Holst: Orchestral Works, Vol. 3 Susan Gritton, BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Chorus & Sir Andrew Davis

• Gustav Holst (1874 - 1934): The Mystic Trumpeter, Op. 18, H. 71:
• 1Holst: The Mystic Trumpeter, Op. 18, H. 71: Hark! Some wild trumpeter (Revised 1912)06:31
• 2Holst: The Mystic Trumpeter, Op. 18, H. 71: Blow again, trumpeter - O, how the immortal phantoms crowd around me (Revised 1912)03:17
• 3Holst: The Mystic Trumpeter, Op. 18, H. 71: Blow again, trumpeter - O trumpeter (Revised 1912)03:14
• 4Holst: The Mystic Trumpeter, Op. 18, H. 71: Now trumpeter, for thy close (Revised 1912)05:30
• First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, Prelude:
• 5Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, Prelude: Invocation to Pan "O Thou, whose mighty palace roof doth hang" (Chorus)03:38
• First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, I, Song and Bacchanal:
• 6Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, I, Song and Bacchanal: Ia. Beneath my palm trees, by the river side (Soprano)04:33
• 7Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, I, Song and Bacchanal: Ib. And as I sat, over the light blue hills (Soprano)01:38
• 8Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, I, Song and Bacchanal: II - IV. Whence came ye, merry Damsels! whence came ye! (Chorus) - Within his car, aloft, young Bacchus stood (Soprano) - Whence came ye, jolly Satyrs (Chorus)02:09
• 9Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, I, Song and Bacchanal: V & VI. Onward the tiger and the leopard pants (Soprano) - Bacchus, young Bacchus (Chorus)02:07
• First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, II, Ode on a Grecian Urn:
• 10Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, II, Ode on a Grecian Urn: Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness (Chorus)02:58
• 11Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, II, Ode on a Grecian Urn: Heard melodies are sweet, but those undeard (Chorus)02:09
• 12Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, II, Ode on a Grecian Urn: Ah, happy boughs! that cannot shed (Chorus)01:48
• 13Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, II, Ode on a Grecian Urn: Who are these coming to the sacrifice? (Chorus)02:01
• 14Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, II, Ode on a Grecian Urn: O Attic shape! fair attitude! with brede (Chorus)03:15
• First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, III, Scherzo:
• 15Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, III, Scherzo: I. Fancy "Ever let the Fancy roam" (Chorus)02:56
• 16Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, III, Scherzo: II. Folly's Song "When wedding fiddles are a-playing" (Chorus)02:47
• First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, IV, Finale:
• 17Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, IV, Finale: I & II. Spirit here that reignest! (Soprano) - God of the Golden bow (Chorus)03:16
• 18Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, IV, Finale: III & IV. Then, through thy Temple wide (Soprano) - Tis awful silence then again (Chorus)05:18
• 19Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, IV, Finale: V & VIa. Next thy Tasso's ardent numbers (Soprano) - But when Thou joinest with the Nine (Chorus)03:17
• 20Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, IV, Finale: VIb. Bards of Passion and of Mirth (Chorus)04:49
• 21Holst: First Choral Symphony, Op. 41, H. 155, IV, Finale: VII. Spirit here that reignest! (Soprano) - Bards of Passion and of Mirth (Chorus)02:05
• Total Runtime01:09:16

Info for Holst: Orchestral Works, Vol. 3

The Grammy-nominated soprano Susan Gritton joins Sir Andrew Davis and the BBC Symphony Chorus and Orchestra in the third volume of Chandos’ series exploring orchestral works by Gustav Holst. Inspired by Keats’s writings, the First Choral Symphony was described by Holst as “the best thing I have written.” It is paired with The Mystic Trumpeter, a work based on a poem by Walt Whitman.

Composed originally in 1904 and revised in 1912, The Mystic Trumpeter received only two performances in Holst’s lifetime, and it was not revived until 1980. Holst based this work on a poem from Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass. The influence of Hindu thought is clearly present throughout the piece, while musically there are fingerprints of his later style too, particularly in the use of bitonality (two different keys used simultaneously). The ending, calm and beautifully serene, is wholly characteristic of the mature Holst’s ability to do the unexpected.

Holst drafted the First Choral Symphony in 1923, shortly after his largely unsuccessful attempt at grand opera with The Perfect Fool. The mixed reception that the Symphony received was to some extend provoked by his choice of texts. All are by Keats, but they are still vastly different one from another. Holst chose them for their ability to stimulate his musical imagination, and the fact that, verbally, they followed little or no sequence was of no great concern to him. In the texts from Endymion, for example, his exuberant side is given free rein, while Ode on a Grecian Urn reveals another side, one of calm and composure. ‘Fancy’, from Extracts from an Opera, is set as a whirling Scherzo, ‘Folly’s Song’ serving as a contrasting earthbound trio. Holst himself said of this Symphony: ‘I think the work as a whole is the best thing I have written.’

Susan Gritton, soprano
BBC Symphony Chorus
BBC Symphony Orchestra
Sir Andrew Davis, conductor

Susan Gritton
studied botany at Oxford and London Universities and won the 1994 Kathleen Ferrier Memorial Prize. Recognized as one of the finest and most versatile singers of her generation, her operatic engagements have included Liù (Turandot), Micäela (Carmen) and Marenka (The Bartered Bride) for the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; Blanche (Dialogues des Carmélites), Konstanze (Die Entführung aus dem Serail), Vitellia (La clemenza di Tito), Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte), Romilda (Xerxes), Cleopatra (Giulio Cesare) and the title role of Rodelinda at the Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich; Ellen Orford (Peter Grimes) for Opera Australia and La Scala, Milan and Donna Anna (Don Giovanni) for the Opéra de Montréal and for the Bolshoi in Moscow. She has sung the title role in Theodora at the Glyndebourne Festival; Countess Madeleine (Capriccio) for Grange Park Opera and her many roles at the English National Opera have included Countess Almaviva (Le nozze di Figaro), Pamina (Die Zauberflöte), Fiordiligi and the title role in The Cunning Little Vixen. She has also sung in innovative staged performances of Sibelius’s Luonnotar in London; Honegger’s Jeanne d’Arc au bûcher in Rome and Handel’s Messiah in Vienna.

She is a regular guest with many of the world’s great orchestras, working with conductors such as Sir Charles Mackerras, Sir Simon Rattle, Sir Colin Davis, Antonio Pappano, Richard Hickox, Sir Bernard Haitink, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Paul McCreesh, Daniel Harding and Sir Roger Norrington. A Grammy nominated artist, she has recorded prolifically.

Booklet for Holst: Orchestral Works, Vol. 3