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Composer Felix Mendelssohn commemorated with English Heritage plaque
6 February 2013
Dmitry Sitkovetsky unveils Mendelssohn commemoration
The regular London visits of Felix Mendelssohn - composer of
the oratorios Elijah, St Paul and Die erste Walpurgisnacht,
as well as a significant body of organ music - have been commemorated with the
installation of a 'Blue Plaque', at the behest of conservation and historic
buildings organisation English Heritage.
The plaque was officially unveiled on 4 February by
violinist/conductor Dmitry Sitkovetsky and is attached to 4 Hobart Place, a
Grade II listed building near Buckingham Palace in the City of Westminster.
The house is the former home of the Hanoverian embassy
secretary, Karl Klingemann. Mendelssohn was at the height of his fame during a
series of visits to Britain, stayed four months in total over five
separate periods.
During his stays in Hobart Place he conducted the
Philharmonic Society on numerous occasions and gave many organ recitals. It was
from this building he left to dine with Isambard Kingdom Brunel, which he did
not enjoy, and Charles Dickens, which he very much did. It was back to this
address that he rushed back to give his account of his audience with Queen
Victoria and Prince Albert in 1842.
At his death in 1847 Mendelssohn was widely regarded as
Europe’s greatest composer, with one biographer suggesting he was the first
composer to be internationally mourned. An obituary in The Times asserted
that he 'loved England as heartily as his own home'; memorial concerts were
held across the country and a Mendelssohn scholarship was endowed in London the
following year.
Sir Nicholas Kenyon, managing director of the Barbican
Centre, former BBC Proms director and member of the blue plaque panel, said a
key factor in Mendelssohn being widely accepted in the UK was largely down to
its enduring choral tradition. 'It was a major factor in the 19th Century,
which enabled him to have his works done well here, and as we know they then
became accepted into the warp and weft of the English choral tradition in a
very major way; Elijah absolutely stood at the centre of that.'
Mendelssohn loved London and his links to the city were
strong. Writing about the city he said that there was 'no question that that
smoky nest is my preferred city and will remain so. I feel quite emotional when
I think of it.'
A plaque was first mooted over a century ago; the case was
only recently revived at the suggestion of an English Heritage historian who
works on the Blue Plaques scheme. Asked why it had taken over a century for
Mendelssohn to be honoured, Sir Nicholas explained that, 'The people at that
time who owned the building didn't want a blue plaque on it and the file simply
mouldered away until Howard Spencer had a new discussion about it and revived
the idea.'
In the year 2016, English Heritage will celebrate 150 years
of commemorative plaques, in spite of swingeing cuts in its funding. 'Because
there is a huge backlog of nominations for the scheme, there won't be any new
nominations for the next couple of years, but plaques will continue to go up,'
Sir Nicholas added.
Graeme Kay
Winning hands
30 January 2013
Toby Young, Kerry Andrew and Stef Conner have won the Incorporated Society of Musicians’ (ISM) inaugural competition for young composers with original works for voices inspired by the music of Benjamin Britten to celebrate the composer’s centenary this year.
ROYAL SEAL OF APPROVAL
30 January 2013
HM The
Queen has awarded a prestigious Regius Professorship to the music department of
Royal Holloway, University of London (RHUL).
The announcement was made by the Government, and recognises the exceptionally
high quality of research and teaching in the RHUL music department. A Regius
Professorship is a rare privilege and only two have been created in the past
century.
The Queen will bestow the awards to mark her Diamond Jubilee. Professor Julian
Johnson, Head of the RHUL music department, said: ‘It is a great honour to have
the title of Regius Professor bestowed upon the department and wonderful to
hear that the quality of our teaching and research has been recognised in this
way.
‘We know that our students rate our teaching very highly and indeed our
research placed us as the top Music Department in the UK in the last Research
Assessment Exercise. It means a great deal to receive such a mark of public
esteem.’
Vicar blasts ‘cringeworthy’ beatbox machines
30 January 2013
Dr Giles FraserBBC
Dr Giles Fraser, former canon of St Paul’s Cathedral, and now vicar of St Mary's, Newington, has condemned karaoke-style recorded music devices in churches as ‘cringeworthy beatbox machines with no gravitas.’
Interviewed on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, along with Westminster Abbey sub-organist Robert Quinney, Dr Fraser said, ‘In the liturgy, a musician sitting at an organ needs to react sensitively to what's going on; a machine can’t do that and you can hear how inappropriate a machine's intervention is when it gets it wrong.’
Asked by presenter Jim Naughtie how else churches might replace superannuated organists with no obvious successors to hand, Dr Fraser responded that as Christianity predated the invenation of the organ there were and still are other ways of making music in church – plainsong and taizé chanting, for example – without resorting to machines. ‘If you wouldn’t have it at your funeral, you shouldn’t have it in church on a Sunday morning.’
Robert Quinney added, ‘Anything that sounds so transparently fake needs to be treated with suspicion. It’s not necessarily a natural step for a pianist to become the sort of organist who could play in a local church, but local congregations have changed, and there is still a stock of young organists coming through.’
‘Live’ organists are familiar enough with the perils of lack of co-ordination with congregations – getting ‘out’. ‘A human being playing the organ can hear what other people are doing, so accompanying a congregation enables you to be sensitive to the speed etc,’ said Quinney.
Dr Fraser concluded that, having witnessed one organist eating sandwiches during his sermon and another slyly improvising a processional on the theme tune of Blackadder for a visit by a former Bishop of Bath and Wells, he would miss their ‘fantastic’ sense of humour if replaced by machines, and stressed the importance of organists’ contribution to the liturgy.
Graeme Kay
Six of the best
28 January 2013
Suzy Digby: First of six guest presenters for Radio 3’s The Choir
Conductor Suzi Digby (3 Feb) draws on her unrivalled experience of working with youth ensembles for an exploration of choral music, focusing on young choral talent. On 10 Feb, composer Paul Mealor, who shot to international fame with works including Wherever you Are (the Military Wives Choir) and Ubi Caritas et Amor (premièred at the 2012 Royal Wedding) will discuss writing for special events.
Ken Burton, founder/conductor of Tessera, The London Adventist Chorale and the Croydon Seventh-day Adventist Gospel Choir, will explore the ways in which choral music genres have integrated with gospel styles and looks at spiritual choral music by choirs not from a traditional gospel background (17 Feb).
Harry Christophers, conductor of The Sixteen will discusses sacred choral music, with specific reference to Victoria, Poulenc and James MacMillan (24 Feb). On 3 March, regular Radio 3 presenter Sara Mohr-Pietsch will lead a special live programme of Baroque music, as part of BBC Radio 3’s month-long Baroque Spring season, and vocal coach and animateur Mary King continues the celebrity series with an exploration of the links between folk and choral music, introducing works by Janáček and Bartok, alongside arrangements of British folk tunes. And on 17 March, the US composer-conductor Eric Whitacre will talk about what inspires him as a composer and a performer, and introduce a concert by the Eric Whitacre Singers to be recorded at LSO St Luke's, London, on 12 March.
The six special presenters replace Aled Jones as he leaves BBC Radio 3 after seven years as presenter of The Choir. Jones said, 'I feel honoured to have been able to enjoy seven years at the helm of The Choir, a very special show which truly celebrates choral music of every kind. I’d like to thank my colleagues at BBC Radio 3 and all those who helped make this show the success it is today.' Radio 3 says that details of future programmes will be announced shortly.
Graeme Kay
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