Word: holst
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...steady accumulation of astoundingly vulgar pieces of brassy claptrap and woolly woodwind shrieks which feed the voracious football band. In the face of this surging ocean of treacle stand a handful of superb works for wind, three of which--Stravinsky's L'Histoire du Soldat and Octet, and Gustav Holst's Hammer-smith: Prelude and Scherzo--were performed by the newly organized and intensely promising Harvard Wind Ensemble...
...final work of consequence was Holst's masterpiece for large wind band, Hammersmith. Holst was a chaste, humble man of quiet, massive integrity and gentleness. His conscience burned aghast at the stupidity of conflict while at the same time luxuriated in stout goodwill. While most comfortable in small forms, Holst also created large works such as the Hymn to Jesus, the opera Savitri, the cinematic Planets, and the sombre tone poem Egdon Heath. The Ensemble was less successful with this work, but the excellence of the brass choir, which played with solar brightness, was the best I have heard...
...risorgimiento of the Harvard Glee Club in the annual Harvard-Yale concert. The Yale group began with a thin version of Palestrina's Supplicationes for main chorus and responsive small choir (which joined me in the Tibetan heights of the upper balcony) and proceeded to good performances of Holst's delightful Blacksmith Song and Dowland's beautiful Come Again, Sweet Love. Their part closed with a stupendously tedious arrangement by Fenno Heath of Donne's Death Be Not Proud. The Harvard Glee Club performed a less interesting program except for a mildly "modern" work by Thomas Beveridge. The Harvard group...
...GUSTAV HOLST: A CHORAL FANTASIA/ PSALM 86 AND GERALD FINZI: DIES NATALIS (Everest). An opportunity to compare two widely diverging paths in modern vocal music. Hoist is sophisticated and eclectic: his bold Fantasia has a concerto-like role for the organ along with choral and solo sections; in the Psalm, he spins a gossamer a cappella prayer. By contrast, Finzi's quiet music comments on the lyrics, in this case Metaphysical Poet Thomas Traherne's musings on the innocence and beauty of children. Tenor Wilfred Brown's impeccable diction helps to make this a delightfully accessible, intimate...
There were some superb performances by the solo flute and obe. Their ensemble work with the solo clarinet in the trio of Gustav Holst's Hammersmith Prelude and Scherze was perhaps the most musically sensitive part of the concert...