A pupil of Charles Villiers Stanford, and classmate of both Ralph Vaughan Williams and Gustav Holst, English Composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor was heralded as the 鈥楢frican Mahler鈥� by white American musicians following three tours to the USA in the early 1900s, and his music enjoyed great popularity and regular performance during his lifetime. In England his most famous work Hiawatha鈥檚 Wedding Feast, often seen as his crowning achievement, was equalled only in popularity by Handel鈥檚 Messiah and Mendelssohn鈥檚 Elijah, yet today his works are not performed as often as they should be.
Coleridge-Taylor possessed a real skill for portraying character through music, indicative of the later incidental music he went on to write, and his Nonet in F minor, which received its premiere while he was still a student at the Royal College of Music, perfectly encapsulates the character of each instrument through exquisite melodies, a wonderful romantic style and an abundance of tone colours.
Handwritten in the front of the original manuscript is the phrase 鈥楪radus ad Parnassum鈥�, meaning steps to Parnassus, and throughout the whole work you hear that gradual ascension into, and soaring above, the highest mountain ranges. This is particularly evident in the violin writing 鈥� coincidentally the instrument he himself excelled at before turning his hand to composition 鈥� and the regular appearance of ascending runs in the piano, played here by Simon Crawford-Phillips.
Programme Note 漏 Amy Campbell
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This concert will be available in video format - it will not be possible to have an audience at 鲍鱼tv Hoddinott Hall
