Saturday, 19th September - 7.30 pm. Christ Church, St. Leonards-on-Sea

Cinq Mélodies de Venise Op.58 Fauré

Nocturne No. 1 in E flat minor Fauré

Three Préludes Debussy

Let us Garlands Bring Finzi

- INTERVAL -

Sonata for Oboe and Piano Poulenc

Valses Nobles et Sentimentales Ravel

The House of Life Vaughan-Williams

Marcio da Silva Baritone

Susan Rayner Oboe

Francis Rayner Piano

Marcio da Silva - Baritone. Born in Brazil Marcio began his music studies at the age of 9 with piano lessons and choral singing. As a young boy-soprano he performed as a soloist in Germany, Italy and Brazil, including performances for audiences of over 32,000 people. In 1998 he travelled to the United States, where he studied in Arizona for six months, graduating from the renowned Phoenix Boys Choir. From a young age Marcio also gained extensive experience in opera, beginning as a child soloist at Palacio das Artes in Belo Horizonte, and then subsequently at the Théâtre du Capitol de Toulouse, and the Théâtre des Champs Elysees and the Théâtre du Chatelet in Paris. In 2006 Marcio received his Diplôme d'Études Musicales in voice from the Conservatoire de Toulouse, France. He obtained a Bachelor of Music degree from the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg, Germany, and a Masters degree from the Royal College of Music, specialising in choral and orchestral conducting. As a singer (baritone and countertenor) Marcio has recently performed the roles of Arnalta in Monteverdi's L'Incoronazione di Poppea, Mercurio in Cavalli's La Callisto, Aristone in Cavalli's Xerse, Thésée in Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie, Colas in Mozart's Bastien et Bastienne and La Haine in Lully's Armide. Marcio works extensively as a vocal coach. He has founded his own company, Ensemble OrQuesta, which specialises in Baroque music and runs opera academy programmes for young singers who attend from all over the world, and in recent years, he has acted as stage and music director for a number of professional opera productions which have toured to fringe venues. He also conducts the HPO Singers, the Hastings Philharmonic Choir and the Grange Choral Society. Marcio also sustains a busy schedule as an orchestral conductor. He is principal conductor of Hasting Philharmonic Orchestra, and is regularly invited to conduct orchestras internationally. www.marciodasilva.com

Susan Rayner - Oboe. Susan studied oboe and piano at Chetham’s School of Music and later the oboe with Donald Humphries, gaining an LGSMDp from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. She enjoys a busy musical life performing with local orchestras such as the Sussex Concert Orchestra, Opera South East, various choral societies and chamber music concerts. In recent years she has performed the Bach Oboe and Violin concerto, the Albinoni concerto for two oboes in F major and the Mozart Oboe quartet, among other works. Susan also enjoys teaching both the oboe and piano, and has recently started teaching the oboe at Battle Abbey School. She loves working with children and passing on the love of music, something she is passionate about with her four young children.

Welcome to the opening recital concert of our new HPO season.

Thank you for all your support: for your extraordinary generosity and kindness; for your understanding as we have worked hard to put secure Covid-19 measures in place to meet Government regulations; and for your trust in being here this evening. Thank you in advance for your patience as we take the first steps in live-streaming our performances. This is a new and exciting initiative, but it does present complex technological challenges that we have been working hard to resolve. If this is successful, we hope to be able to reach out on a regular basis to a broader audience - people who are shielding, or who are unable to travel to our concerts. Final thanks must go to the hardworking HPO management team: without them none of this would be possible. We are looking forward to an exciting season, and intend to rise to meet the challenges ahead responsibly, but with determination.

Francis Rayner - Piano. Francis was born in Merthyr Tydfil in 1960, and started piano lessons at the age of six. Three years later, he won first prize in the Under-14 National Piano Competition. He then entered Chetham's School of Music, and studied piano with Fanny Waterman and Ryszard Bakst. Whilst there, he gave many solo recitals and performed a number of concertos, including Beethoven's 3rd with the Hallé Orchestra. While a pupil there he gained the LRAM performer's diploma at the age of sixteen, and entered the Royal Northern College of Music two years later. At College, he continued to perform extensively as a soloist as well as a chamber musician, visiting Prague and the Channel Islands, and graduated in professional performance. In 1982, he won major prizes in the Alessandro Casagrande competition in Terni and in the Claude Debussy competition in Paris. In 1983, he moved to London, where he benefited from the professional advice of Murray Perahia and Charles Rosen, and continued to perform and to teach both in the U.K and abroad, visiting Switzerland, Spain, Sweden and the U.S.A. He has also broadcast on Italian television, French radio and the B.B.C. Since his move to East Sussex in 1996, Francis has performed as soloist in works such as Rachmaninov’s Second Piano concerto and has been associated with musical organizations such as Enfield Choral Society, Opera South East, Glyndebourne Touring Opera, Counterpoint Arts, and Hastings Philharmonic Choir. He has also been associated with the prestigious Hastings International Piano Concerto Competition. In 2017 he became a member of the London Piano Trio.

Cinq Mélodies de Venise Op.58 Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924)

Fauré composed the Cinq Mélodies de Venise Op.58 in 1891 in Venice and Paris. According to Fauré himself, the cycle contains a number of musical themes which recur from song to song. Fauré believed that he had created a new form with this cycle, whereby the return of the themes of the other songs in the final one made the songs into a kind of suite. The cycle is based on poems written by the French poet Paul Verlaine (d.1896) taken from the collections Fêtes galantes and Romances sans paroles (the latter based on his nostalgic recollections of the wife he abandoned and impressionist sketches of his stormy affair with fellow poet, Arthur Rimbault). Verlaine’s poetry was admired and recognized as ground-breaking and served as an inspiration for a

number of composers – Debussy’s Clair de Lune was inspired by another of Verlaine’s poems. Herewith the text of the songs, as translated by Richard Stokes: ‘Mandoline’ (from Fêtes galantes): ‘The gallant serenaders, And their fair listeners, Exchange sweet nothings, Beneath singing boughs. / Tirsis is there, Aminte is there, And tedious Clitandre too, And Damis who for many a cruel maid, Writes many a tender song. / Their short silken doublets, Their long trailing gowns, Their elegance, their joy, And their soft blue shadows, Whirl madly in the rapture, Of a grey and roseate moon, And the mandolin jangles on, In the shivering breeze.’

‘En sourdine’ (from Fêtes galantes): ‘Calm in the twilight, Cast by loft boughs, Let us steep our love, In this deep quiet. / Let us mingle our souls, our hearts, And our enraptured senses, With the hazy languor, Of arbutus and pine. / Half-close your eyes, Fold your arms across your breast, And from your heart now lulled to rest, Banish forever all intent. / Let us both succumb, To the gentle and lulling breeze, That comes to ruffle at your feet, The waves of russet grass. / And when, solemnly, evening, Falls from the black oaks, That voice of our despair, The nightingale shall sing.’

‘Green’ (from Romances sans paroles): ‘Here are flowers, branches, fruit, and fronds, And here too is my heart that beats just for you. Do not tear it with your two white hands, And may the humble gift please your lovely eyes. / I come all covered still with the dew, Frozen to my brow by the morning breeze. Let my fatigue, finding rest at your feet, Dream of dear moments that will soothe it. / On your young breast let me cradle my head, Still ringing with your recent kisses; After love’s sweet tumult grant it peace, And let me sleep a while, since you rest.’

‘À Clymène’ (from Fêtes galantes): ‘Mystic barcarolles, Songs without words, My darling, because your eyes, The colour of the heavens, / Because your voice, strange, Vision that upsets, And troubles the horizon, Of my reason. / Because the wonderful aroma, Of your cygnet-like pallor. And because the distinctness, Of your fragrance. / Ah! Because your entire existence, Like music that pervades all, Nimbuses of former angels, Tones and perfumes. / Has, in wondrous cadences, Attracted into a connection, My subtle heart: Let it be praised! Amen.’

‘C'est l'extase’ (from Romances sans paroles): ‘‘It is languorous rapture, It is amorous fatigue, It is all the tremors of the forest, In the breezes’ embrace, It is, around the grey branches, The choir of tiny voices. / O the delicate, fresh murmuring! The warbling and whispering, It is like the sweet sound, The ruffled grass gives out … You might take it for the muffled sound, Of pebbles in the swirling stream. / This soul which grieves, In this subdued lament, It is ours, is it not? Mine, and yours too, Breathing out our humble hymn, On this warm evening, soft and low.’

Nocturne No. 1 in E flat minor Op. 33 Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924) Gabriel Fauré's thirteen Nocturnes are considered to be the most significant group of works in his oeuvre for solo piano. Composed over a period of forty-six years (between 1875 and 1821), they bear witness to the composer’s remarkable stylistic evolution, and it has been argued that it was in the intimacy of this genre that Fauré succeeded time and again in nothing short of exposing his very soul. His Nocturne No. 1 in E flat minor Op. 33 was composed c.1875 and is considered to be one of the best of the composer's early works. Like ‘Après un rêve’ it is dedicated to his friend and early patron Marguerite Baugnies. This nocturne contains many hallmarks of Fauré's style, including undulating rhythms, syncopation of the accompaniment against the melody and layered textures. It opens with a slow, expressive melody, followed by a more agitated central section (including a second theme and another melody in C major). A gradual diminuendo then ushers back the opening theme, which is followed by a short coda.

Three Préludes Claude Debussy (1862-1918) Debussy’s Préludes consist of 24 pieces for solo piano, divided into two books of 12 preludes each. Each book was written in a matter of months (1909-1910, 1912-1913), at an unusually fast pace for Debussy. There is no proof that Debussy intended the preludes to be performed as a cycle, although the musical language throughout each book is so consistent that it is possible to do so. Performers generally play the preludes in groups of three or four.

Clair de Lune Debussy started to write ‘Clair de Lune’ in 1890 when he was just 28. The piece takes its title from an atmospheric poem by the French poet Paul Verlaine, which depicts the soul as full of music. Birds, it suggests, are inspired to sing ‘au calme clair de lune triste et beau’ (in the still moonlight sad and beautiful). The piece is part of the four-movement work Suite Bergamasque. In translation the words of the poem read: ‘Your soul is a chosen landscape, Where charming masquerades and dancers are promenading, Playing the lute and dancing, and almost, Sad beneath their fantastic disguises. / While singing in a minor key, Of victorious love, and the pleasant life, They seem not to believe in their own happiness, And their song blends with the moonlight, / With the sad and beautiful moonlight, Which sets the birds in the trees dreaming, And makes the fountains sob with ecstasy, The slender water streams among the marble statues’. Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l'air du soir The fourth prelude of Book I, takes both its title and inspiration from the poetry of the highly influential French prose-poet Charles Baudelaire (d.1867). It is an atmospheric piece in A-major with floating melodies. Even the harmonies seem tinged with a dusky hue, giving musical evocation to the twilight setting. The prelude is built around three principal ideas and embodies a sort of ternary design, with a brief middle section in the key of A-flat major. The only true point of contrast to the shadowy swaying mood is a melody in octaves accompanied by a persistent semi-quaver countermelody. This, however, simply returns us to a variant of the opening melodic motif and the prelude’s serene close. In translation the words of the poem read: ‘Now is the time when, vibrating on its stem, each flower exhales in vapour like incense from a censer; Sounds and scents mingle in the evening air; Melancholy waltz and languorous vertigo!’ La Cathédrale engloutie The tenth prelude of Book I was published in 1910. It is a fine example of Debussy's musical impressionism. The piece is based on an ancient Breton myth in which a cathedral, submerged underwater off the coast of the Island of Ys, rises up from the ocean on clear mornings when the water is transparent. The harmonies within the piece act as musical symbolism: sounds can be heard of bells chiming, priests chanting, and the organ playing. To open the piece, Debussy uses rising pianissimo parallel fifths, which evoke distant church bells. The emerging G-major pentatonic scale has an Eastern or perhaps Medieval resonance. As the cathedral rises to the surface, the left hand tracks a wave-like pattern, then, after a section marked Augmentez progressivement, the fortissimo sounding of the grand organ - Sonore sans dureté - marks the highpoint of the piece, before the cathedral sinks back into the water. Pedalling effects are used to alter the tone colour as we hear the sound of the organ from underwater and the fading pianissimo of the bells. These preludes provide an excellent illustration of Debussy’s radical compositional process: his use of motivic rather than thematic development, his exploration of chordal sound, and his use of harmonic parallelism (the parallel movement of two or more lines) to create tonal ambiguity. Debussy’s music was a significant turning point from the Romantic music that had dominated the 19th century to the music of the 20th century. When asked what rule he followed, Debussy scandalised his harmony teachers by answering: ‘Mon plaisir’. With fellow composer Maurice Ravel, Debussy is regarded as a leader of French impressionist music. It took some time for Impressionist music to be appreciated, but critics and audiences eventually responded favourably to this experiment in harmonic freedom.

Let us Garlands Bring Gerald Finzi (1901-1956)

Let us Garlands Bring was composed by Finzi between 1929 and 1942 and was published as his Op. 18. It became one of his best known works. The thirteen-year long gestation period is typical of the composer, who worked on many compositions over the same period. He would often put a piece aside and return to it repeatedly over time for editing and polishing.

The cycle consists of five settings of songs from plays by William Shakespeare. It was premiered in London at a National Gallery lunchtime concert on the 70th birthday of Vaughan Williams, and the cycle is dedicated to him.

The five songs are: ‘Come away, come away, death’ from Twelfth Night, Act II, Scene 4 – Lugubre (B minor). The tempo and initial mood that this song creates is that of a powerful lament, and the opening line is certainly a melancholy evocation. Finzi’s attention to salient words is exemplary - the falling seventh to ‘death’, and the tantalizingly protracted melisma on ‘weep’ are two fine examples. There is also a mournful intensity in Finzi’s choice deployment of ‘jarring’ dissonance, which is skilfully integrated with melodious, yet at times angular vocal lines. Yet, in the play the song is sung by the Fool who conveys his message with irony, and so, although the song is about unrequited love, the tone does not remain purely soulful. Following the proclamation, ‘I am slain by a fair cruel maid,’ the character of the song lightens to convey the strength and innocence of the young man’s love.

‘Who is Silvia?’ from the Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act IV, Scene 2 – Allegro (F major). This is a charming ditty in ternary form. It characterises Silvia who is a wise, fair, and innocent woman admired by her suitors, and asks the question whether or not Silvia is as kind as she is fair, because only kindness can make her truly beautiful. For the first three lines of each verse Finzi opts for transparent simplicity in his use of periodic (two-bar) phrases, but in the last two lines (which are effectively fused) this regularity is deftly subverted. The song has a lightly dancing lilt and is faster in pace. The final line of the song provides the title for the song cycle, ‘To her let us garlands bring.’

‘Fear no more the heat o' the sun’ from Cymbeline, Act IV, Scene 2 – Grave (B-flat major). This is a gentle song in compound time. It is a meditation on the passing of time, on growing old, and on the dissipation of life’s fears in death. The song, a prime example of sophisticated, controlled and sustained vocal writing, using the simplest of rhythmic and harmonic means, has a pathos (notably in the final, ethereal stanza) which rivals the best of Finzi’s Hardy songs. The song has a gentle sarabande-like motion until a striking change takes place in the final verse. Here the first four lines form a kind of recitative, with even note values over a static, pulseless chord. At the end, on the lines: ‘Quiet consummation have; and renowned be thy grave,’ the voice gently takes up the rocking rhythm of the first section, but the piano accompaniment becomes almost static .

‘O mistress mine’ from Twelfth Night, Act II, Scene 3 - Allegretto amabile (E-flat major). The mood of this song is light and carefree; Finzi himself referred to it as ‘troubadourish’. It is a call to seize the day – to live and find happiness in the present and to take advantage of one´s youth, rather than losing out to life’s uncertainties. It has a distinctive ‘thrummed’ guitar-like accompaniment and includes a two-part quasi-Baroque dialogue in the upper parts.

‘It was a lover and his lass’ from As You Like It, Act V, Scene 3 - Allegretto con moto (E major). One of Shakespeare’s best-known and lightest verses is a glorious celebration of young love in springtime, presenting an idealised vision of the rural landscape as a place for young lovers to frolic and love. In internally rhyming ‘spring-time’ with ‘ring-time’, the verses draw together wooing and the promise of new life: ‘ring-time’ denoting both the exchange of rings for betrothals and the ringing of wedding bells (echoed in the ‘hey ding a ding a ding’ refrain). The song itself is characterized by a syncopated accompaniment pattern (favoured by Finzi), which lends the song an invigorating sense of well-being. Only briefly does a grey cloud appear in the third verse, when, for a moment only, there is a sense of regret (‘How that life was but a flower in springtime’). But this is soon dispelled by the jubilation of the last verse, complete with ecstatic coda.

— 20 MINUTE INTERVAL —

Sonata for oboe and piano Francis Poulenc (1899-1963)

This sonata for oboe and piano was completed in 1962. During the last years of his life, Poulenc worked on a series of sonatas - he planned to write one for each wind instrument. He lived to complete only three, the others being for flute and for clarinet. All are dedicated to the memory of friends or fellow musicians, and this oboe sonata is inscribed 'à la mémoire de Serge Prokofieff'. Poulenc wrote the three movements of the sonata n the order slow-fast-slow, as opposed to the fast-slow-fast of the traditional sonata. The movements are: Élégie (Paisiblement, Sans Presser); Scherzo (Très animé); Déploration (Très calme).

The opening Élégie, marked ‘Paisiblement’, begins with the oboe’s high D, the first note of an introductory four-note phrase. What follows is familiar Poulenc: a steady pulsing bass line with which the piano supports the oboe’s lament in G, a line informed throughout by the semi-quaver pattern that begins it. Then the piano initiates a more second lyrical theme in E-flat major, soon adopted by the oboe. A third theme featuring a double-dotted rhythmic motif builds to the climax of the movement, before the peaceful recapitulation of previous motifs and rhythmic patterns and a gentle end.

The central Scherzo, based on B-flat, is an animated 6/8 movement in which angular rhythms are balanced with smoother motifs, and an arpeggio is altered rhythmically to rock up and down. A slower and more lyrical middle section – seemingly based on one of the themes from the finale of Prokofiev's flute sonata - rises to a climax in the piano part, gradually receding to a dominant close before the toccata-like Scherzo resumes, racing to an abrupt ending.

The final Déploration, is pervaded by a sense of woeful calm - it muses on A-flat minor with the oboe singing out in a style that echoes Poulenc’s religious music, above the piano’s quaver pulse, marked ‘monotone’. There are several shifts in tonality before the final page seals the hauntingly sombre mood of the movement. It is somehow fitting that the valedictory final page was to be the last music that Poulenc wrote.

Valses Nobles et Sentimentales Maurice Ravel (1875-1937)

Valses Nobles et Sentimentales is a suite of eight waltzes. Ravel composed the piano version in 1911 (and an orchestral version in 1912). The title was chosen in homage to Franz Schubert, who had released two similarly named collections of waltzes in 1823, although there is little similarity between the works. While Schubert’s waltzes were independent, separated pieces, Ravel’s waltzes flow together in an uninterrupted dreamscape. Ravel’s suite was first performed on May 8, 1911, by Louis Aubert, to whom the work was dedicated, at a performance where the composers’ names were withheld. The idea behind this initiative was to promote adventurous works, perhaps preventing pre-judgement by audience members. Even so, the anonymous

work generated ‘a disturbing chorus of boos and cat calls’, since many were unnerved by the harsh harmonic palette that Ravel used. Some audience members ascribed the suite to Satie, or even Kodály.

Some did respond positively. The poet and musician, Tristan Klingsor remarked: ‘[we] were immediately seduced by the music, and yet he had taken a lot of risks, at least for the period…. he had taken the use of unresolved dissonances to its furthest point. What we now find very piquant was extremely daring at the time. The first bars of the Valses seemed quite extraordinary. Then, since there was nothing there that was not well thought-out, the ear quickly grew to enjoy these pseudo ‘wrong notes’, and a glance at the score revealed that they had a proper harmonic justification’.

The piano edition was published with a quotation from a novel by Henri de Regnier about a young man’s amorous adventures: ‘…le plaisir délicieux et toujours nouveau d'une occupation inutile’ (the delicious and forever-new pleasure of a useless occupation). In coaching the work, Ravel insisted on the cross rhythms being brought out. This suggests, as often with Ravel, that there is a tension between strict form and uncontrolled emotion. Harmonically, Ravel’s distinctive use of dissonance and his elegant sensuality pervades throughout. The waltzes are marked: Modéré – très franc / Assez lent – avec une expression intense / Modéré / Assez animé / Presque lent – dans un sentiment intime / Vif / Moins vif / Épilogue: lent

The House of Life Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958)

Ralph Vaughan Williams composed The House of Life in 1904 when he was 32. It was a series of songs written to sonnets penned by the Pre-Raphaelite poet and painter, Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Lyrics: The history of Rossetti’s House of Life is intense and fascinating. It seems likely that Rosetti wrote it as a meditation on and exaltation of his marriage to Elizabeth Siddal – a woman who inspired many Pre-Raphaelite painters besides Rossetti. But Rossetti and Siddal’s affection was not ideal. Siddal came from a lower-class family and, since Rossetti’s family disapproved,

years passed before they married. Siddal, predisposed to depression, was badly affected. Despite contentment in early marriage, Rossetti’s affections waned, and he fell in love with his friend’s wife. A still birth and a second pregnancy left Siddal with worsening depression and addiction to laudanum, and Rossetti blamed himself when she died from an overdose. His guilt led him to bury his poetry with the remains of his wife. It was not until 1870 that House of Life was exhumed and published. Vaughan Williams chose six sonnets from over a hundred that make up Rossetti’s complete cycle. He seems to have selected sonnets that offer insights into a range of different images and aspects of love. Rosetti had two very different approaches his writing - one tending toward the objectification and generalization of emotion, the other toward presenting it more immediately, more subjectively, offering sometimes intimate detail about his time and place, his feelings and his loved one. For Vaughan Williams as a composer this created ideal contrasts within the verses of a sonnet, and divergencies or tensions in the words, that he could explore musically. ‘Lovesight’ - Andante con moto ma non troppo (A major) Muses on the abstract vision of love held close in the mind’s eye, in spiritual purity, and in the intimacy of the night, and contemplates the dreaded despair brought by Death. ‘Silent Noon’ - Largo sostenuto (E-flat major) Remembers the joy of the gentle encounter of two souls entwined within the beauty of nature, conjoining in silent understanding of love. ‘Love’s Minstrels’ - Lento (D major) Recognises the tension between different kinds of love, embodied here as minstrels. ‘Heart’s Haven’ - Lento ma con moto (E major) These words have such poignancy, most especially if the biographical context is understood. In the first stanza ‘she’ is portrayed as like a child, ‘Cowering beneath dark wings that love must chase, - With still tears showering and averted face, Inexplicably fill'd with faint alarms’. But, there is a duality of vulnerability, for in the second half of the stanza, the words convey that he is in fact the one who feels weak and in need of assistance in battling against the forces that assail him: ‘And oft from mine own spirit's hurtling harms I crave the refuge of her deep embrace,— Against all ills the fortified strong place And sweet reserve of sovereign counter-charms’. Death-in-Love’ - Allegro maestoso (C major) It is tempting to view the words of this song as full of despair; after all the ‘veiled woman’ of the final stanza, gives voice to the final lines: ‘Behold, there is no breath: I and this Love are one, and I am Death’. Yet, Rossetti, like many of his era, was seeking to retrace the journey made by Dante, who, following the vicissitudes of passion mediated by the intellect, was led to a new understanding of love. Thus the title of the song – Death-in-Love – reflects Dante’s rapture after being greeted by Beatrice at the end of Vita Nuova, when he ‘envisions a new perception born of grieving love’. ‘Love’s Last Gift’ - Andante con moto (F major) The sonnet compares love to elements of nature and reflects on what is left when love departs. The words suggest that Love's last gift is ‘this laurel’ – the laurel is the sonnet, or in this case the song - love has left him with just the words to express his emotions. The poet then juxtaposes two contrasts. Unlike the leaves, fruits and flowers of the first stanza: ‘this laurel dreads no winter days.’ And in the final line includes a characteristic divergence: ‘Take my last gift; thy heart hath sung my praise’. . ..continued

Rossetti’s Beata Beatrix

www.hastingsphilharmonic.com

Musical analysis Vaughan Williams used a subtle and complex range of elements in the songs to create an audible sense of overall unity. These include: motivic recollection and allusion (motifs echoed between songs); recurring recitative-like passages (declamatory passages with little or no rhythmic support); cross references between a pitch/note or tonal areas (with each song emphasizing in a variety of ways the pitch that will become the tonal centre of the next song); and balanced and complementary internal proportions to the songs. Additional uniformities can also be noted: all the songs include an introduction and a postlude; there tends to be a notable increase in instability - harmonic, tonal, metrical, and rhythmic - within each individual song as it progresses; and most attain their melodic, and emotional, climax in the final tercet. Thus, the coherent musical treatment of each of the sonnets produces a powerful sense of unity across the cycle. Like its contemporary, Songs of Travel, the cycle marks an important step forward in the history of English art song. Vaughan Williams explores the concept of the sublime (allowing our emotions to overwhelm our rationality), through a unique fusion of poetry and music that is wonderfully tuneful and meditative, and the cycle has an intense impact on the listener. Musicologists commend Vaughan Williams for lifting English art song out of the sentimentality of the parlour, enabling it to stand proudly alongside the 100-year tradition of excellence set by German-speaking composers.

Other forthcoming concerts:

HPO Singers & Ensemble OrQuesta Baroque 5th December 7pm - Christ Church (St Leonards on Sea) Messiah Handel

Hastings Philharmonic Orchestra 15th January 7:30pm - St Mary in the Castle (Hastings) Leonore Overture No. 3 Beethoven | Piano Concerto No. 1 Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 6 (Pastoral) Beethoven