. This it was beyond doubt propelled by Mr Harrison’s undoubted skill and this was reflected in the fine reception he received from a young audience which appreciates his enormous talents. The program opened with Stravinsky’s orchestral suite from the ballet “The Fairy’s Kiss” one of this great Russian, French, American’s gentler works. What could go unnoticed was the excellence of harpist, Michael Jefferies, the first chair solo quartet provided by leader Vaughn Hanly, Stanislav Kowarski (second violin) George Coleman (viola) and Raymond Fraser (cello) and, again risking reputation, the WASO’s splendid horn section led by Neil Pierson. Concert audiences in Liverpool, England still recall with awe and admiration Mr. Paul’s appearance on the podium of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic last October. Here, beyond question, is a conductor of world standing. The A.B.C. the WASO and Perth concert audiences should appreciate the nature and global reputation of Mr. Paul while he is with us, they should count themselves fortunate. [3]
| 9.5.1972 | Charles Villiers Stanford Clarinet Concerto, Op. 80. AUSTRALIAN PREMIERE | Jack Harrison (clarinet) Tibor Paul (conductor) West Australian Symphony Orchestra | Youth Concert, Winthrop Hall, University of Western Australia |
Sonata for Clarinet and Piano Op. 129 (1911)
Stanford wrote only two works for clarinet; the Sonata, completed on 28 December 1911, and the slightly earlier Concerto. In both, his admiration for Brahms is evident, but the slow movement of the Sonata proves how potent, too, was the influence of the music of his own country (a ‘Caoine’, pronounced ‘keen’, is a type of Irish lament). Throughout the work Stanford’s great technical skill is shown by the beauty and transparency of the textures, and by the cunning way in which the thematic interest is so evenly divided between the two instruments.
from notes by Howard Ferguson and Robert Matthew-Walker © 1997
https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dw.asp?dc=W8290_66014
| 19.8.1981 | Charles Villiers Stanford Sonata for Clarinet and Piano Op. 129 (1911) | Jack Harrison (clarinet) Michael Cole (piano) | ABC Recital Basil Kirke Studio A.B.C. |
[1] Make Mine Music (Perth Youth Concerts Committee) No. 2 1972
[2] The West Australian Wednesday May 10 1972
[3] Sunday Independent May 14 1972