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Available to stream online from 7:30pm, 28 May 2021 until midnight, 6 June 2021

Programme

Errollyn Wallen Horseplay

Stravinsky Pulcinella

(full ballet with narration)

Violin 1Clio GouldManon Derome Charles Sewart Sophie LockettAnna Harpham

Violin 2Kathy ShaveCiaran McCabeAlexandra CaldonGuy ButtonHarriet Murray

ViolaKate MuskerBecky LowJenny CoombesMariam Ruetschi

CelloRobert MaxJulia GrahamRachael LanderBecky Knight

BassStacey WattonAndy MarshallTim AmherstMartin Ludenbach

Flute Karen Jones Chris Hankin

Oboe Gordon HuntAlison Alty

ClarinetMark van de Wiel

Bass ClarinetJonathan Parkin

Soprano SaxophoneSimon Haram

BassoonMeyrick AlexanderBartosz Kwasecki

HornAlex WideDavid McQueen

Trumpet Ross Brown

Trombone Andrew Connington

Percussion Julian PooleJoby Burgess

With

Christopher Warren-Green, conductor

and special guests

Errollyn Wallen, presenter & narrator

Lucy Crowe, soprano

Toby Spence, tenor

James Platt, bass

London Chamber Orchestra

Presented by Errollyn Wallen

At The Ballet

Errollyn Wallen Horseplay

I. dark and mysteriousII. livelyIII. larghettoIV. dark and mysterious - presto!

Errollyn Wallen is celebrated both as a singer-songwriter and for her rigorous and communicative contemporary music. Her works include operas of many different sizes (the latest, Dido’s Ghost, is premiered this summer at the Barbican), as well as a plethora of chamber music, solo and ensemble piano pieces and concertos, plus award-winning scores for film and TV. Early in her career she started her own group, Ensemble X, with the motto: ‘We don’t break down barriers...we don’t see any.’

Born in Belize, Wallen moved to the UK with her family at the age of two. Creating music absorbed her even from childhood. Her passion for dance led her to train with the Dance Theater of Harlem, but she eventually left in order to concentrate on composition. She went

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The Guardian described the 1998 ballet score Horseplay as ‘one of Wallen’s satisfyingly dense dance scores... a four-movement array of melodic and textural delights.’

Tom Sapsford for the Royal Ballet, who gave the premiere that year at the Theatre Royal, Sheffield.

Sapsford writes: ‘Horseplay is a ballet for four male dancers. The composer’s idea of the horse as archetype was the impetus of the work. Each movement has its own colour and word or image associated with horses: the first is ‘dark’ and brooding, the second is ‘swift’ and is a winged horse cutting brightly through the sky. The word for the third movement is ‘rocking’ which sways beautifully but uneasily, and the fourth, ‘race’, gallops on to the climactic finishing post.’

Igor Stravinsky Pulcinella

I. SinfoniaII. SerenataIII. Scherzino – Allegretto – AndantinoIV. TarantellaV. ToccataVI. Gavotta (con due variazioni)VII. VivoVIII. Minuetto – Finale

Since its launch a century ago, the LCO has given numerous world and UK premieres of new works ranging all the way from Gabriel Fauré to Graham Fitkin. Perhaps one of the most significant was the UK premiere of Igor Stravinsky’s Suite from the ballet score Pulcinella – and this work has remained associated with the orchestra ever since.

Tonight, we have not the Suite but the whole ballet, complete with three solo singers and a new, specially written narration by Freya Johnson, a student at Queen Mary University of London.

The world premiere of Pulcinella was given on 15 May 1920 at the Paris Opéra, by Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. Following Diaghilev’s principles of employing the very best artists for every aspect of a new work, the designs were by Pablo Picasso and the choreography by Leonid Massine. Diaghilev, for whom Stravinsky had written his three most famous ballet scores seven to ten years earlier – The Firebird, Petrushka and Le Sacre du Printemps – was responsible for dreaming up the idea, partly in order to repair a relationship with Stravinsky that had turned shaky, and also perhaps to create something in tune with the new cultural mood emerging in the wake of World War I’s devastation.

Orchestras were smaller, the music written for them inspired by the chamber orchestras of the classical era, in marked contrast to the extravagant scale on which composers such as Mahler, Debussy and Stravinsky

on to study at London and Cambridge universities. Her Concerto for Percussion and Orchestra was the first work by a black woman to be performed at the Proms. Indeed, she is the UK’s first internationally celebrated black female composer, and has become a figurehead for a whole new generation. She was awarded an MBE in 2007 and a CBE in 2020. As for her own role models, the figure she cites most often is JS Bach, not least for his intense, down-to-earth work ethic.

Wallen has been recognised with commissions for the Paralympics opening ceremony in 2012 and the Royal Opera House, among many others. She has won an Ivor Novello Award, and teaches at Trinity Laban College of Music, Royal College of Music and Birmingham Conservatoire, where her students included the singer-songwriter Laura Mvula. She has recently been appointed Visiting Professor of Composition at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

The Guardian described the 1998 ballet score Horseplay as ‘one of Wallen’s satisfyingly dense dance scores… a four-movement array of melodic and textural delights.’ It was commissioned by the choreographer

himself had operated in earlier decades. Crossing the Place de la Concorde in Paris with the composer, Diaghilev made the suggestion that he should look at some 18th-century pieces with a view to orchestrating them for a ballet. At the mention of Pergolesi, Stravinsky thought the impresario must be out of his mind.

An examination of the Italian manuscript from 1700 that Diaghilev sent his way soon convinced him: ‘I looked and fell in love,’ he later recalled. As it turns out, more than half the music was not at all by Pergolesi; this Commedia dell’Arte story of wit, deception and mistaken identity unfurls thanks to the additional input of such composers as Domenico Gallo from Venice, the Dutch diplomat Count von Wassenaer and a priest from Milan, Carlo Iganazio Monza.

‘I began by composing on the Pergolesi manuscripts themselves, as though I were correcting an old work of my own,’ Stravinsky wrote. ‘I knew that I could not produce a “forgery” of Pergolesi because my motor habits are so different; at best, I could repeat him in my own accent.’ He therefore retained the melodies and the bass-line and worked that ‘accent’ into the music’s inner voices. At first it can sound like 18th-century music with ‘wrong notes’ – but there is amply more to it than that. Stravinsky’s own voice twinkles out of every bar. ‘The remarkable thing about Pulcinella,’ he said, ‘is not how much but how little has been added or changed.’

Diaghilev, who had not expected more than a reorchestration, was somewhat shocked and not a little displeased by the result. It triumphed initially – Picasso’s designs in particular – but as a theatrical entity the production was too soon forgotten. Stravinsky, who had real affection for this score, made the concert suite in 1922 and later transformed it again into the Suite Italienne for violin and piano.

LCO gave the UK premiere of the Pulcinella Suite in 1925. It was described by The Sunday Times as ‘most admirable fooling’.

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‘I began by composing on the Pergolesi manuscripts themselves, as though I were correcting an old work of my own,’ Stravinsky wrote. ‘I knew that I could not produce a “forgery” of Pergolesi because my motor habits are so different; at best, I could repeat him in my own accent.’

Toby SpenceTenor

Toby Spence is an internationally renowned tenor, dividing his time between the concert platform and some of the world’s best opera houses.

He has sung with the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic orchestras under Rattle, San Francisco Symphony under Tilson Thomas, Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia under Pappano, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra under Gergiev, Los Angeles Philharmonic under Dudamel and at the Salzburg and Edinburgh Festivals under Norrington and Mackerras.

Highlights of this season include Florestan Fidelio in Stavanger and Garsington Opera; Mahler 8 at Atlanta Symphony Hall; Das Lied von der Erde in São Carlos; The Dream of Gerontius at the Slovak Philharmonic Concert Hall; Missa Solemnis with the Wroclaw Philharmonic and Britten’s Serenade with the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, l’Orchestre National de Lyon and the Kanazawa Orchestra Ensemble in Tokyo.

Christopher Warren-GreenConductor

British conductor Christopher Warren-Green is Music Director of both the London Chamber Orchestra and Charlotte Symphony in North Carolina.

Warren-Green has worked extensively in North America, with key engagements including The Philadelphia Orchestra, the Detroit, Houston, St. Louis, Toronto, Milwaukee, Seattle and Vancouver symphony orchestras, the Minnesota Orchestra and Washington’s National Symphony Orchestra. In Europe, he has worked with the Philharmonia Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Belgian National Orchestra and Iceland Symphony amongst others. And further afield, Warren-Green works with orchestras such as the NHK, Singapore and Sapporo symphony orchestras and the Hong Kong Philharmonic.

In addition to his international commitments, he has been invited to conduct at the weddings of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge at Westminster Abbey in 2011 and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex at St George’s Chapel, Windsor, in 2018. He conducted the Philharmonia Orchestra for HM The Queen’s 90th birthday concert at Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, as well as HRH The Prince of Wales’ 60th birthday concert in Buckingham Palace.

A violinist by training, Warren-Green began his career aged 19 as concertmaster of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, followed by the Philharmonia Orchestra and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music, having been a Professor there for eight years, and has appeared numerous times on television and radio. He has recorded extensively for Sony, Philips, Virgin EMI, Chandos, Decca and Deutsche Grammophon, and records with the London Chamber Orchestra for Signum Classics.

Errollyn WallenComposer

Errollyn Wallen is a Belize-born British composer whose output includes twenty operas and a large catalogue of works which are performed internationally. Her latest large-scale work, a re-imagining of Parry’s Jerusalem — JERUSALEM — our clouded hills for soprano and orchestra was performed at last year’s Last Night of the Proms and broadcast around the world from Royal Albert Hall. THIS FRAME IS PART OF THE PAINTING for mezzo-soprano and orchestra, is a BBC Proms commission for 2019 and was performed by BBC National Orchestra of Wales, conducted by Elim Chan, to a sold out Royal Albert Hall. Her acclaimed Concerto Grosso was released on the NMC label in January 2020, performed by Chineke! who also premièred the chamber work NNENNA. Her opera The Silent Twins (libretto by April De Angelis) will receive its US première in New York in 2022.

Her arrangement of Johnetta Bryant’s song, I’m a Young Black Man (composed in response to George Floyd’s murder) for Clean Bandit and Friends has received over 86,000 views to date on YouTube. It features Grace Chatto, Sheku and Braimah Kanneh-Mason, Nicola and Stephanie Benedetti.

Other works in progress include a piano concerto (commissioned by Royal Birmingham Conservatoire), a new opera for Chicago Opera Theatre and a book on composing.

Errollyn is co-curator of Spitalfields Festival 2020 and 2021. Her new radio documentary, Classical Commonwealth, has just been broadcast on Radio 3. In 2015 she became an Honorary Fellow of Mansfield College, Oxford and in 2019 an Honorary Fellow of Goldsmiths, London.

Lucy CroweSoprano

Born in Staffordshire, Lucy Crowe studied at the Royal Academy of Music, where she is now a Fellow. With repertoire ranging from Purcell, Handel and Mozart to Donizetti’s Adina, Verdi’s Gilda and Janacek’s Vixen, she has sung with opera companies throughout the world, including the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, the Glyndebourne Festival, English National Opera, the Teatro Real Madrid, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Bavarian State Opera, Munich, and the Metropolitan Opera, New York. In concert, she has performed with many of the world’s finest conductors and orchestras including the Berlin Philharmonic/Harding and Nelsons, Vienna Philharmonic/Nelsons, the Monteverdi Orchestra/Gardiner, the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia/Pappano and the London Symphony Orchestra/Rattle. A committed recitalist she has appeared at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, New York’s Carnegie Hall, and the Aldeburgh, Edinburgh, Mostly Mozart and Salzburg Festivals, and is a regular guest at the BBC Proms and Wigmore Hall.

James PlattBass

British bass James Platt was educated at Chetham’s School of Music and went on to study at the Royal Academy of Music and the Opera Course of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. He was a member of the Jette Parker Young Artist Programme at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden from 2014-2016.

Recent highlights have included Crespel Les Contes d’Hoffmann and Basilio Il barbiere di Siviglia for the Deutsche Oper, Berlin; Sarastro Die Zauberflöte and Sparafucile Rigoletto for the Welsh National Opera; Ortel Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg for Teatro alla Scala, Milan; Il Commendatore Don Giovanni for Opera North; and Notary Don Pasquale at the Glyndebourne Festival.

His concert appearances include Handel’s Messiah with the Hallé Orchestra/Christian Curnyn, Verdi’s Requiem with the Orchestre National de Lyon/Leonard Slatkin, Dvorak’s Requiem with the BBC Symphony Orchestra/Jiri Belohlavek, Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle at the BBC Proms with the BBC Singers/David Hill and Nino’s Ghost in Rossini’s Semiramide also at the BBC Proms with the OAE/Sir Mark Elder.

Meyrick AlexanderBassoon

When did you first start playing music?I was taken to hear Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring when I was seven years old and decided then and there to become a bassoonist. I started on the violin and piano and began the bassoon when I was eleven

If you could collaborate with anyone, who would it be and why? Josef Haydn. He would be my favourite person to meet. We could talk about our shared interest of vegetable gardening and I could persuade him to write a Bassoon Concerto.

London Chamber Orchestra Musicians

Ross BrownTrumpet

Describe your favourite LCO experience Impossible - there are so many! All LCO performances manage to be memorable in many ways, but being part of the Royal Wedding in Westminster Abbey in 2011 was particularly so – the atmosphere in London that day was so happy and optimistic.

If you could collaborate with anyone, who would it be and why? Bach’s trumpeter Gottfried Reiche must have been an incredible player to get around the incredibly florid and strenuous trumpet parts that Bach wrote for him, all without valves! I’d love to have played in one of the services in Leipzig, time-travel permitting!

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I can’t wait to get to bustle my way through the throngs and sign in at the stage door again

Andrew MarshallDouble Bass

When did you first start playing music?We had a string class when I was about 7 and we were asked to choose a string instrument from the room. There were all these tiddly little fiddles and cellos at the front, and then I saw this gigantic beast at the back. I thought, “I’m having some of that...”

Have you been part of a performance that didn’t feature classical music? One non-classical memory is playing for a Peter Gabriel gig at a festival in Portugal. At the end as the dusk settled, 50,000 people carried on singing the last number “Don’t Give Up” back to us as we packed up and left the stage. It was magical.

What are you most looking forward to doing as lockdown eases? Definitely being able to perform to audiences again. Having that connection again, it’s why we do it. That and being able to get away to the mountains when I’m not working!

Andrew ConningtonTrombone

When did you first start playing music?I first started playing the piano when I was in year 1 or 2 primary school. My sister was having lessons behind a closed door and I really wanted to know what was going on in there! I then moved onto the trombone in year 3 after watching an Acker Bilk concert where he had a small group with him – the trombonist looked like he was having lots of fun and the instrument kept changing size! No going back after that!

If you could collaborate with anyone, who would it be and why? I would love to have met Glenn Miller - growing up I was obsessed with his dance band and he was taken too soon! I said met rather than collaborate as I don’t think someone as incredibly gifted as Glenn Miller would be able to cope with my swing playing!

Karen JonesFlute

When did you first start playing music? I am the fifth generation of professional orchestral musicians. In fact my great grandmother was the harpist in LPO, and the first female to be employed in a London orchestra.

Describe your favourite LCO experienceMy outstanding memory of LCO is the very first time I ever played with them, nearly thirty years ago. I turned up to what was effectively my first professional engagement, and we recorded Mendelssohn 4th Symphony. I remember being so incredulous at the pace of the outer movements, and felt as though we were all wildly on fire. That was my first taste of the electricity that is palpably switched on when Christopher Warren-Green is at the helm and he unleashes and empowers his musicians to play truly from their hearts.

Have you been part of a performance that didn’t feature classical music? Most memorably and unbelievably was working with Chick Corea and his ensemble on and album called SPAIN. In addition, recording with Stevie Wonder was surreal and beyond my wildest dreams.

Jennifer CoombesViola

Describe your favourite LCO experienceThe very first time I played with LCO will be always etched in my memory. I was in a slight lull gig-wise, and I was booked very last minute to fill in for someone who couldn’t make the LCO concert, and the second the rehearsal started I had the biggest smile on my face. The standard was incredibly high, but even more importantly for me at the time, everyone was giving it their absolute all, and I can remember that feeling of euphoria that exciting music making brings so well, which I hadn’t felt for a while before that concert, and which, in some ways, made me fall in love with the profession all over again.

What are you most looking forward to doing as lockdown eases? Performing to a live audience! When I was little, one of my teachers told me that a performance is made up of three ‘entities’ – the composer, the performer and the audience. Each are important for a full performance, and one-third of that has been missing for so long (the performers themselves have also been missing to a large degree!). It is going to be so exhilarating and I cannot wait.

Ciaran McCabeViolin

When did you first start playing music? I started the violin when I was 9, after taking an aural test at school. I was asked what instrument I’d like to play and I remember choosing cello. Unfortunately they had no cello places left and so I had to be content with my second choice!

Describe your favourite LCO experienceMy first major tour with the orchestra to Korea, back in 2008. We performed with cellist Ha-na Chang in wonderful concert halls to full audiences every night and received an incredibly warm reception. The local culture and cuisine was good too!

What are you most looking forward to doing as lockdown eases? Like most musicians, playing to audiences and touring again!

Rachael LanderCello

When did you first start playing music? I started playing when I was 8, having begged my parents, who are both professional orchestral musicians and both remarried two more orchestral musicians, for 3 years. They relented and let me start playing the cello.

What are you most looking forward to doing as lockdown eases? I work a lot in the West End and I love playing in pits of packed theatres. I can’t wait to get to bustle my way through the throngs and sign in at the stage door again.

Julian PoolePercussion

When did you first start playing music?My mum and dad were both in the BBC Symphony Orchestra so I was surrounded by music from day one. When I realised playing for Spurs was never going to happen, I decided it had to be music and was always going to be the drums.

Have you been part of a performance that didn’t feature classical music? No - I’ve played my trombone whilst splashing around in a paddling pool and in total darkness but no matter how bizarre the setting, it’s always been based in classical music!

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It felt as though we were all wildly on fire. That was my first taste of the electricity that is palpably switched on when Christopher Warren-Green is at the helm

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When I realised playing for Spurs was never going to happen, I decided it had to be music

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London Chamber OrchestraQueen Mary University of London, Mile End Road, London E1 4NS

info@lco.co.uk020 3397 1298

Andrée Concert Overture Annamaria Kowalsky Rhizom

Poulenc Organ Concerto

Chloé van Soeterstède conductor Anna Lapwood presenter & organ soloist

London Chamber Orchestra

Chloé van Soeterstède

Airs and OrganistsPresented by Anna Lapwood

25 June 2021

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At the Ballet was recorded at St John’s Smith Square, Westminster, London SW1P 3HA

This concert is generously supported by Arts Council England’s Culture Recovery Fund & The Garfield Weston Foundation

Partnered with Bluestone Vineyards

Programme notes by Jessica Duchen