Goossens Orchestral Works Vol 2
Davis Andrew Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Goossens Orchestral Works Vol 2
Davis Andrew Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
This disc marks the beginning of the partnership between the\nMelbourne Symphony Orchestra and its recently appointed Chief\nConductor, Sir Andrew Davis, who already boasts an impressive\ndiscography on Chandos.
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In the pieces performed here, we find Goossens emerging at the\nend of World War I as a brilliant and innovative orchestrator, a\nmodernist with a technique derived from Debussy, Ravel, and early\nStravinsky. As Director of the New South Wales Conservatorium in\nSydney and Chief Conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, he was\nphenomenally successful, his achievements earning him international\nfame.
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Four Conceits, Kaleidoscope, and Two Nature Poems all began life\nas works for solo piano, written during or just after World War I.\nAll were later adapted for orchestral forces, and in steep contrast\nto the excessive length and opulence of much wartime music, these\nworks (Kaleidoscope and Four Conceits in particular) are\nconspicuously brief. In fact, only one of the four Conceits exceeds\ntwo minutes.
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The short tone poem Tam o’Shanter and the four-act opera Don\nJuan de Mañara were both inspired by literary works. The former\nillustrates the well-known poem of the same name by Robert Burns,\ndepicting the drunken return from Ayr of Tam on this horse, the\nuncertain gait of which is heard in the music from the outset. The\nlibretto for Goossens’s opera had been written by Arnold Bennett\nafter a play by Alexandre Dumas, père.
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Also closely associated with the arts, Three Greek Dances was\nwritten for Margaret Morris whose flowing style of dancing,\ninspired by Isadora Duncan, we today associate with the 1920s. The\npiece, in its final form, was first performed in London by Morris\nand her dancers at the Faculty of Arts, Piccadilly in January\n1931.
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At the suggestion of their friend the critic Edwin Evans, four\ncomposers – John Ireland, Frank Bridge, Arnold Bax, and Eugene\nGoossens – jointly produced a miniature set of variations on the\nFrench folksong ‘Cadet Rousselle’, for soprano and piano. Goossens\nlater arranged the set for orchestra without voice, the version\nperformed here.
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Review
Kate Rockstrom
Sir Eugene Goossens did a lot for classical music in Australia when he lived here. Unfortunately most of his music has fallen off the grid and is not often performed. However Chandos recording have been doing their best to try and get it Goossens’ music back on the map. I haven’t heard much about his music but what I didn’t realise was that there is a lot of excitement. You can hear the influence of film music, as well as contemporary music and with local orchestra, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra performing this is a recording that needs to be listened to.
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