Something Good Began at Cambridge

New Zealand Listener, Volume 14, Issue 347, 15 February 1946, Page 6

Something Good Began at Cambridge

F you approach Cambridge from the north in daytime, as most of the students did who went to the recent Summer School for Music, you pass through some very lovely country; but perhaps you might be in a mood to take more notice of the ugliness there ts along the road-the ridiculous modern bungalow, or the drab farm cottage, the grubby railway township that has the ugliest approach and main thoroughfare you have ever seen, like an untidy backyard; or the mutilated pine-trees, the rusty bath-tub discarded in the housepaddock, the ugly advertising signs, symbols everywhere that would make you think the people here prefer ugliness, Of course, you don’t have to see it that way. But if you do, then perhaps it can happen that you ask yourself; What has Mozart’s music to. do with all this? Who wants Beethoven that wants these things? Does William Walton matter here? What use for Brahms in these parts? Or supposing the ugliness of the scene can easily be reconciled with some active search for other beauty, where are the signs of the exhilaration that would have to go with it? Where is evidence of the liveliness of mind and spirit that would make people reach out for artistic experience? And if you were silly enough to go on in that vein for long, you would soon be very depressed, if the thing mattered to you at all. I only thought of this possibility after the Summer School for Music had broken up and I was being driven away by car. And it was because of the things I had seen and heard during the last three days of the school that I was able to see how absurd that attitude would be-though it is not unknown. Confusion of Riches But before I can go on and say what those things were, I must try to convey some impression of the extraordinary confusion most of us must experience, looking back at the week’s work immediately afterwards, and of the things that produced that confusion-the exhilaration and phenomenal energy, shared without exception by everyone who was there, and the constant excitement of meeting new music and new people with common interests. These things, in common with the informality and good humour that persisted all the time, made the cyclostyled programme of activities obsolete within 24 hours as a record of the week’s work, The School was to have been officially opened by A. F. B. Broadhurst (founder and headmaster of St. Peter’s School) on the evening of the first Saturday, when everyone began to arrive. But Mr. Broadhurst was walking up from the swimming baths not long after the first batch had arrived, wondering what he would say to open the School, when he discovered a girl at one of the pianos already. During the week it was not easy to find a piano for practising at 7.0 a.m., though there are 14 in the school. And on the last morning, when everyone was to leave straight after breakfast (the School had actually broken up the night

— before), someone was up before breakfast, snatching a last half-hour at one of the pianos. In between was continual exertion at music in one form or another-the choir doing two hours’ practice every morning under its conductor, Stanley Jackson (Director of ‘Music at St. Peter’s School), and the orchestra doing its two hours under three different»conductors: Owen Jensen (Director of the ‘Summer School), A. Ramsay Howie (Music Specialist at Seddon Memorial Technical College, Auckland), and Douglas © Lilburn (Composer-in-residence at the School, who wrote an overture for the occasion). Then there was the series: of lectures on contemporary composers, which began at 9.0 a.m., and the afternoon series on broadcasting and music in New Zealand. These kept the non-performing section of students busy and interested, and a good many of the performers took active part in-them too. In the evenings were organ recitals and lectures (in the first half of the week) ‘and as time went on more music prepared at the school was available to make up evening concerts. So that the last two evenings were devoted to full-length recitals of chamber music, choral singing and orchestral music, which had all been pre- . pared at the School. That was how it was organised in advance. In the end so much music was} heard and played, what with everyone snatching at every minute and refusing to waste time in relaxing (especially the country people), that no one could really pretend to sort it out and say in precise terms what was achieved; and the best comment on this aspect is contained in the funny story that circulated through the whole School the day after the one free afternoon, when a party had been taken to see the Karapiro Hydro-electric Station. The story went-and eventually it was told to the original butt of the joke -that two of the older women, members of the Listening Group, who: had been hearing a good deal of new music, were talking over the day’s exertions: "How are you feeling after to-day?" said the one. "Not so tired to-night," said the other. "But Karapiro took a bit of standing up to, don’t you think?" said the former. "Karapiro?" said the latter, "Which piece was that?" — oe The popularity of the story, which you were likely to have told you by three or four people in turn, was an indication of how it hit the mark. And the speed with which it ran through the whole place was an indication of the unanimous good humour of the people who were there. Who and Whence Who came to the school, and where did they come from? Teachers accounted for nearly a third; there were 35 altogether-13 music teachers and 22 ordinary teachers. "Domestic duties" accounted for another 26, and then there were 16 students; business and professional, 9; clerks, secretaries, etc., 9; shop assistants, 5; farmers and land-girls, 4; two carpenters, two retired, (continued on next page)

(continued from previous page) and one each of the following: clergyman, church organist, compositor, naval air-pilot, Karitane nurse and dress-de-signer. And these are the places they came from: Auckland, 64; Hamilton, 13; Wellington, 10; Cambridge, 9; North Auckland, 6; Gisborne, 5; and others from Thames, Hawke’s Bay, Palmerston North, Tirau, Hawera, Opotiki, Matamata, Te Awamutu and such places. The Adult Education Centre, Auckland, was represented by its Director, P. Martin Smith, and its registrar, Mervyn Lusty (whose work on the detailed organising side was that unspectacular but heroic kind of work that gets barely enough gratitude and seldom adequate praise). So there were people from the City, people from provincial towns, and people from the smallest townships, all with their varying opportunities for musical experience at home. Some in the discussion group knew a good deal about Britten and Walton and Shostakovich before the lectures on them even began. Others from the country only knew the names from radio programmes which they usually couldn’t hear because someone else always wanted the radio to listen to serials. All these came to St. Peter’s School, to living conditions that were luxurious for most. It meant sleeping in dormitories for all but a few, but the freedom from housework, the beautiful grounds, the swimming-pool and tenniscourts made life easy and pleasant. Fourteen pianos were enough at most times of the day, and the special facilities for music at St. Peter’s (including specially-built practice rooms), a hall with two grand pianos, and the library (which was supplemented for the week by a special collection of music books sent by the Country Library Service)all these things made it possible for 120 people with the most diverse aims to

spend all their time as they would have wished-and time was the only shortage. The more important lectures were over before I arrived, and time had been left free on the last three days for music. There was a course on contemporary musicians, another on music in schools and one on Broadcasting and Music. One which I did not hear, but which had left a great impression, was given by Douglas Lilburn on "The Composer in New Zealand." The lectures on composers were illustrated. with music, of course-recordings in most cases, but in the case of Benjamin Britten with extracts from the opera Peter Grimes, which were prepared at the School. The Orchestra had Spirit The orchestra held about 25 players, which included one flute, one clarinet, one oboe, ‘and Mr. Jackson’s double-bass. It included some players from the country whose instruments had been silent for years, and others who have been semi-professional musicians in the cities for just as long. In the centre, like Bach in the centre of his "web of sound," sat Mr. Broadhurst as a viola player, showing immense and obvious enjoyment of .that humbler status. The orchestra, with all its initial limitations, had to come up to the mark for three conductors each day, who still came fresh to the task when the players were tiring. But by the end of the week you could hear» their enthusiasm and spirit in the music they played. Rough edges were as Slehtitul'ad they were inevitable, but the experience of

hearing fully alert players working without one moment of slackness made up for all that. A Mozart two-piano con-*, cetto which employed the flute and clarinet, Mr. Lilburn’s "Cambridge Overture" (for strings) and a "Serenade to Mr. Broadhurst" composed at the School by three different contributors, were the orchestra’s main achievements. Some of the rehearsals were done in the presence of the discussion group, with Owen Jensen making the players the victims of his irrepressible humour. Choral and Chamber Music The choir’s first achievement, after hurried . rehearsal, was the successful performance of the difficult music by Britten. Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring was beautifully sung in the chapel, with strings and organ and the clarinet taking the oboe part. The choice of music at the Chapel Service on the Sunday was disappointing, but some very finished singing was done later in the week — short pieces by Purcell, Boughton, Sullivan and Sanby. Mr. Jackson was able to get good results very quickly with a specialised and. skilful choral-training technique. A women’s choir, conducted by Dorothy Franchi, of Auckland, sang Elgar’s "The Snow" with the orchestra. Most of the chamber music was played by combinations formed at the School, and some astonishingly well finished results were achieved-by sheer hard work, -needless to say. A Beethoven string trio, a trio by Dvorak, a Brahins: clarinet sonata, Howard Ferguson’s ‘Four pieces for clarinet and piano," a Bach violin sonata, Milhaud’s "Scaramouche" for two pianos, and Bach's

Suite in B Minor for Flute and Strings were in this category. The clarinettist Ken Wilson emerged as a "discovery" if that word may properly be used of a player who has so obviously gone ahead by his own endeavour. Mr. Wilson’s playing of Mozart reveals him as a very promising young artist. The Serenade to Mr. Broadhurst was a tremendous success at the last concert. It had three movements, all composed at the School, the first a pleasant little piece for strings by Dorothy Franchi, the second by David Farquhar, a former pupil of St. Peter’s School, who made fun at the end of his contribution by introducing rather wittily the tune of Frere Jacques, and the third, entitled "Fanfare and Aubade for Strings and Qarinet," by Owen Jensen. Mr. Jensen’s sense of humour, always valuable at lectures and discussions, came to light again here: one passage, marked "Con snoro,’ reproduced the sound-effect which had made it necessary for one of the women to take her bed from the dormitory out to the passage so that others might sleep. And at the end the school bell came in in the key of F. The Movement Must Spread For all those people who went to the School, the music, the straight-out instruction, the fun and humour, the freedom to concentrate, and above all the contacts with others who were prepared to give anything up to 10 or 11 hours a day to music rather than waste a moment of the time, started a movement that must inevitably become continuous, and must spread to other places. Students left at the end, determined to get more music for themselves in the gaps between future Summer Schools, and the Adult Education Centre learned a good deal more about what is required of it in the Auckland education district by musical people. Anyone who saw what went on at Cambridge must know that all that is needed now to make things go ahead in music in a big way is a scheme for encouraging this ‘kind of gathering and musical contacts in general. The glimpses we had, frem one or two of the women who spoke at discussions, of the loneliness there is in country life for a musical person, the almost pathetic incident of the pianist who played before breakfast on the last morning, the phenomenal energy that resulted from the concerted snatching at precious time-all these things tell the same story. Our scattered musical community needs to be reticulated, Just as transport and communications bring higher standards of living to isolated rural peoples, so some development of what has been begun at Cambridge could bring higher standards of music to New Zealand.- Perhaps something on the same lines as Britain’s Arts Council (the new name for what was known as CEMA during the war) is the answer, and perhaps Dorothy Helmrich is right when she says "it must come," and that we should look ahead and think about. co-operation with CEMA Australia, in the first place, and later with such other organisations as have the same aims, The rest, of New Zealand in the meantime might well envy Auckland province -Mr. Broadhurst has already spoken of the Summer School for Music as if it might become an annual affair at St, Peter’s.

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