Modern British Composers

New Zealand Listener, Volume 29, Issue 735, 14 August 1953, Page 19

Modern British Composers

SOME listeners may think that a study of -the choral works .of modern British composers could well be heavy going, but. with such a guide as Jolin Longmire they need never feel that their musical pilgrimage is "Towards the Unknown Region." Guy Warrack, examiner in New Zealand for the Royel Schools of Music, and lately conductor of the BBC Scottish Orchestra, expresses this opinion in an introductory talk for a series of twelve illustrated talks by Mr. Longmire which 1YC is to begin broadcasting at 8.0 p.m, on Monday, August 17.°Mr. Longmire (at right, top) is an English composer now living in Auckland, where- he is ‘conducto: of the Royal» Auckland Choir. This. series, called) Choral Music and Modern British Composers, will seek to explain. the aims, achievements anid styles .of. contemporary. choral writers, and, says Mr. .Warrack, "it so clearly expounds their works that as you hear them, which some of you may be doing for the first time, you will understand them." The talks, which will be heard on consecutive Mondays, will be followed, in each case, by examples of the music just "discussed. Five programes of mddern English songs have been recorded for the’ series "by the Auckland baritone’ Donald Munro (at right, bottom); the Auckland Choral Group will be heard: in excerpts from Dyson’s Canterbury Pilgrims; and Britten’s A _ Ceremony of Carols will be presented by a section of the Ardmore College Ladies’ Choir, conducted by Barry Trussell. Other major works from standard recordings will include the Walton oratorio Belshazzar's Feast, and -These Things Shall Be, by John Ireland. "T have not set out to be controversial,’ Mr. Longmire ‘told The Listener, "but I have tried to make some original contributions to contemporary musical thought. This being so, it seems almost inevitable that’ many people will find in my talks some ideas that they will not like."

Mr. Longmire has some trenchant things to say, for example, about 19th Century. composers, "when musical England was a German Colony." All of the English composers of the period which began with the reign of Queen Victoria were minor figures, he thinks. Greatness did not exist, and Vicforian England was no fostering ground for a great English composer, in spite of its literary and other glories. Speaking of dissonance, which he bhelieves is the chief cause of popular dis-

content with modern music, Mr, Longmire says "We have inherited centuries ef music which is preponderantly ‘con-cordant-becoming in the process of evolution gradually more discordant. And now it is .preponderantly discordant. This is natural and inevitable-we must accept it." And as a final stimulus to thought on this point he adds, "But in its trail this has brought along a happy state of affairs for the self-delud-ing composer-or worse, the impdédstor composer. ‘Anything goes. You may write anything you like, any mortal thing; and ‘if only you keep a face serious enough ‘you'll find .someone to take you seriously .. . maybe as big a self-deluder as yourself. But he exists. His number is legion."