Having waxed almost lyrical on the power of the written word in another post this morning on the power of writing, I am overdue to share this piece in a different medium from another creative friend, Mark Northfield:
As Mark said of this to me in an email:
This one is a musically symbolic classical instrumental with a very obvious ‘message', developed from one of my rough homemade piano recordings posted back in March 2022.It's a more fully realised and properly recorded trio arrangement entwining the official anthem of Europe - Beethoven's ‘Ode to Joy', of course - with the national anthem of Ukraine.As the piece progresses, Russia's invasion (and Putin's imperial ambition) is noted with a brief use of Mussorgsky from ‘The Great Gate of Kiev' movement of Pictures At An Exhibition. However, the two anthems resume with vigour and entwine once more with greater complexity, finishing the piece in defiance and determination.
Mark timed the release of this piece to mark the second anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. I am late in sharing it. I do so now, noting again the idea that a person possessed of a powerful idea and the means to express it has real power. No wonder so many politicians hate the arts in all their forms.
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Brilliant and inspiring. Thanks for sharing it.
Magnificent and many thanks. This really needs the widest possible sharing. Ihope it gets the oxygen of a suitable public performance – indeed many.
Inspiring and brilliant. Makes me feel superior to the sort of people who hate art.
I missed this conversation yesterday as I was singing with the wonderful Swansea Bach Choir in a concert of German baroque music in Margam, South Wales. And next Saturday I will be singing with the equally impressive Chiltern Choir in the Clarendon Muse, Watford.
The power of music to lift spirits, to create communities, and to change the world is underestimated by the philistines who govern us. They just don’t get it.
If anyone is interested, and in the area, the concert on Saturday will feature a beautiful new work by Michael Cayton, that has an environmental theme, and was commissioned by me some time ago.
Michael’s programme note includes the following:
“I decided to base the piece around the four seasons which led me on a delightful poetry hunt for the texts that may be suitable. There were a number of poems that immediately stood out, Housman’s Loveliest of Trees and the traditional, Summer is icummen in were helpful starting points. Internet searches provided the poem Vanishing! saving! which I found extremely useful to set as a fugetta in the Spring section. (The website where I found the poem did not attribute an author, I would be delighted to find out who wrote it so I can credit them accordingly). I interspersed the poetry with first-hand accounts of an environmental issue, some taken from the BBC news archive.
I interspersed the poetry with first-hand accounts of an environmental issue, some taken from the BBC news archive. Spring deals with forest fires, Summer with hurricanes and Autumn with deforestation. Each movement contains a verse from the Extinction Rebellion Song, I’m sorry my friends which warns the listener of the danger presented by these environmental concerns. For Winter, the darkest moment of the piece, I make a link with nuclear radiation with Anaïs Tondeur’s first hand account of the damage done to nature following the accident at Chernobyl. This coupled with the Marmesbury Scholar’s Winter poem Storm and destruction creates a new meaning warning of nuclear catastrophe.
However, the overriding message of the piece is one of hope and of natures capacity to heal.”
https://www.chilternchoir.org.uk/
Forgive the plug, Richard. It seemed appropriate, given the subject above. I will understand if you don’t print it.
You are forgiven!
Thank you!
🙂
For the majority of the rich that now dominate Western Society Art has become just another commodity to be owned and exploited for their benefit.
I remember the first Thatcherite zealots assuring us that State support for the Arts was undesirable and no longer necessary because newly wealthy patrons would soon be stepping in to build Theatres, Concert halls, Opera Houses, Libraries and Art galleries.
Instead we have the same downward spiral of out of control price increases and closures that have become a common theme of UK life.
To some if the wealthy art is just a medium for money laundering