A sum of all parts

Wednesday, 25th March 2009

Most attractively packaged, these four CDs comprising the new survey of British songwriting are issued by NMC recordings to mark the 20th anniversary of its indispensable activities

Most attractively packaged, these four CDs comprising the new survey of British songwriting are issued by NMC recordings to mark the 20th anniversary of its indispensable activities; poetically evocative photographs of the initial letters, drawn from pubs, floral clocks, blue heritage plaques, transport directions, shops, warehouses, fruit barrows, etc., spell out the salient words, and promise a rich and sparky diversity of contents amply fulfilled when one knuckles down to listen.

Vital statistics: the total of 110 items is slightly deceptive because 12 are partial arrangements, by NMC’s presiding begetter Colin Matthews, of a galliard by the eminent Jacobean, Thomas Morley (a 13th presents the entire dance in all its ceremonial majesty). So there are 96 new songs in all; no one will complain of a shortage on these well-filled discs.

Let me also declare several vital interests. Of the 96 composers 10 are ex-pupils of mine (and two ex-teachers), 33 are personal friends, 48 are known to me by acquaintance and/or repute, 15 I’d not heard of before. These categories overlap — I know the sum comes to more than 96! Nor are they hard and fast. And the same goes for a preliminary (but probably also final) sifting according to my sense of calibre and interest. The ‘experience of a lifetime’ grading exams at a great university and the occasional excursion into adjudicating international composing competitions have made it natural to assign classes to this mass of material. Here the sums do add up. My figures yield 40 Duds — varying between frankly dire to passably decent; 24 Standards — minus, middling, plus — representative of a sound well tried mainstream; and 23 Triumphs — pieces (sometimes by surprising names, and often not achieved by those more celebrated) that sustain real utterance within the constraints: something to say, said with skill, intensity, strangeness, beauty. If to these are added 9 which can only be called eccentric, the total comes to 96, I think (though sums were never my forte — a composer only needs to go up to 12, and even that can be too much!).

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