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Free Download: Ian Bostridge and Thomas Adès perform Schubert's Winterreise

This week's free download is the fifth song, 'Der Lindenbaum', of Schubert's Winterreise, performed by tenor Ian Bostridge with Thomas Adès on piano. It was recorded on the Pentatone label and was the Choral & Song choice in the December issue of BBC Music Magazine. This performance was recorded live at Wigmore Hall in September 2018.

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The best classical music book releases of 2019

Six of the best Russian orchestral works

Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 7 ‘Leningrad’

Shostakovich’s Leningrad Symphony was written at the height of the Second World War and dedicated to the people of St Petersburg, which was named Leningrad at the time. Its performance by starving members of the orchestra in August of 1942 had an extraordinary impact on the audience’s spirits.

The Russian premiere took place in March in Kuibyshev (now Samara). Soon after, the score was photographed and smuggled to the West where it was performed in London under Sir Henry Wood as part of a BBC broadcast on 22 June 1942. The broadcast threatened to overlap with Big Ben’s chimes at 9pm, so it was decided in advance to stop the chimes of Big Ben if that happened. The piece fortunately finished with four minutes to spare.

• Six of the best lesser-known works by Soviet composers

Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 1 ‘Winter Daydreams’

Tchaikovsky’s First Symphony was written when Tchaikovsky was 26, soon after he accepted a teaching position at the newly opened Moscow Conservatoire (now named after Tchaikovsky). The idea behind it was to create an orchestral work that would be the first ‘Russian Symphony’, so a listener could trace the unmistakably Russians origins of the music.

Anton Rubinstein had previously composed several symphonies, but all of them were similar to those of the great German composers. Exceptionally beautiful melodies, slight naivety and the great sense of nostalgia so typical of Tchaikovsky make this symphony a true masterpiece.

• The best recordings of Shostakovich's Symphony No. 7 'Leningrad'

Prokofiev's Symphony No. 1 

Prokofiev’s First Symphony, known as the ‘Classical’ Symphony, is one the most charming and accessible works by the Russian composer. Despite being cited by Schoenberg as ‘a slashing attack on musical Romanticism’, Prokofiev was a great admirer of Viennese Classics and especially Haydn: ‘It seemed to me that if Haydn had lived to our day, he would have retained his own style. This is the kind of symphony I wanted to write: a symphony in classical style.’

The symphony was completed when Prokofiev was 26 (an interesting coincidence as this was Tchaikovsky’s age when he wrote his first symphony) at the height of the Russian Revolution in 1917. Nothing in this elegant, witty and very light symphony reflects the horrors of the political situation in the country at the time.

• The best recordings of Prokofiev's Piano Concertos

Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring

Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring is the one of the most extraordinary and innovative pieces of music ever created. Daring, dissonant harmonies, irregular and relentless rhythms, a distinct absence of melodies – nothing of this kind had been written before. Originally performed as a ballet, this work created a huge stir in at the time, thanks to its infamous premiere in Paris’s Théâtre des Champs-Elysées on May 29, 1913. This explosive work is a fine example of real modernism in music.

• The best recordings of Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring

Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade

The Scheherazade symphonic suite was composed in 1888, based on a collection of Middle Eastern folk tales known as the Arabian Nights. The story plays out within the colourful orchestration, which introduces melodies for each character and plays out their relationship throughout the piece, with elements of orientalism heard in the writing. This incredibly beautiful and rather exotic composition is always a joy to listen to.

• The best recordings of Rimsky-Korsakov

Rachmaninov’s Symphonic Dances

Rachmaninov completed this orchestral suite in 1940 – his final major composition. This incredible work combines Rachmaninov’s late lyricism with elements of Prokofiev’s dissonances and Stravinsky’s rhythms, and is an astonishing example of Rachmaninov’s orchestral mastery. Written in 1940 and originally named Fantasy Pieces with movement titles ‘Noon’, ‘Twilight’, and ‘Midnight’, the dances are a true masterpiece. The work was one of Rachmaninov’s personal favourites among his own compositions.

• Seven of the best works by Rachmaninov

Reader offer: Bavaria's Oberammergau Passion Play

Dates: 1-5 June 2020
Five days only £1,990
Lecturer Tom Abbott

Martin Randall Travel and BBC Music Magazine have got together to bring you the chance in a decade to visit Bavaria for the Oberammergau Passion Play, a unique and moving event that has been staged just once every ten years since 1634.

Based in a small village nestled in the Bavarian Alps, the play is theatrical spectacle and religious ritual rolled into one, and involves over 2,000 people. In its 400-year history, the Oberammergau Passion Play has gained iconic status for its brilliant and beautiful depiction of the Passion story. And it’s a spectacle that doesn’t come around very often. Miss it this year, and you’ll have to wait until 2030 for your next chance.

This extraordinary and rare trip is preceded by several days in the Bavaria capital Munich, spent visiting some of the region’s finest art and architecture.

How to book: Call Martin Randall on +44 (0)20 8742 3355
and quote 'BBC Music Magazine'

ITINERARY

Day 1: Munich

Fly at 12.40pm from London Heathrow to Munich (British Airways). After an introductory lecture and discussion, there’s a chance for everyone to meet over a dinner in the hotel restaurant.

Day 2: Munich

The day begins with a walking tour of key city sights: the glittering Baroque interior of the Asamkirche, the soaring nave of the Frauenkirche, and the Ohel Jakob Synagogue. The afternoon is devoted to the spectacular palace of the Wittelsbach dynasty – the Residenz. Here, the Cuvilliés Theatre houses one of the most wonderful Rococo interiors in Europe – its carvings were removed for safe keeping during World War II.

Day 3: Munich, Oberammergau

Free morning in Munich. En route to Oberammergau, we visit the loveliest of Ludwig II’s palaces, the Linderhof, before arriving at our Oberammergau hotel in time for a group dinner.

Day 4: Oberammergau

The day of the Passion Play begins with our second lecture, and some free time – a chance perhaps to visit the museum documenting the play’s history. The play is the product of ten months of rehearsal and the work of 2,000 people: each half lasts two and a half hours, with a three-hour dinner interval.

Day 5: Wies

On the way back to Munich Airport, we’ll stop at the beautiful 18th-century pilgrimage church of Wies, whose success, like the Passion Play, derives from its integration of high art and local, peasant tradition. Arrive at Heathrow at 5.25pm.

Plus: Each of the five-day tours will also be attended by BBC Music Magazine’s editor or deputy editor

DETAILS

Price, per person: 
Two sharing: £1,990, or £1,790 without flights. 

Single occupancy: £2,290, or £2,090 without flights.

Included: flights (economy class) with British Airways (Airbus 320); travel by private coach; hotel accommodation as described below; breakfasts; 3 dinners with 2 glasses of wine, water, coffee; all admissions; all tips; all taxes; the services of the lecturer and tour manager. Performance: second category tickets to the Passion Play have been confirmed.

Accommodation: Vienna House Easy, Munich (viennahouse.com): a 4-star hotel in the vibrant district of Neuhausen-Nymphenburg. Details of the 4-star hotel in Oberammergau are to be confirmed. Single rooms throughout are doubles for sole use.

How strenuous is this holiday? This is a fairly strenuous tour with some long coach journeys and walking and standing in churches and galleries. A good level of fitness is essential. Average distance by coach per day: 53 miles.

Travelling group size: 10-24

How to book: Call Martin Randall on +44(0) 20 8742 3355
and quote 'BBC Music Magazine'

Terms and conditions: Holidays are organised by, and subject to the booking conditions of Martin Randall Travel Ltd, Voysey House, Barley Mow Passage, London W4 4GF, United Kingdom, and are offered subject to availability. Martin Randall Travel may cancel the tour if there are insufficient bookings for it to be viable. This would always be more than eight weeks before departure and Martin Randall Travel would refund everything you paid to them. ATOL and ABTA protected.

Booking deadlines: 
For the 1-5 June tour, book before 31 May

Winners of the 2019 Ivors Composer Awards announced

This year’s winners of the Ivors Composer Awards – previously known as the British Composer Awards – were announced last night at a ceremony at the British Museum in London. 

The prizes were awarded to new works written in the last year by UK composers across classical, jazz and sound art. As well as the primary awards, two composers were awarded individually: Anna Meredith was announced as the recipient of this year’s Ivor Novello Award for Innovation, and Erika Fox for Lifetime Achievement. 

In the list of recipients this year, 91% were first-time winners and there was almost an equal gender divide, with 54% of the winners being women. 

Nature inspired many of the winning composers: James Weeks won his second award in as many years for Leafleoht, which is inspired by the image of sunlight reflecting off leaves, using elemental sounds on the string instruments to echo the sounds of the natural world. Alison Rayner’s jazz composition There is a Crack in Everything mimicked the rhythms of cycling up and down the hills and lochs of Scotland searching for light. In the sound art category, Martin Green won with Aeons: A Sound Walk for Newcastle, which is a piece designed to be listened to on a walk on the banks of the River Tyne. Charlotte Bray’s Invisible Cities, meanwhile, reflects on the urban environment.

Other composers took inspiration from philosophy and history, with Geoff Hannan’s choral work Pocket Universe featuring text by Isaac Newton and Galileo Galilei. Christian myths were the focus of Gavin Higgins’s trombone concerto The Book of Miracles, influenced by a recently discovered German Renaissance manuscript.

BBC Radio 3 will broadcast a programme dedicated to the awards at 9pm on Sunday 8 December.

The full list of winners can be found below.

AMATEUR OR YOUNG PERFORMERS
The Salamander and The Moonraker by Edward Gregson 

CHAMBER ENSEMBLE
Flute Concerto by Dai Fujikura

CHORAL
Pocket Universe by Geoff Hannan

COMMUNITY OR EDUCATIONAL PROJECT
Convo by Charlotte Harding 

JAZZ COMPOSITION FOR LARGE ENSEMBLE
Jumping In by Laura Jurd

JAZZ COMPOSITION FOR SMALL ENSEMBLE
There is a Crack in Everything by Alison Rayner

ORCHESTRAL
The Book of Miracles (Trombone Concerto) by Gavin Higgins

SMALL CHAMBER
Leafleoht by James Weeks

SOLO OR DUO
Invisible Cities by Charlotte Bray

SOUND ART
Aeons: A Sound Walk for Newcastle by Martin Green 

STAGE WORKS
Harriet (‘Scenes in the life of Harriet Tubman’) by Hilda Paredes

INNOVATION
Anna Meredith MBE

LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT
Erika Fox

The best new Christmas classical music releases

Five essential works by Benjamin Britten

Ceremony of Carols

Composed in 1942 while Britten was crossing the Atlantic from America, its unusual scoring of treble voices and harp present a range of serene, exhilarating and ecstatic settings of medieval carols.

Recommended recording:
Choir of King’s College, Cambridge/David Willcocks
Classics for Pleasure 968 9492

• Top 20 Britten recordings
• Five of the best modern Christmas carols

Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings

This was Britten’s first major work on returning to England. The calm pastoral of its opening song revealed a new vein in his music.

Recommended recording:
Peter Pears (tenor), Barry Tuckwell (horn); English Chamber Orchestra/Benjamin Britten
Decca 436 3952

• Six of the best 20th-century British choral works
• Five essential works by Schubert

Peter Grimes

The première secured Britten’s international fame and the opera testifies to Britten’s masterful sense of drama.

Recommended recording:
Peter Pears; Royal Opera House Chorus and Orchestra/Benjamin Britten
Decca 467 6822

• Six great contemporary operas
• The best recordings of Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony

War Requiem

Written for the reconsecration of Coventry Cathedral, Britten juxtaposed the Requiem Mass with poems by Wilfred Owen.

Recommended recording:
Peter Pears, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau; Bach Choir; LSO/Benjamin Britten
Decca 475 7511

• Six of the best great works with chorales in them
• Five essential works by Bartók

Suite on English Folk Tunes

Britten admired Grainger more than Vaughan Williams, and this is evident in his by turns quirky and brooding suite.

Recommended recording:
Bournemouth SO/Richard Hickox
Chandos CHAN 9221

'Here is the little door' by Owain Park: The BBC Music Magazine 2019 Christmas Carol

For the sixth consecutive year, BBC Music Magazine has commissioned a brand new carol for our readers. This year, the brilliant young composer Owain Park has set the evocative poem, Here is the little door by Frances Chesterton. 

Get your choir singing our wonderful new carol and download the score here!

• The 25 Greatest Christmas carols of all time

A few words from Owain Park:

I find Christmas a magical time of year, and remember fondly my time as a chorister at St Mary Redcliffe Church in Bristol. There was something special about pitching up so late at night: a sense of anticipation in the air before Midnight Mass, and then wishing each other a ‘Merry Christmas’ in hushed tones as the clock struck, invariably during the sermon.

One of my favourite carols was Howells’s 1918 setting of Frances Chesterton’s poem Here is the little door. Howells’s music allows the words to resonate with both choir and congregation – at St Mary’s there was always an extra few seconds of quiet after we’d finished singing it. The poem consists of two stanzas: the first is reflective and subdued while the second is more colourful and lively.

Most lines seem to end strongly after a more questioning start, and so I’ve tried to express this using tension and release in the harmony. A lot of my choral music has been in many parts and is quite difficult to sing, so I wanted to sustain a simple idea over two verses without any divided parts. My hope is that I have captured something of the wonder I felt as a young singer.

• Five of the best ancient Christmas carols

Performance notes:

The words are key to my setting of Here is the little door. I would encourage singers to be as expressive as possible with the text, even when everyone moves together. I’ve kept one set of words throughout to keep the score as uncluttered as possible, which sometimes means that the words aren’t vertically aligned with your part. Always move with your note, and with confidence. It would be a good idea for everyone to read through the poem together, to develop a collective interpretation.

I was in two minds as to whether to add dynamics to the score as, much like Away in a manger or Ding, dong! merrily on high, the ups and downs are guided by the text. The included markings are not exhaustive, so I look forward to hearing what you come up with. When rehearsing the piece, it might be useful to split the choir in two: the sopranos and basses often work in contrary motion; the altos and tenors largely move in scales, with any leaps reserved for expressive moments.

• Five of the best modern Christmas carols

There are a few moments when the tenors briefly head above the altos (mostly to keep the interest in the individual lines), so a legato approach will help with these transitions. When everyone feels comfortable with the notes, it would be lovely to add in some flexibility. As the second verse gets going, I would suggest moving on a little, and towards the end easing back a touch as the words and music become more reflective.

Lastly, I hope you enjoy singing my carol – thank you for taking the time to do so!

• Six of the best unknown carols

Click here to download the score.

To hear recordings of previous carols commissioned by BBC Music Magazine, buy our latest issue and listen to the free cover CD, which features performances of Toby Young's The Owl (2017 commission) and Dobrinka Tabakova's Good-will to men, and peace on earth (2018 commission). 

Winners of the Royal Philharmonic Society Awards 2019 revealed

The winners of the Royal Philharmonic Society Awards 2019 were revealed last night (Thursday 28 November) at a ceremony in Battersea Arts Centre, London. 

The coveted RPS Gold Medal was presented to Tartar-Russian composer Sofia Gubaidulina in tribute to her long and illustrious compositional career as one of the leading representatives of new music in Russia. Accepting the award, Gubaidulina said: ‘This award is especially precious because it comes as we are preparing to celebrate the 250th birthday of Beethoven. To that great composer belongs the merit of affirming in his work the love of harmony – which is the true meaning of the word “Philharmonic”.’

Every award presented to an individual artist this year was given to a female musician: violinist Alina Ibragimova won the Instrumentalist Award and soprano Nina Stemme won the Singer Award for her performance as Brünnhilde in the Royal Opera House’s production of Wagner's Ring Cycle. Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla, music director of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, won the Conductor Award, an award sponsored by  BBC Music Magazine - look out for our interview with Gražinytė-Tyla in our January 2020 issue.

For the first time in the 30-year history of the Awards, both of the awards dedicated to composition were given to women. Rebecca Saunders won the Large-Scale Composition Award for her work Yes and Tansy Davies won the Chamber-Scale Composition Award for her work Cave.

Chineke!, the first majority Black and Minority Ethnic orchestra established in the UK, was the first ever recipient of the Gamechanger Award, which was established this year to celebrate ground-breaking and transformative work in classical music.

The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra’s (BSO) Change Makers and Resound received the Impact Award, which recognises an outstanding organisation or initiative that has had a lasting positive effect on people who may not otherwise experience classical music.

The Aurora Orchestra won the Ensemble Award for their command of contemporary repertoire and their outstanding theatricality. Awards were also presented to projects that integrated local communities with the finest professional musicians. The Birmingham Opera Company’s epic production of Shostakovich’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk won the Opera and Music Theatre Award, and The Cumnock Tryst, directed by Scottish composer James MacMillan, won the Concert Series and Events Award.

The Storytelling Award was won by Oliver Soden's biography of the British composer Michael Tippett. And finally, the Castalian String Quartet won the Young Artists Award.

Highlights from the RPS Awards will be broadcast in a special programme on BBC Radio 3 on Sunday 1 December at 8:45pm.

To view all the Award nominations, click here.

Winners in full:

RPS GOLD MEDAL

Sofia Gubaidulina

GAMECHANGER

Chineke!

CHAMBER-SCALE COMPOSITION

Tansy Davies Cave

CONCERT SERIES & EVENTS

The Cumnock Tryst

CONDUCTOR

Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla

ENSEMBLE

Aurora Orchestra

IMPACT

BSO Change Makers and Resound

INSTRUMENTALIST

Alina Ibragimova (violin)

LARGE-SCALE COMPOSITION

Rebecca Saunders, Yes

OPERA & MUSIC THEATRE

Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk – Birmingham Opera Company

SINGER

Nina Stemme (soprano)

STORYTELLING

Michael Tippett The Biography – Oliver Soden

YOUNG ARTISTS

Castalian String Quartet

Stephen Cleobury (1948-2019)

Stephen Cleobury, the former music director at King’s College, Cambridge, has died aged 70, after a long illness.

Cleobury was appointed director of music at King’s in 1982 and, in a tenure that lasted for 37 years, he was responsible for maintaining the choir’s reputation as one of the finest in the world. He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2009 Queen’s Birthday Honours and he was knighted in 2019, both for his services to choral music.

Born in Bromley in 1948, Cleobury was educated at St John’s College, Cambridge, where he was organ scholar. Prior to his arrival at King’s, he held positions in Westminster Abbey and Westminster Cathedral.

Cleobury’s discography was as accomplished as it was extensive. One of his most notable recordings was his 2018 album marking the centenary of A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols. It was in this service, which is broadcast live on BBC Radio 4 every Christmas Eve, where Cleobury’s innovation was brought to the fore. Every year, he commissioned a new carol for the service, which brought forth new works by composers such as John Rutter, Judith Weir and Thomas Adès. Speaking to BBC Music Magazine about the service in December 2013, Cleobury remarked: ‘I hope it ends up being a judicious amalgam of old and new, set in a sequence that’s musically satisfying.’

• An exclusive interview with Sir Stephen Cleobury (December 2013)

Cleobury also expanded the choir’s repertoire beyond what was deemed traditional, performing works by Rachmaninov, Kodály, Górecki, Pärt and Janáček. Additionally, he established both the Easter at King’s festival and Concerts at King’s, the latter of which featured world-class performers and ensembles such as Gerald Finley, Alison Balsom and the Academy of Ancient Music. The choir itself established its own record label in 2012.

Away from King’s, Cleobury was chief conductor of the BBC Singers from 1995 to 2007, conductor of Cambridge University Musical Society from 1983 to 2009 and he was honorary president and regular conductor of the East Anglia Chamber Orchestra. Also a celebrated organist, he gave recitals in various locations across the world, including Houston, Cape Town, Westminster and Hong Kong’s Performing Arts Centre.

A book of condolence is available at King’s College Chapel and online.