It really doesn’t matter whether Granville Bantock is writing music about ancient Greece, the life of Christ, Celtic, Islamic, or Hindu legend, or setting the words of the Bible. What you get is the same luscious, exotic, vividly orchestrated music full of sinuous faux-oriental melodies and big splashy climaxes. It may be counted a defect that he was not able to better characterize his subject matter, but if you enjoy his bold late-Romantic style you’re not going to care especially, and there’s really no reason why you should, particularly when the performances have the sort of conviction on offer here.
The Overture to a Greek Tragedy is a big, brooding slab of music similar to a Tchaikovsky tone poem, if without quite the intensity. Some of the quicker music also offers a nod to Beethoven’s Coriolan Overture, but it’s great fun and Handley whips up the climaxes to a fine lather. Pierrot of the Minute sounds delightful, and we can readily appreciate Bantock’s gift for writing music that’s light in texture but doesn’t wind up sounding like leftover Mendelssohn (as does so much British music in this vein). The Wilderness and the Solitary Place comes from a massive oratorio on the life of Christ, and its pretty writing for harp and tambourine would not sound out of place in a score for a Hollywood Bible epic. It’s a charmer.
All of which brings us to The Song of Songs, another huge oratorio completed (like most of Bantock’s larger works) in pieces over a number of years. These excerpts last some 40 minutes and contain most of the love music, which according to the excellent booklet notes (which I am quite prepared to believe) seem to have inspired the composer to the finest music in the work. Of course, the choruses are all missing, and probably much else besides, but what we have is opulent, skillfully written, and certainly enough to give us a sense of what Bantock was up to, which of course was more of the usual, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
As noted above, Handley’s conducting leaves nothing to be desired, and the playing of the Royal Philharmonic is terrific too. Soloists Elizabeth Connell and Kim Begley sing bravely and generally well, though neither singer has a vocal timbre that strikes me as especially fetching. Curiously both seem happiest when they sing loudest, and thankfully Bantock gives them plenty of opportunity to cut loose. The sonics are state-of-the-art, with hugely resonant bass and excellent balances. If you’re collecting this series, here’s another winner.
