A Vision in a Dream: Gregson Concertos

Chandos has done Edward Gregson proud in this release.

The Tuba Concerto has a personal connection, in that it was commissioned by Besses o' th' Barn band, based between Whitefield and Prestwich; I passed Besses every day on the way to and back from school - Besses is one of the finest of brass bands of the North of England.

This concerto was intended as a "sequel" to Vaughan Williams' Tuba Concerto. There's more than a touch of Walton to the first movement of the Tuba Concerto. Bright and brash, the opening reflects Gregson's success in the brass band world; Ross Knight's tuba begins like a low-pitched hero but soon reveals the instrument's lyrical side.

The slow movement is its complement: darker, interior, the string chorale so beautiful (the BBC Philharmonic strings sounding lovely under Ben Gernon, who seems to have a real predilection for English music: the one time I heard him live was at the Proms in 2019 with just this orchestra (he became Principal Guest Conductor in 2017), and he kicked off with Malcolm Arnold's Peterloo Overture, Op. 97 (1967)

The finale opens out again into the sunshine, full of dance. Ross Knight (superbly) plays the alternative, more challenging cadenza, too. The performance strikes me as faultless form first to last. And quite right that Gregson should inject life-enhancing rhythms alongside reminders of the concerto's swashbuckling opening.

There are two "interludes" on this disc, both in memoriams. The first is for piano and orchestra and was written in 2-22-24: A Song for Bram (Bram being conductor Bramwell Tovey). The composer himself is soloist, with the important trumpet part performed by Thomas Fountain. The slightly bluesy opening section cedes to a middle section on one of Tovey's favourite hymns (Saint Denio: "Immortal, invisible, God only wise") and also St Clements ("The day thou gavest, Lord, is ended"). In this version of the score (the final 2024), it is trumpet that gives out the opening theme in a sort fo lyrical climax, beautifully played by Fountain:

The Concerto for Three Goddesses was written for the present soloist, Rachel Roberts, and again holds a nimportant solo instrument from the orchestra (here, violin, played by Aoe Beyers). The three Goddesses are: The Morrigan; Aphrodite; Diana. The work is an outgrown of the earlier Goddesses, for strings with viola obbligato.

The Celtic Goddess known as "The Morrigan" is associated with war: this is an extended post that explains thought about her in detail, including the etymology of Her name. She is sometimes also seen as a Triple Goddess (syncretic therefore with Hekate and Diana, single Goddesses with three aspects ('triformis') as opposed to tripilicities such as the Nordic Norns of Götterdämmerung or the elemental triplicity of the Ring's Rheinmaidens). Goddess triplicities tend to have a fearsome aspect, so it is unsurprising two of the tempo markings of this movement include the word "menacingly". Most of all, the tension comes from the tightness of Gregson's writing: nothing is lost, noting is superfluous. Roberts and Gernon are superb in this, Gernon inspiring the BBC Philharmonic to playing of utmost concentration. The solo cadenza-like passage towards the end of this first movement is beautiful, and Roberts is at her most impressive:

Aphrodite, Goddess of Love, surely needs less introduction from me. Nice that Gregson weaves in a reference to Wagner's Tristan und Isolde here, while the use of ground at the end recall's Purcell's Dido and Aeneas. Roberts' viola, so virtuoso in teh first movement, is here achingly lyrical. The clue Gregson gives us in his indications, like Hecate's "menacingly," is via two words: "mysteriously" and "appassionato". Roberts' haunting soliloquies capture these aspects of Aphrodite to perfection. Her sound is always strong, but infinitely malleable, the Dark Morrigan now morphed into something more liminal. To my ears, though, the very final bars seem just a touch contrived by the composer:

Finally, Diana, Goddess of the hunt: remember her contribution to Britten's Serenade for tenor, horn and strings in the fast rondo that is "Hymn"? (so-called because it's a setting of Ben Johnson's Hymn to Diana):

Gregson's Diana-take so full of energy apart from one indicator that, unusually, ends with an exclamation mark ("Dreamily!"), reflecting Diana's lunar aspect (she is also a Goddess of the moon). Roberts articulates the spiky rondo theme to perfection, and interactions with the BBC Philharmonic are expertly managed (Gregson certainly keeps everyone on their toes!).

Rachel Roberts is part of Ensemble 360, so has been much covered via the Sheffield Chamber Music festival (here, for example); she has also featured in a sequence of concerts given in Leytonstone, East London, under the name Pitchstone Music, of which she one of the prime moving forces.

The second interlude is A Song for Sue (1966, adapted 2020, revised 2024), heard here in the version for piano and string orchestra. The "Sue" is Gregson's wife (at the time of composition, his wife-to-be) and the 1966 piece was a Concertante for piano and brass band. The 2020 score is for solo piano in which he extracted the "love theme"; now we have piano and strings in a piece with a delicious reference to Gershwin, plus scoring that in its lusciousness recalls Rachmaninov. It is filmic, but unashamedly so, and clearly heartfelt:

... and here's solo piano version on Naxos:

A Song for Sue acts as the perfect interlude; the concerto from which the disc takes its title, A Vision in a Dream, is the closing work. This is Gregson's oboe concerto, written for Jennifer Galloway in 2019 to a BBC Radio 3 commission, and revised in 2024. The premiere was given by Galloway at Leeds Town Hall, with the present orchestra and conductor. The title is the subtitle of Coleridge-Taylor's Kubla Khan. This concerto is a "re-imagining" of the 2005 piece for oboe and percussion, Shadow of Paradise.

The Prologue is headed by the following lines:

A savage place! as holy and enchanted

As e’er beneath a waning moon was haunted

By woman wailing for her demon-lover!

The origins of a piece with percussion are palpable, while the inaccompanied cor anglais (the brilliant Lydia Griffiths) recalls both Tristan Act 3 in its solo aspect and Berlioz' Symphonie fantastique in its calls-and-responses with the solo oboe. while teh opening of the Tube Concerto was grittily muscular, this is the most Modernist music of the disc so far:

The ensuing "Duologue" is dynamic, as brass represent "prophets of war":

And ’mid this tumult Kubla heard from far

Ancestral voices prophesying war!

Poundings echo Brahms' First Symphony (and maybe Tippett's Second?):

In contrast, the "amoroso" Pastorale offers a space of heart-centred hope:

A damsel with a dulcimer

In a vision I once saw:

Could I revive within me

Her symphony and song,

To such a deep delight ’twould win me

The oboe is the damsel, whose langorous meanderings seem to offer a siren song. I remain to be convinced that this is Gregson's most inspired moment, though: it is beautifully scored and could hardly hope for a better performance, though. The finest moment is the transition to the next movement, bare, raw:

The work closes with three "Round Dances" and an Epilogue. The dances are headed by the following poetry:

Beware! Beware!

His flashing eyes, his floating hair!

Weave a circle round him thrice,

And close your eyes with holy dread,

For he on honey-dew hath fed,

And drunk the milk of Paradise.

The idea of round dance as ritual ("Weave a circle around him thrice") is turned by Gregson into a wild dance a frenetic containing of a foreign energy. Ross Knight is superb here, piping urgently, his oboe speaking in its entreaties. . This is tricky music to perform, and the BBC Philharmonic are absolutely on it. Each dance is between one and two minutes; the third includes a fetching pentatonic tune, interrupted by gong strike that heralds the "Epilogue", including an oboe cadenza with occasional percussion input. The concerto ends in serenity, oboe and cor anglais united as one:

A fabulous disc, then, available at Amazon here. Streaming below except for iDagio, here: