大象传媒

Donald Macleod concludes his week of programmes about the life and music of Percy Grainger with an exploration of some of the composer's more unsavoury views and his quest for musical 'freedom'.

There鈥檚 no question that Percy Grainger had some pretty strange ideas. Some of them seriously offensive, such as his notions about racial purity and the superiority of the Nordic and Anglo-Saxon races. One of his cranky obsessions was a long-held quest to 鈥榩urify鈥� the English language, avoiding what he termed 鈥淔rench-begotten, Latin-begotten and Greek-begotten鈥� words, to achieve his goal of a 鈥榖lue-eyed English鈥� and this he applied to musical terms as well.

In later life he also devoted time to developing his ideas about free music, which he had had for some time. As a young man he had heard in his head what he called 鈥渘ature-echoing, gliding, scale-less and non-metrical sounds鈥�. Grainger鈥檚 gloriously open-minded approach to music was such that he loved upsetting musical apple-carts wherever he found them, flying in the face of orthodoxy and relishing the opportunity to try new musical experiences and constantly hurtling himself into bruising brushes with authority. His pioneering trail culminated in the almost unique experiments he made with 鈥渇ree music鈥�.

Shepherd's Hey
Percy Grainger, piano

The Power of Love
Claire Booth, soprano
Christopher Glynn, piano

Jutish Melody (Danish Folk Song Suite)
Penelope Thwaites, piano

To a Nordic Princess
Danish National Radio Symphony Orchestra
Richard Hickox, conductor

Immovable Do
Joyce Griggs, tenor saxophone
J Michael Holmes, soprano saxophone
Phil Pierick, alto saxophone)
Adrianne Honnold, alto saxophone
Adam Hawthorne, alto saxophone
Joyce Griggs, tenor saxophone
Drew Whiting, tenor saxophone
Jesse Dochnahl, baritone saxophone
Ben Kenis, bass saxophone

Free Music
Academy of St Martin in the Fields Chamber Ensemble

Free Music No 2
Lydia Kavina, theramin

The Jungle Book (excerpts)
Polyphony
Stephen Layton, conductor

Producer: Martin Williams