FESTIVAL LAUNCH

King Harald’s Saga is a 3-act opera based, as is a good deal of 19th century opera, on an actual historical event; in this case, the Norwegian invasion of England in 1066 led by King Harald ‘Hardradi’, which ended in defeat at the battle of Stamford Bridge, 19 days before the successful Norman invasion at the Battle of Hastings.

As King Harald’s Saga is scored for solo soprano and lasts just under ten minutes, a certain amount of compression has been necessary. The soprano sings 8 solo roles, as well as the part of the Norwegian army; and none of the work’s musical items lasts over a minute. Furthermore, since it would be difficult to stage a work which progresses so quickly, the soprano gives a short spoken introduction to each act to establish the staging, as might happen in a radio broadcast of a staged opera.

The musical items are as follows: Act 1 – Harald (aria), Fanfare, Tostig (aria); Act 2 – St Olaf (aria), Harald (aria), Harald’s wives (duet); Act 3 – the Norwegian Army (chorus), Messenger (recit), Soldier (aria); Epilogue – the Icelandic sage (recit).

Much of the detail in the libretto has been taken from the account of the invasion in the 13th century Icelandic saga Heimskringla by Snorri Sturluson (1179-1241).

King Harold’s Saga was written in 1979 and commissioned by Jane Manning with funds provided by the Arts Council of Great Britain.

© Judith Weir

Fourteen virtuoso instrumentalists arrange themselves into a semicircle and a number of them hand round from one to another a continuous, but changing solo line, many of the players thus exploring the roles of both soloist and accompanist within this one piece. A central position on the stage is reserved for whoever is carrying the solo at any one time, creating a fascinating drawn-out dance as players move to the front of the stage and then peregrinate around the outer semicircle as others fill the physical and musical space they have just vacated. 

Such an original ritualised game in sound immediately suggests the pre-eminent hand of Sir Harrison Birtwistle, who has made such a specialisation of combining ritual, theatre and music through more than half a century of spectacular output. Cortege, written to celebrate the reopening of the Royal Festival Hall, is based on a previous piece, Ritual Fragment (1990) – will become a signature piece for the London Sinfonietta. This is only fitting: both pieces are dedicated to the memory of Michael Vyner, the tireless, visionary idealist who was the London Sinfonietta’s first Artistic Director and who died in 1989 at the age of 46. Those who knew Michael well will recognise much of him in Cortege: the restless and almost exotic intensity, the constant concern with talent, dedication and modernity; all these qualities will surely be present in conjuring his memory from the sounds of this world premiere. 

Marshall Marcus © 

Allegro Molto
Scherzo: Allegro non troppo
Adagio non troppo
Minuet
Scherzo: Allegro
Rondo: Allegro

Brahms’s D major Serenade is well known as his first orchestral work – but, like the D minor Piano Concerto from the same period, it had a complicated genesis. It was first conceived in 1857 as a Serenade for eight instruments in three or four movements, and a year later it had become a work in six movements, now scored for nine instruments. By 1860, it had been rewritten for full orchestra – the version that survives today (though Brahms even considered developing that into his first symphony, but decided to leave well alone). The nonet version was performed in public on 28 March 1859 at a concert in Hamburg, and a year later the orchestral version was given its premiere in Hannover. Whether Brahms destroyed the chamber version, or whether the material simply vanished is not known, but a skilful reconstruction reveals something of Brahms’s original conception: a work much closer in spirit to the serenades and divertimentos of Mozart than the reworked orchestral version.

© Nigel Simeone 2013