Release Date: 10 January 2002
Label: Naxos - Ex Select Products / Naxos Classics
Packaging Type: Jewel Case
No of Units: 1
Barcode: 747313579228
Genres: Classical
Composer/Series: FINZI
Description
Gerald Finzi (1901-1956)Lo, the full final sacrifice and other choral worksGerald Finzi studied composition with Ernest Farrar, Edward Bairstow and R.O. Morris. During the 1920s works like his orchestral miniature A Severn Rhapsody (1923) attracted critical attention and his reputation grew with the first performances of the song-cycle A Young Man’s Exhortation (1926-9) and the cantata Dies natalis (mid-1920s, 1938-9). In the post-war years several of his works were given their premières at the Three Choirs Festival, for example the Clarinet Concerto (1948-9) and his setting of Wordsworth’s ode Intimations of Immortality (late-1930s, 1949-50). The final years of his life were lived under the shadow of incurable illness, but before he died he completed the Christmas scene In terra pax (1954) and the Cello Concerto (1951-2, 1954-5). Finzi’s music is rooted in the tradition of Elgar and his lifelong friend Vaughan Williams. It was his response to words, however, that gave his music its particular individuality, resulting in music that seems inevitably to mirror the essence of the poet’s thought. As in Finzi’s favourite poet, Thomas Hardy, a sense of urgency can be felt in the music reflecting his keen awareness of life’s frailty. A further preoccupation was his belief that adult experience tarnishes the innocent wonder of childhood. Both these concerns may be traced to Finzi’s own early experience when the deaths of his father, three brothers and his teacher Farrar made an indelible impression on him. As a young man he was introspective: literature provided companionship, and in authors like Robert Bridges, Thomas Traherne, Wordsworth and Hardy he found like minds. Indefatigable that nothing good should be lost, Finzi’s energetic mind went far beyond his compositions. He was an ardent champion of neglected composers like Ivor Gurney, and with the fine amateur string orchestra he founded, the Newbury String Players, he revived works by forgotten eighteenth century composers such as John Stanley and Richard Mudge. He also collected a library of English poetry and literature of over three thousand volumes including many rare editions. Not least, in his orchard, he rescued several traditional English apple varieties from extinction. During the early 1930s Finzi was encouraged to compose a cycle of unaccompanied partsongs to poems by Robert Bridges by the photographer and early keyboard specialist Herbert Lambert. (It was Lambert who took the well-known photograph of the composer sitting reading whilst smoking his pipe.) Composed between 1934 to 1937, the resultant Seven Unaccompanied Partsongs were given their first performance in a BBC broadcast on 29th December 1938 by the BBC Singers conducted by Trevor Harvey. Although Finzi himself was not entirely satisfied with his settings, which he described as ‘finicky’ and ‘old maidish’, their fresh lyricism has continued to make t
Tracklisting
Dariia Lytvishko
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra; Marin Alsop
Alice Di Piazza; Basel Sinfonietta; NDR Bigband; Titus Engel
Anna Alas i Jove; Miquel Villalba
David Childs; Black Dyke Band; Nicholas Childs
Yaqi Yang; Margarita Parsamyan; Robynne Redmon; Minghao Liu; Frank Ragsdale; Kim Josephson; Kevin S
Vilmos Csikos; Olivier Lechardeur; Manon Lamaison
Tomas Cotik; Martingale Ensemble; Ken Selden
