By the mid-1940s, Vaughan Williams had written five symphonies of widely varying characters, from the choral Sea Symphony (1909)[1] to the turbulent and discordant Fourth (1934)[2] and the serene Fifth (1943), which some took to be the septuagenarian composer's symphonic swan song.[3] In the event there were four more symphonies to come; his Sixth was premiered in 1948.[4] After completing it, Vaughan Williams undertook a substantial film score to accompany Scott of the Antarctic produced by Michael Balcon and directed by Charles Frend.[5] The composer became deeply interested in and moved by the story of the disastrous polar expedition of Robert Falcon Scott and his companions, and music suggested by ice and wind, penguins and whales came into his head.[6] Before even seeing the film script he had composed most of the score.[7] His biographer Michael Kennedy writes that the autograph full score contains 996 bars of music, of which about half was used in the finished film.[n 1]
While writing the film music, Vaughan Williams had begun to feel that it might later form the basis of a symphony.[9] He worked on that intermittently during the next few years, between other major compositions including his opera The Pilgrim's Progress. By early 1952 the symphony was complete. His musical assistant Roy Douglas played a piano arrangement to a group of musicians including Arthur Bliss, Gerald Finzi and Edward Dent; also in the group was Ernest Irving, who had commissioned the film score and to whom Vaughan Williams dedicated the new symphony. An orchestral score was sent to Sir John Barbirolli, who had secured the composer's agreement that he should conduct the premiere. The work was first given in public on 14 January 1953 at the Free Trade Hall, Manchester, by Barbirolli and the Hallé Orchestra and Choir with Margaret Ritchie in the wordless soprano solo.[10] The performers repeated the performance at the same venue the following evening, and gave the London premiere at the Royal Festival Hall on 21 January.[11] The title of the symphony was changed at the last minute from Sinfonia Antarctica to Sinfonia Antartica, so as to use consistently Italian spelling in the two words.[11]
Voices: (first and last movements) soprano solo, three-part women's chorus.
Mechanics of the composition
A typical performance lasts around 45 minutes. There are five movements. The composer specified that the third movement lead directly into the fourth. The score includes a brief literary quotation at the start of each movement. While Vaughan Williams did not say that these quotations were intended to form part of a performance of the work, they are sometimes declaimed in performance and in recordings. Among the recordings including the quotations are Sir Adrian Boult's first recording for Decca in 1954 (supervised by the composer) with Sir John Gielgud narrating, and André Previn's 1967 recording for RCA with Sir Ralph Richardson narrating.[14]
1. Prelude: Andante maestoso
To suffer woes which hope thinks infinite,/ To forgive wrongs darker than death or night,/ To defy power which seems omnipotent,/ ... / Neither to change, nor falter, nor repent:/ This ... is to be/ Good, great and joyous, beautiful and free,/ This is alone Life, Joy, Empire and Victory. (quotation from Shelley, Prometheus Unbound)
2. Scherzo: Moderato
There go the ships, and there is that Leviathan whom thou hast made to take his pastime therein. (quotation from Psalm 104, Verse 26)
3. Landscape: Lento
Ye ice falls! Ye that from the mountain's brow/ Adown enormous ravines slope amain —/ Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice,/ And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge!/ Motionless torrents! Silent cataracts! (quotation from Coleridge, Hymn before Sunrise, in the vale of Chamouni)
4. Intermezzo: Andante sostenuto
Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime,/ Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time. (quotation from Donne, The Sun Rising)
5. Epilogue: Alla marcia, moderato (non troppo allegro)
I do not regret this journey; we took risks, we knew we took them, things have come out against us, therefore we have no cause for complaint. (quotation from Captain Scott's Last Journal)
Recordings
Conductor
Orchestra
Chorus
Soloist
Narrator
Recorded
Cat no
Sir John Barbirolli
Hallé Orchestra
Hallé Choir
Margaret Ritchie
—
Free Trade Hall, 15–16 June 1953
HMV ALP 1102
Sir Adrian Boult
London Philharmonic
London Philharmonic Choir
Margaret Ritchie
John Gielgud
Kingsway Hall, 10–11 Dec 1953
Decca LXT 2912
André Previn
London Symphony Orchestra
Ambrosian Singers
Heather Harper
Ralph Richardson
Kingsway Hall, 14–16 Sept 1967
RCA Victor SB 6736
Sir Adrian Boult
London Philharmonic
London Philharmonic Choir
Norma Burrowes
—
Kingsway Hall, 18–21 Nov 1969
HMV ASD 2631
Ainslee Cox
American Symphony Orchestra
ASO Women's Chorus
Jacqueline Pierce
Franklin Williams
Carnegie Hall, 13 April 1970
CRQ Editions CD 251
Bernard Haitink
London Philharmonic
London Philharmonic Choir
Sheila Armstrong
—
Royal Festival Hall, 27 Nov 1984
LPO-0072
Bernard Haitink
London Philharmonic
London Philharmonic Choir
Sheila Armstrong
—
Abbey Road, 28–29 Nov 1984
EMI CDC 7 47516 2
Gennadi Rozhdestvensky
USSR State Symphony Orchestra
Chamber Choir of Moscow Conservatory
Elena Dof-donskaya
—
Philharmonia Building, Leningrad, 28 April 1989
Melodiya CD 10-02170-5
Bryden Thomson
London Symphony Orchestra
LSO Chorus
Catherine Bott
—
St Jude-on-the-Hill, Hampstead, 19–22 June 1989
Chandos CHAN 8796
Vernon Handley
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic
Liverpool Philharmonic Choir
Alison Hargan
—
Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool, April 1990
EMI Eminence CD EMX 2173
Leonard Slatkin
Philharmonia Orchestra
Philharmonia Chorus
Linda Hohenfeld
—
Abbey Road, 28–29 Nov 1991
RCA Victor Red Seal 09026-61195-2
Raymond Leppard
Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra
Indianapolis Symphonic Choir
Dominique Labelle
—
27–29 April 1992
Koss Classics KC 2214
Andrew Davis
BBC Symphony Orchestra
BBC Symphony Chorus
Patricia Rozario
—
St Augustine's Church, London, March 1996
Teldec 0630-13139-2
Kees Bakels
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
Waynflete Singers
Lynda Russell
David Timson
Poole Arts Centre, 6–7 Sept 1996
Naxos 8.550737
Sir Andrew Davis
Bergen Philharmonic
Bergen Philharmonic Choir, Grieg Kor
Mari Eriksmoen
—
Grieghallen, Bergen, 30 Jan to 2 Feb 2017
Chandos CHSA 5186
Andrew Manze
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic
Liverpool Philharmonic Choir
Rowan Pierce
Timothy West
Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool, 28 Sept 2018
ONYX, ONYX4190
Sir Mark Elder
Hallé Orchestra
Hallé Choir
Sophie Bevan
—
Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, 24 January 2019, live and in rehearsal
Hallé CD HLD 7558
Notes, references and sources
Notes
^A suite arranged from the complete score premiered in 2002 plays for more than 40 minutes and consists of 18 sections.[8]
Howes, Frank (1954). The Music of Ralph Vaughan Williams. London: Oxford University Press. OCLC459433504.
Kennedy, Michael (2002). The Film Music of Ralph Vaughan Williams. Colchester: Chandos. OCLC173228673.
Vaughan Williams, Ursula (1964). RVW: A Biography of Ralph Vaughan Williams. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN978-0-19-315411-7.
Further reading
Beckerman, Michael (Spring 2000). "The Composer as Pole Seeker: Reading Vaughan Williams's Sinfonia antartica." Current Musicology, no. 69, pp. 42–67.
Grimley, Daniel M. (Spring-Summer 2008). "Music, Ice, and the 'Geometry of Fear': The Landscapes of Vaughan Williams's 'Sinfonia Antartica.'" The Musical Quarterly, vol. 91, nos. 1–2, pp. 116–150.
Mason, Colin. (March 1953). "Vaughan Williams's 'Sinfonia Antartica.'" The Musical Times, vol. 94, no. 1321, p. 128.