A Sea Symphony -
Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872 - 1958) |
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After the death of
Purcell in 1695, English music went into a long period of decline that
lasted until the late 19th century. Eventually the tireless
efforts of Charles Stanford, Hubert Parry and others brought about the
long-awaited English musical renaissance, which reached its full
flowering with the emergence of Edward Elgar. He was followed by a whole
new generation of talented composers, the leading figure of which was
Ralph Vaughan Williams, who for half a century remained one of the most
influential figures in English music. Like Elgar, he too was a late
developer, reaching his mid-thirties before attracting serious attention
as a composer. |
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As the 19th
century gave way to the 20th, the work of the American poet
Walt Whitman seemed to many to capture the essence of the new age,
portraying an optimistic vision of a world inspired by human and
scientific endeavour and the spirit of adventure. As well as Vaughan
Williams, several other British composers - notably Holst and Delius -
turned to Whitman’s groundbreaking collection, Leaves of Grass,
for inspiration. The radical, humanistic philosophy of Whitman’s verse
held a particular appeal for Vaughan Williams. He had already produced
some songs to Whitman texts when in 1903 he began to think about writing
something on an altogether larger scale. First came Toward the
Unknown Region (1907), also a setting of Whitman. Then in 1909,
after a gestation of nearly six years, he completed A Sea
Symphony, the great choral and orchestral work which, more than any
other, put Vaughan Williams firmly on the musical map when it was first
performed in October 1910 (only a few weeks after his Fantasia on a
Theme of Thomas Tallis). |
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The Sea Symphony
is a remarkable achievement. Vaughan Williams was not blessed with
the natural talent of a Holst or a Britten; his success was due in large
part to his single-minded determination. Though in his thirties, he was
still a relatively inexperienced composer and had so far made only a
modest impression on the musical world, yet for his first symphony he
chose to write a choral symphony, a hugely ambitious project and one
with almost no precedent. True, Beethoven and Mendelssohn had both
produced choral symphonies, but these are essentially orchestral works
with the addition of soloists and chorus in the last movement. The
closest parallel is Mahler’s monumental 8th symphony.
However, since this was premiered only a month before the Sea
Symphony, Vaughan Williams must have been unaware of it for most if
not all of the time that he was composing his own work. |
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Vaughan
Williams proved more than equal to the challenging task he had set
himself. British choral music had enjoyed a long and distinguished
tradition, from Purcell and Handel through to Stanford, Parry and Elgar,
but the striking originality of the Sea Symphony, the masterly
handling of the orchestral and choral forces, its boldness, energy and
vivid orchestration, set it apart as a wholly new and important addition
to the choral repertoire. Even more significantly, it hailed the
triumphant arrival of a new and powerful voice in English music. Vaughan
Williams had succeeded in creating a definitive musical style drawn from
genuinely English roots, rather than continuing, as his immediate
predecessors had chosen to do, in the Austro-German tradition that had
dominated European music since Beethoven’s time. |
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The
composer selected verses from Whitman’s Leaves of Grass for the
first three movements and from his Passage to India for the last.
Whitman uses images of brave sailors exploring the vast oceans as a
colourful metaphor for the voyage through life of the human soul, a
universal message that must have held considerable personal significance
for Vaughan Williams, who at that time was still striving for
recognition. |
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The
first movement, A Song for all Seas, all Ships, opens with a
brief but dramatic brass fanfare in B flat minor, immediately reiterated
by the choir to the stirring words, ‘Behold, the sea itself’, and
arrestingly transposed to the tonic key of D major at the word ‘sea’.
These two devices - the fanfare itself and the harmonic juxtaposition of
major and minor tonalities a third apart - recur throughout the work as
unifying features. This opening section of the symphony vividly evokes
the immensity and primal force of the sea. A change of mood is
introduced with the appearance of a shanty-like theme depicting the
‘dashing spray’ and ‘winds piping and blowing’. The fanfare returns for
the soprano soloist’s dramatic appearance, when the focus of attention
shifts to the ‘soul of man’. A moving lament for those that have lost
their lives at sea then leads to the final section, an extended passage
beginning with the words ‘Emblem of man elate above death’, culminating
in a powerful climax, after which the waves subside and calm is
restored. |
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The slow
movement, On the Beach at Night Alone, is an atmospheric nocturne
introduced by the orchestra, whose alternating tonalities of C minor and
E major evoke the lapping of waves on the shore. The baritone soloist
ponders humankind’s place in the ‘vast similitude’ that encompasses and
unites all time and space. He is joined by the full chorus, and the
music gradually increases in intensity. The reflective mood then
returns, the soloist’s meditations soon dissolving into a tranquil
orchestral epilogue. |
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The
third movement, The Waves, is purely pictorial, and is a
virtuosic scherzo for choir and orchestra. Beginning with a modified
version of the fanfare motif, Vaughan Williams brilliantly depicts the
sea in all its fearsome power, with an exhilarating portrayal of wind
and waves and the great vessel ploughing its way through the ocean. |
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The
finale, The Explorers, opens with the majestic phrase, ‘O vast
Rondure, swimming in space’, set to a melody which the composer later
acknowledged was strongly influenced by Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius.
This expansive introduction prepares the way for further development of
the metaphysical concepts explored in the first two movements. The
climax of the movement, and of the symphony, is reached at ‘Finally
shall come the poet worthy that name, the true son of God shall come
singing his songs’. There follows a sublime duet for the soprano and
baritone soloists, after which an urgent cry of ‘Away, O soul, hoist
instantly the anchor’ is heard to a shanty rhythm, and the ship is made
ready. The concluding section of the work is serenely radiant, as the
anchor is weighed and both ship and soul set sail on their quest,
eventually disappearing from view as they voyage into the great unknown.
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John Bawden
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To those
using these notes You are more than welcome to use
all or part of these notes for your choral society or church
programme, or for educational purposes. If you do, please would
you be kind enough to advise me by e-mail -
bawden37@sky.com - and would you also acknowledge my
authorship. If you wish to use these notes for commercial
purposes, e.g. a CD or DVD liner, please contact me. Thank you.
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