Proms at ... Hoddinott Hall, Cardiff

Tuesday 8 September, 7.30pm–c9.00pm

Bohuslav Martinů
Jazz Suite 11’

John Adams
Chamber Symphony 22’

Gavin Higgins
Rough Voices 8’
大象传媒 commission: world premiere

Samuel Barber
Knoxville: Summer of 1915 16’

Aaron Copland
Appalachian Spring – suite 23’

Natalya Romaniw soprano
大象传媒 National Orchestra of Wales
Ryan Bancroft conductor

This concert is broadcast live by 大象传媒 Radio 3 and live-streamed on 大象传媒 iPlayer. You can listen to any of the 2020 Proms concerts on 大象传媒 Sounds or watch on 大象传媒 iPlayer until Monday 12 October.

Welcome to tonight’s Prom

California-born Ryan Bancroft makes his Proms debut as Principal Conductor of the 大象传媒 National Orchestra of Wales. Bancroft grew up in a household where jazz and prog-rock were heard more often than Bach, so it’s no surprise that jazz plays a role in this mostly American programme.

Martinů’s quirky Jazz Suite complements John Adams’s Chamber Symphony, whose sound-world came to the composer when, as he was studying Schoenberg’s Chamber Symphony one day, he became aware that his young son was watching cartoons in a neighbouring room. Adams heard common ground in these wildly differing styles.

In his new commission, Rough Voices, British composer Gavin Higgins reflects on how the Covid-19 pandemic has disproportionately affected the poorest in society. And the evening ends with two much-loved American classics: Barber’s nostalgic evocation of a balmy summer Tennessee night and Copland’s ballet inspired by early-19th-century pioneer settlers in Pennsylvania.

Welcome to tonight’s Prom

California-born Ryan Bancroft makes his Proms debut as Principal Conductor Designate of the 大象传媒 National Orchestra of Wales. Bancroft grew up in a household where jazz and prog-rock were heard more often than Bach, so it’s no surprise that jazz plays a role in this mostly American programme.

Martinů’s quirky Jazz Suite complements John Adams’s Chamber Symphony, whose sound-world only became clear to the composer when, as he was studying Schoenberg’s Chamber Symphony one day, he became aware that his young son was watching cartoons in a neighbouring room. Adams heard common ground in these wildly differing styles.

Bohuslav Martinů ^{_{(1890–1959)}}

Jazz Suite – for small orchestra
^{₍₁₉₂₈₎}

First performance at the Proms

1 Prélude
2 Musique d’entr’acte: Blues
3 Musique d’entr’acte: Boston
4 Finale: Allegro

Martinů’s Jazz Suite is one of a line of works by the Czech-born composer from the late 1920s that explicitly proclaim their roots in jazz, a genre he described in 1925 as a ‘violent blow against the soft lyricism of impressionism’. Composed mostly in Paris, the first two movements were premiered on 7 June 1928 in Baden-Baden; the Suite was completed later that year and received its premiere in Frankfurt.

Scored for a small orchestra that nods to both symphonic and jazz ensembles, the Suite is an experiment in fusing the classical and the popular. Reflecting what were then the leading trends in Paris, the city Martinů had called home since 1923, the composer combined the clarity of neo-Classicism with the rhythmic invention of jazz across the Suite’s four short movements.

*Paris by Night* (Edmond Haraucourt, 1925) – capturing the spirit of Paris in the Jazz Age, where Martinů composed part of his *Jazz Suite* *(Granger/Bridgeman Images)*
*Paris by Night* (Edmond Haraucourt, 1925) – the spirit of Paris in the Jazz Age *(Granger/Bridgeman Images)*

Stylistically varied – the Suite includes both a meditative blues and an exuberant, cadenza-filled finale – it is ultimately a tightly constructed work packed with syncopation, complex harmonies, enticing melodic fragments – and a dash of Stravinsky and Milhaud.

^{Programme note © Sophie Redfern}^{Sophie Redfern lectures on music at the University of Sheffield, where she is also an Honorary Research Fellow. She is a specialist in 20th-century American music and dance.}

John Adams ^{_{(born 1947)}}

Chamber Symphony
^{₍₁₉₉₂₎}

First complete performance at the Proms

1 Mongrel Airs
2 Aria with Walking Bass
3 Roadrunner

A direct response to Arnold Schoenberg’s 1906 Chamber Symphony, Op. 9, Adams’s own Chamber Symphony emerged from a curious musical juxtaposition. As he remembered it, he was studying the score of the Schoenberg in one room and became aware of the music to the cartoons his son was watching in another: ‘The hyperactive, insistently aggressive and acrobatic scores for the cartoons mixed in my head with the Schoenberg music, itself hyperactive, acrobatic and not a little aggressive, and I realised suddenly how much these two traditions had in common.’

This was the impetus for Adams’s freewheeling three-movement work, composed between September and December 1992. Imbued with an extraordinary kinetic drive, it makes virtuosic demands of its 15 performers and sees Schoenberg’s forces expanded to include trumpet, trombone, drum kit and a synthesizer (used to memorable effect in the final movement, ‘Roadrunner’). Dizzying, dissonant and endlessly inventive, there is a joyful anarchy to Adams’s experimentation in the outer movements and an ominous foreboding in the central one. The result is a playful and thrilling ride.

Premiered in The Hague on 17 January 1993 by the Schönberg Ensemble, the Chamber Symphony’s first US performance was given on 12 April by the San Francisco Contemporary Chamber Players, for which it was commissioned. It won Adams the 1994 Royal Philharmonic Society Award for chamber music.

^{Programme note © Sophie Redfern}

Gavin Higgins _{^{(born 1983)}}

Rough Voices
^{₍₂₀₂₀₎}

大象传媒 commission: world premiere

Like most of the composers commissioned to write new works for this Proms season, I was asked if I could respond in some way to the Covid-19 pandemic.

I thought long and hard about the impact of the crisis and I kept returning to the thought of how those living in poverty have been disproportionately affected – as has also been the case with issues such as mental health, loneliness, education, housing and redundancy. This made me angry.

As I was writing the piece, I came across the poem ‘Tough’ by Tony Walsh (born 1965, aka Longfella) – a battle cry for the working class – and his words resonated with the music I was composing:

They don’t like it when we make it despite all their ifs and cuts
They don’t like it when we take it as our right to shake things up
They don’t like it when rough voices start demanding better choices
But it’s tough, we’ve had enough and we are coming

Being from a working-class background myself, I know how life-changing music can be. I also know that, as we come out of the pandemic, readdressing questions of diversity and class within the classical-music world will become even harder. We must continue to support and promote working-class talent or we will needlessly lose a generation of brilliant musicians. As such, Rough Voices is a rallying call for the underclasses.

The piece starts with a scream – of anger, frustration – that seems to interrupt a continuous and immanent chorale played on strings. The interruptions move into an insistent, incessant procession that drives relentlessly onwards.

The ‘scream’ returns at the climax of the work, now in a righteously indignant tone, before the chorale reappears, changed somewhat with echoes of the rhythmic pulse that has dominated much of the piece.

^{Programme note © Gavin Higgins}

Samuel Barber _^(1910–81)

Knoxville: Summer of 1915
^{_{(chamber version: 1947, rev. 1949, 1952)}}

First performance of this version at the Proms

Natalya Romaniw soprano

A deep sense of nostalgia permeates Barber’s lyrical and evocative Knoxville: Summer of 1915, his setting of a 1938 prose poem by writer James Agee. Recalling a long summer evening spent with family as a child in Knoxville, Tennessee, Agee’s text resonated with Barber, who composed the work at a time when both his father and aunt were gravely ill. Neither lived to hear the work. ‘The text moved me very much,’ he acknowledged to his uncle. ‘It reminded me so much of summer evenings in West Chester, now very far away, and all of you are in it!’

Family time on the porch (painting by Peter Nahum, c1935) – the kind of idyllic scene depicted in James Agee’s ‘Knoxville: Summer of 1915’, which inspired Barber *(Peter Nahum/The Leicester Galleries, London)*
Family time on the porch (painting by Peter Nahum, c1935) – the kind of idyllic scene recalled in Barber's *Knoxville: Summer of 1915*

The first performance took place on 9 April 1948 with the soprano Eleanor Steber, who commissioned it, as soloist alongside the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Serge Koussevitzky. The following year Barber created a chamber version, which he ultimately preferred, and in 1952 he further refined this into what we hear this evening.

Presented as a single, richly textured movement, the work has a dreamy quality and surface-level simplicity that belie Barber’s sophisticated approach. Vividly capturing childhood memories of quilts laid in a back yard and the ‘iron moan’ of a streetcar, it is ultimately a profound adult reflection on the fleetingness of such moments and the innocence of an earlier time. The dedication reads: ‘In Memory of my Father’.

^{Programme note © Sophie Redfern}

Aaron Copland _^(1900–90)

Appalachian Spring – suite for 13 Instruments ^{_{(1943–4, arr. 1945, 1970)}}

Premiered on 30 October 1944, in the intimate Coolidge Auditorium of the Library of Congress, Washington DC, the ballet Appalachian Spring was the first and only collaboration between modern dance pioneer Martha Graham and Aaron Copland. Set in 19th-century Pennsylvania, the ballet depicts the wedding day of a young frontier couple, exploring their hopes and fears as they embark on a new life together. It was to be a defining work both for those involved and for 20th-century American art.

Copland won a Pulitzer Prize for his score, which is at once tender and celebratory. Encapsulating many of the traits that characterise his music between the 1930s and 1950s – wide-open harmonies, rhythmic vitality, a deceptive simplicity and a quintessential Americanness – it is also notable for the inclusion of variations on the Shaker tune ‘Simple Gifts’ (popularly known in the UK as ‘Lord of the Dance’).

The tune came to Copland's attention in an anthology, and he was taken with how it was intended for dancing and spoke to a unity of spirit, though he later joked about the extent of his research: ‘I did not realise that there never have been Shaker settlements in rural Pennsylvania!’

Copland originally scored the ballet for 13 instruments, later producing an eight-part orchestral suite in 1945; in 1970 he premiered the 13-instrument version of the suite we hear tonight.

Biographies

Ryan Bancroft conductor
Proms Debut Artist

Ryan Bancroft (Benjamin Ealovega)
Ryan Bancroft (Benjamin Ealovega)

Born in Los Angeles, Ryan Bancroft studied trumpet, harp, flute, cello and Ghanaian music and dance before studying conducting in Scotland and the Netherlands. He first came to international attention in April 2018, when he won both First Prize and Audience Prize at the Malkö Competition in Copenhagen. Tonight he is making his debut as Principal Conductor of the 大象传媒 National Orchestra of Wales. From September 2021 he will also be Artist in Association with the Tapiola Sinfonietta in Finland.

Recent highlights include debuts with the Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, RAI Symphony Orchestra (Turin), 大象传媒 Symphony Orchestra, Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra and the Malmö and Stavanger Symphony orchestras.

Passionate about new music, he has also performed with Amsterdam’s Nieuw Ensemble, assisted Pierre Boulez in a performance of his Sur Incises in Los Angeles and premiered a number of new works.

Planned engagements include his debuts with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Atlanta and City of Birmingham Symphony orchestras, Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, National Arts Center Orchestra (Ottawa), Munich and Swedish Chamber orchestras and National Centre for the Performing Arts Orchestra, Beijing.

Natalya Romaniw soprano

Natalya Romaniw *(Patrick Allen)*
Natalya Romaniw *(Patrick Allen)*

Welsh soprano Natalya Romaniw studied at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama, London – where she was awarded the Gold Medal – and at the Houston Grand Opera Studio. She was a finalist in the Song Prize at 大象传媒 Cardiff Singer of the World 2009, and in 2012 she won the Kathleen Ferrier Award and became a prizewinner in the Houston Grand Opera Eleanor McCollum Competition.

She has sung Mimì (La bohème) for English National Opera, Mařenka (The Bartered Bride) and Tatyana (Eugene Onegin) for Garsington Opera, the title-role in Jenůfa with Grange Park Opera and the title-role in Iolanta for Opera Holland Park.

This season she made her role debut singing Cio-Cio-San (Madam Butterfly) with English National Opera and the title-roles in Tosca and Iris with Scottish Opera. Other notable engagements include appearances with Danish National Opera in Aarhus and the National Theatre in Brno.

She recently released her well-received first recital disc, with pianist Lada Valešová, featuring music by Dvořák, Janáček, Novák and Rachmaninov.

Engagements planned for next season and beyond include Alice Ford (Falstaff) for the Grange Festival, a return to English National Opera and Houston Grand Opera, and the title-role in Rusalka for Garsington Opera.

大象传媒 National Orchestra of Wales

For over 90 years, the 大象传媒 National Orchestra of Wales has played an integral part in the cultural landscape of Wales, occupying a distinctive role as both broadcast and national symphony orchestra. Part of 大象传媒 Wales and supported by the Arts Council of Wales, it performs a busy schedule of live concerts throughout Wales, the UK and around the world. The orchestra is an ambassador of Welsh music, championing contemporary composers and musicians.

The orchestra performs annually at the 大象传媒 Proms and biennially at the 大象传媒 Cardiff Singer of the World competition, and its concerts can be heard regularly across the 大象传媒: on Radio 3, Radio Wales and Radio Cymru.

大象传媒 NOW works closely with schools and music organisations throughout Wales and regularly undertakes workshops, side-by-side performances and young composer initiatives to inspire and encourage the next generation of performers, composers and arts leaders.

Last year saw 大象传媒 NOW perform the first ever ‘Classical Playlist: Live’ concert as a way for audiences to enjoy classical music in a more relaxed environment, and it plans on expanding its work in making orchestral music available in more innovative ways.

In January this year, Lisa Tregale joined the orchestra as director, becoming the first female director in the orchestra’s history. Tonight’s performance – the first Prom from Wales – marks Ryan Bancroft’s debut with the orchestra as its new Principal Conductor.

First Violins
Lesley Hatfield
Nick Whiting
Second Violins
Anna Smith
Jane Sinclair
Violas
Rebecca Jones
Alex Thorndike
Cellos
Alice Neary
Keith Hewitt
Double Bass
David Stark
Flute
Matthew Featherstone
Piccolo
Lindsey Ellis
Oboe
Steven Hudson
Cor Anglais
Sarah-Jayne Porsmoguer
Clarinets
Nick Carpenter
Lenny Sayers
E-flat Clarinet
Nick Carpenter
Bass Clarinet
Lenny Sayers
Bassoon
Jarosław Augustyniak
Contrabassoon
David Buckland
Horns
Tim Thorpe Section
Meilyr Hughes
Trumpets
Philippe Schartz
Robert Samuel
Trombones
Donal Bannister
Dafydd Thomas
Tuba
Daniel Trodden
Percussion
Phil Girling
Phil Hughes
Harp
Valerie Aldrich-Smith
Piano
Catherine Roe Williams
Keyboard
Siwan Rhys Guest

The list of players was correct at the time of publication

大象传媒

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