Brian Gothic Symphony

 Day 91

Brian Gothic Symphony 

Soloists

Various choirs

BBC National Orchestra of Wales

BBC Concert Orchestra

Martyn Brabbins

This short series of British Symphonies ends with perhaps one of the most famous - perhaps notorious - of all of them. The Gothic symphony has the reputation of being both the longest and biggest of all symphonies. Whether that is true depends on how you define a symphony and whether or not you count unperformed pieces but under any definition this is a monster of a piece. The score is almost unreadable simply because there are so many staves so how anybody conducts from it is a complete mystery. There is a famous picture of Sir Adrian Boult, who conducted the professional premiere, addressing the distant choir at a rehearsal though a megaphone.

I’d heard a couple of the shorter Brian symphonies before but this was my first exposure to the Gothic. It is certainly an extraordinary piece and hearing it live in the Albert Hall must have been a thrilling experience But in the cold light of day how does it rate as a piece of music?  Pretty well in my opinion. There was some very impressive music here as well as some music which seemed, at least on first hearing, completely bizarre and impenetrable. There is a multiplicity of music styles here: the Russian influence is strong but it is still demonstrably English in character - Holst and Vaughan Williams were clearly part of the same tradition though they never ventured into the extremes of the idiom in the way that Brian does. But there are all sorts of other resonances in the music as well as foretastes of things to come. There were hints of Ives, Stravinsky and Britten among others.

The choral writing is extraordinary and places almost impossible demands on the singers - I noticed that some discrete organ support for some of the most difficult passages which was not included in the score. It is a reminder of the virtuosity that composers could expect from English choirs in the early 20th century - the choral symphonies of Granville Bantock are another example.  

I must confess that I didn’t listen to the symphony in one continuous sitting but spaced it out over the day - so perhaps I didn’t get the full cumulative effect of the piece but still it made a big impact. There is an endless fascination in what Brian does with the massive forces at his disposal. Not everything works and in many ways he doesn’t exploit some of the more unusual instruments in the way that I had expected. But his writing for the percussion is phenomenal - and the xylophone solo in the third section is one of the maddest things I have ever heard in a major symphonic work - I hope the player got a special bow at the end of the performance.

This ends this phase of my exploration of British symphonies. There are still many more of them to listen to and perhaps I will return to the subject later in the project.