One of my favorite symphonies, the Symphony No. 5 by Ralph Vaughan Williams, makes today’s ”Composers Datebook.” As you’ll read (or hear) at the link below, the work was first performed on this date, at a time of great anxiety, in 1943. Vaughan Williams was 75-years-old.
In contrast to many wartime symphonies, there is no tub-thumping patriotism or gestures of defiance in RVW’s 5th. Instead, the composer takes the long view, sharing a larger vision of hope and serenity. The work surely resonated with listeners who lived through the Blitz, and even in 1943 continued to endure nightly air raids. The concert took place at Royal Albert Hall, because German bombings had gutted Queen’s Hall, the traditional venue of the summertime Proms. Also, it was held during the day, so that people could get back to their homes before London could be menaced after dark.
Reflected in the work is not only the soul of a nation, assimilating England’s proud sacred and secular musical traditions; it also exudes a unshakeable belief in our shared humanity. Contrast that with the anxiety, turbulence, and violence of the Symphony 4, completed in 1935, a time when the storm clouds were gathering – although the composer persistently denied any external influences. He always stood by his assertion that there was nothing at all programmatic about the work, and that he wrote what he wrote because he was compelled to write it. It was a wholly abstract piece of music.
The 5th symphony, on the other hand, shares themes with his long-gestating opera, “The Pilgrim’s Progress,” after John Bunyan’s popular Christian allegory; but again, there is no definitive extra-musical program. The composer himself stepped in for an indisposed Henry Wood to conduct the symphony’s premiere.
The work was dedicated to Jean Sibelius. Sibelius confided in a letter to Swedish composer Kurt Atterberg (who, in turn, was in touch with Vaughan Williams champion Adrian Boult), “This Symphony is a marvelous work… the dedication made me feel proud and grateful… I wonder if Dr. Williams has any idea of the pleasure he has given me?”
The music is transcendent in its luminosity. Why Vaughan Williams’ symphonies are not performed more often in the U.S. is a mystery. It’s probably just that people, even conductors, don’t really know the music. If it’s not “The Lark Ascending” or the “Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis,” they don’t even give it a second – or even a first – thought.
Which is a real shame, because the world can certainly use more reminders of the kind of positivity and reassurance expressed in the Symphony No. 5.
Listen to ”Composers Datebook” at the link.
https://www.yourclassical.org/episode/2026/06/24/composers-dateboo-ralph-vaughan-williams
Adrian Boult conducts the symphony here:
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Vaughan Williams’ Vision of Hope and Shared Humanity
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A Dream to Some… A Nightmare to Others!
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Even though the solstice was on Sunday, the longest day, a lot of Europeans celebrate the height of the season tonight, St. John’s Eve. For the record, that’s when the demon Chernobog is supposed to emerge from Bald Mountain – regardless of what Disney may think. (The narrator of “Fantasia,” Deems Taylor, says it’s supposed to be Walpurgis Night, April 30, the eve of May Day.)
In England, June 23 is Midsummer’s Eve, the setting of Shakespeare’s most famous comedy. I have a soft spot for the 1935 film version of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” overseen by Viennese impresario Max Reinhardt and featuring a real hodgepodge of actors from the Warner Bros. stable, including crooner (and later tough guy) Dick Powell as Lysander, Olivia de Havilland as Hermia, James Cagney as Bottom, and yes, 14-year-old Mickey Rooney as Puck.
But it’s the technical achievement that really puts it over. The opulent film (spun off from an extravagant Hollywood Bowl production) sports an effervescent score by Erich Wolfgang Korngold, woven together with dewy gossamer from the compositions of Felix Mendelssohn, enthralling production design and art direction by Anton Grot, with an especially delightful sequence of fairies ascending a woodland mist encircling a tree, and poetic choreography by Branislava Nijinska. There’s so much poetry in this movie it even sustains the ridiculous antlered crown worn by magnificent Victor Jury (soon to play John Wilkerson, the unsavory overseer in “Gone with the Wind”), putting his superior elocution to impressive use as Oberon.
“A Midsummer Night’s Dream” has been filmed many times, of course. (I’m still trying to forget a middle-aged Stanley Tucci as Puck, riding a turtle, from the frustrating 1999 version, also starring Michelle Pfeiffer and Kevin Kline.)
One I find especially unpleasant sports perhaps the most impressive pedigree of them all – a 1968 version that stars, among others, Judy Dench, Helen Mirren, Diana Rigg, David Warner, and Ian Holm, in green body paint, as perhaps the creepiest Puck in history. Also, for “Star Wars” aficionados, one-time Annakin Skywalker (before George Lucas scrubbed him out) Sebastian Shaw as Peter Quince. To think, the film is directed by theatrical deity Peter Hall! With such an assemblage of talent, how could it miss?
Well, it *was* 1968, and there were certainly more attractive, more lucid eras. As I recall, the film is uningratiating – ugly and claustrophobic, with hand-held cameras and “Kung Fu Theater” style editing, little concern for the beauty of the language, and perhaps Holm’s only bad performance (with that damn tongue).*
I disliked it so intensely, in fact, that it’s one of those instances in which I feel surely it couldn’t be as bad as I remember. This is the most dangerous kind of bad, because there’s a good chance I will wander back to it, lured beyond my will by curiosity and fey enchantment.
I must say, at least the print at the link is in the best resolution I have ever seen. I’m used to encountering it in transfers from grainy VHS. Here it is. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!
Then check out the 1935 version, for the production, especially. It really is like a dream. Perhaps it won’t hit you the same way it does me, but I find it to be pure enchantment. Here’s a taste.
It’s unfortunate I couldn’t find a crisper transfer.
Americans might question why Midsummer would fall at the beginning of the season. Traditionally, in much of Europe, summer began on May Day. Under the Julian calendar, the calendar employed the Roman Empire that traveled to Anglo-Saxon England, summer began on May 9. So Midsummer is June 24.
Yeah, they got it wrong, but when in Rome…
Happy Midsummer Night!
———-*EDIT: Okay, maybe I went too far in my savaging of the 1968 version with “little concern for the beauty of the language.” This is one cleanly-articulated text. I’ve been noticing of late how nobody these days enunciates. So the readings were actually quite refreshing. The problems (the rapid-fire delivery and disruptive editing) don’t really kick in until the fairies show up. Holm must have had a thermos of coffee and a kilo of cocaine every morning on the way to the shoot. It’s still an ugly movie, but if you just listen to the words, it’s actually quite good. And of course, you can’t dismiss it out hand with that cast!
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Mozart’s Loss Is Our Guînes
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The Mozart-related rediscoveries continue!
Last week, a 248-year-old notebook housed at France’s National Library was identified conclusively as having belonged to Mozart, when he was 22. The notebook, containing material set down between May and July 1778, was kept by the composer while he was employed as a music tutor in Paris for Marie-Louise-Philippine de Bonnières de Guînes. Her father, the Duke de Guînes, a highly-regarded flutist, commissioned Mozart’s Concerto for Flute and Harp, which you can’t help but encounter weekly if you ever listen to classical radio.
The notebook contains daily exercises for Mozart’s harp-playing protegée and seven original works for flute and harp, written under Mozart’s supervision. Mozart being Mozart, it appears he penned a substantial portion of the music himself. Presumably, these were designed to be played by Guînes and her father. The pieces were performed in public for the first time only yesterday at the library.
With the outbreak of the French Revolution, the Duke, a confidant of Marie-Antoinette, fled the country for England. Apparently, he stiffed Mozart for his work. In absentia, he authorized a butler to pay the composer half of what he was owed. Offended, Mozart refused to take it. Eat the rich!
As is so often the case, the rediscovery occurred when sorting through a pile of documents already stored at the library. A few years ago, somebody knocked over a stack at yet another library and discovered Stravinsky’s “Funeral Song,” a 12-minute orchestral piece composed in memory of his teacher, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. It’s very important for librarians to catalogue their holdings well!
At any rate, the Mozart rediscovery is deemed to be a major one, a significant window into the mind, world, and creative and pedagogical processes of the 22 year-old master.
You’ll recall just the other week, a treasure trove of Salieri’s music was rediscovered. This seems then like an especially fortuitous summer for the Bard Music Festival to be focusing on “Mozart and His World” (to be held at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, NY, August 7-16).
The thesis doesn’t mean it’s all Mozart. There will be works by his influences, his contemporaries and associates, and those he himself influenced and inspired; but as always at Bard, the real magic resides in the manner of the music’s presentation – the context, the juxtaposition of pieces, the pre-concert talks, and the scholarly panels. These are things you won’t find anywhere else.
The Bard Music Festival is part of the college’s larger celebration of the arts, Bard SummerScape (June 25-August 16), which encompasses opera, theater, dance, and cabaret at the campus’ Spiegeltent. If Mozart doesn’t really float your boat, there will be a fully-staged production of Richard Strauss’ opera “Die ägyptische Helena” (“The Egyptian Helen,” July 24-August 2). When’s the last time you heard that?
If I’m a little behind on sharing news of the discovery of the Mozart notebook, I take solace in the fact that the New York Times is only just getting around to reporting on it today as well! Read more about it at the link.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/22/arts/music/mozart-music-flute-harp.html?unlocked_article_code=1.sFA.YSkW.l46NoRKsVayu&smid=url-share
For tickets and information about Bard SummerScape, the Bard Music Festival, and “Mozart and His World,” visit https://fishercenter.bard.edu/.
Concerto for Flute and Harp in C major, K. 299
Rediscovered pieces for flute and harp!
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Liquid Brunch for Dad
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It’s the first day of summer! Only three more months until autumn. Happy Father’s Day!
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“Day of the Dad” on “The Lost Chord”
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It is the eve of Father’s Day. Both my folks are gone, and I had a rather complex relationship with my biological father, who died of cancer in 2018. Still, toward the end, I visited him a lot, and we kind of became friends. At least I developed a better, or more rounded, understanding of him, though we still had a few adventures that reminded me of why it was probably a good thing that my mother herded us out of the nest when she did.
My old man could be an amusing personality if he were a work of fiction, or if he could be taken in at a safe remove. Also, in his way, he had a kind heart. His circle included a remarkable number of outsiders and societal cast-offs, and he managed to take care of many of them, after his fashion. But he was not one to be bound by rules or, more strictly speaking, the law. At best, he could be considered a bit of a scapegrace; at worst, he was an ardent hellraiser, especially in his prime.
But spending time with him later in life, it was fascinating to discover that, whether he knew it or not, he did live by a kind of code. Also, given his nature, I learned that a lot of what the rest of us had resented all these years was probably not entirely his fault. He just wasn’t cut out to raise a family. You can’t really fault a striped hyena for not being able to fly.
I could tell you stories about my dad that would make you howl with laughter or make your blood curdle, but instead I’ll just tie this in with my program today on “The Lost Chord,” which will consist of two pieces by American composers, written in loving memory of their fathers – with perhaps just a transitional bit of advice to get to know your parents, for better or worse, while there’s still time.
In 1999, composer Eric Ewazen was commissioned by an oboist-friend, Linda Strommen, who had recently lost her father, to write a new work as a kind of memorial tribute. Having recently experienced the death of his own father, the composer embarked on the project with a special sense of poignancy. He recollected that the day his father passed – Christmas Day, 1997 – an essay had appeared in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, by Richard Feagler. It consisted of funny, heartfelt stories of relatives and parents, long since departed. Near the end of the essay, titled “Christmas Past Comes Alive at Aunt Ida’s,” Feagler describes those beloved souls, “moving, though they can’t feel the current, down a river of time.”
Ewazen borrowed this image for the title of his concerto, “Down a River of Time,” a contemplation of that inexorable, rushing river – the first movement influenced by its ebbs and flows, hopes and dreams; the second attempting to convey emotions felt during times of loss, sorrow, resignation, tenderness, and peace in remembrance of happier, distant times. In the final movement, happier memories prevail, and feelings of strength and determination dominate.
Ewazen studied at, among other places, the Eastman School of Music. Howard Hanson had been director there for some 40 years. Along with the opera “Merry Mount,” Hanson came to regard his Symphony No. 4 as a personal favorite, a purely orchestral requiem, dedicated to the memory of his father. It falls into four movements, each bearing a Latin subtitle – “Kyrie,” “Requiescat,” “Dies Irae,” and “Lux Aeterna.” The work was given its first performance in 1943, with the composer conducting the Boston Symphony. It was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1944.
It sure as hell beats another necktie. Spare a thought for the Old Man, and then join me for “Day of the Dad,” on “The Lost Chord,” now in syndication on KWAX Classical Oregon!
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Clip and save the start times for all three of my recorded shows:
PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday at 8:00 PM EDT/5:00 PM PDT
SWEETNESS AND LIGHT, the light music program – Saturday at 11:00 AM EDT/8:00 AM PDT
THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday at 7:00 PM EDT/4:00 PM PDT
Stream them, wherever you are, at the link!
https://kwax.uoregon.edu
——-PHOTO: Father knows beast
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