Records
Folk music
Peter Phillips
Stainer's Crucifixion of 1887 is an un- accountable relic. Although a very average Production of high Victorian thought, re- plete with such unfashionable items as five hymns and a rhapsodic religious text, it has retained the affection of present-day choirs and choral societies, when countless hun- dreds of other such pieces have definitively vanished. There is no exact equivalent of this kind of survival in other art forms: the architecture of the period, like St Paul's Knightsbridge, is rather impressive, while the Pre-Raphaelities were anti-establish- ment and by and large much more daring than Stainer. Perhaps one of Lord Leigh- ton's sentimentalised animals would fit the bill. Even Stainer himself described his compositions as 'rubbish' and wished they had not been published. Yet the piece is still widely performed, especially in St FMarylebone Parish Church every Good . ndaY, and now there is a new record- ing of it from Richard Hickox, with John Scott(organ), Robert Tear, Benjamin Luxon and the Westminster Singers (EMI 27 0410 1). To anyone who instinctively believes that British music must have more to it than the world at large is prepared to acknowledge, the second half of the 19th century is certainly an embarrassment. It is made worse by the realisation that this kind of writing was considered by society at the time to be all that a composer needed to strive for. It seems that Stainer, after the event, came to appreciate that this was a mistake, which must have been a cruel insight. Most of his contemporaries never saw that far. Today we deride the emotion- al atmosphere that could support such work and laugh at its naiveties — which does not help to explain why this disc is now to hand. My belief is that this cantata has gone half circle and become folk music, for which it has all the attributes. Despite the lofty expectations of it at the time of its composition, it is quite devoid of any pretension. Indeed the musical language is so direct in expression that it may be painful to those aesthetes who like to escape awhile into a world of abstract counterpoint, and, despite the sliding chro- maticisms, the idiom is very simple. It is, unbelievably, coeval with Strauss's Don Juan. In addition there are some straight- forward tunes to catch hold of, and there is no subtlety whatever in the scoring. The stipulated accompaniment is an organ, but I have no doubt that any keyboard instru- ment, from a piano to a harmonium (always excepting a harpischord), would do the job very tolerably and presumably often did in the past. This, incidentally, is one of the great rules of folk music: it must be performable by any combination of people anywhere without losing its spirit. Folk music is the perfect answer for those who have had a surfeit of authenticity.
The defeat of the Shops Bill has raised again the question of just how many people in the country are at some level religious. It seems to me equally incredible that there can be a majority vote against Sunday trading and that Stainer's Crucifixion can still be widely known; but perhaps the two things are aspects of the same phe- nomenon. This would strengthen the folk music theory and point to another twist in the story, namely that the music was originally intended for High Church con- sumption and has since established a much more general audience. For myself the lack of any strong intellectual challenge in writing which nonetheless makes very per- sistent emotional demands, does not add up to an ideal formula, though there are many who would disagree with that. We cannot know what Stainer, who was Pro- fessor of Music at Oxford University and a pioneer in the study of mediaeval music, would think of it all now, though he would certainly have been delighted by the sing- ing of the chorus on this release, having spent a large part of his career trying to raise the standard in the choir of St Paul's Cathedral at a crucial time. To Stainer more than to anyone the present strength of English singing may be attributed. Robert Tear and Benjamin Luxon both have quite old-fashioned voices in timbre, which is fitting and agreeable, and in tuning, which is not.
seventh day he got up late and washed the car.' From the opposite end of the musical spectrum comes a new recording of Mozart's 40th symphony, coupled with Beethoven's First (Philips 416 329). These are played by the Orchestra of the 18th Century under Frans Briiggen on period instruments, and the ensemble sounds quite different from Christopher Hog- wood's Academy of Ancient Music, who have also recorded the Mozart as part of their complete set of Mozart's symphonies. I suppose there is plenty of room for argument as to which exactly were the instruments of any given period in the past, though this is not an issue that is much discussed by pro-authenticity press re- leases. The end result is that the Briiggen version presents a sound closer to that of a modern orchestra, with a smoother, less idiosyncratic texture. The most familiar detail is the way the timpani explode in that characteristically dry way they have. Many people have come to appreciate the lightness and energy which Hogwood's pioneering orchestra presented in their recordings: I hope there will not be a trend away from that again just yet.
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