Polite Patriotism: The Edwardian Gentleman in English Music, 1904 to 1914

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 383-416
Author(s):  
Paul Hopwood
Keyword(s):  
High Tide ◽  
Folk Song ◽  
National Character ◽  
Upper Lip ◽  
Methodological Basis ◽  
English Music ◽  
Musical Activity ◽  
Musical Rhetoric ◽  
Nationalist Sentiment ◽  
Vaughan Williams

In Edwardian England many of the most widely acknowledged qualities of the national character coalesced around the figure of the English gentleman. One of his defining features was his emotional restraint, his ‘stiff upper-lip’. But these were also years during which patriotic and even nationalist sentiment rose to a high tide, and there was considerable tension between the whole-hearted expression of nationalism and the restrain demanded by gentlemanly manners. This article explores this tension as it was staged and negotiated in the folk-song rhapsodies and nature portraits by Vaughan Williams, Holst, Delius and others during the years from 1904 to 1914. As a methodological basis the article adopts the notion of musical subjectivity – that is, the idea that music can offer a virtual persona with which the listener is invited to identify, and as whom he or she may participate in the musical activity. In this context it is possible to identify aspects of musical rhetoric, namely, the manners which regulate the interaction between the virtual subjectivity and the listener. Ultimately the article suggests that it is the embodiment of gentlemanly manners, every bit as much as the use of folk-song or the representation of English landscape, that accounts for the particularly English quality commonly identified in this music.

scholarly journals Carl Nielsen and the Idea of English National Music

2012 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Fjeldsøe ◽  
Jens Boeg
Keyword(s):  
Theoretical Background ◽  
Folk Song ◽  
Ralph Vaughan Williams ◽  
English Music ◽  
A Value ◽  
Good Music ◽  
National Music ◽  
English Composers ◽  
Hearts And Minds ◽  
Vaughan Williams

Why did Carl Nielsen achieve such a favourable reception in England from the 1950s on, compared to the rather reluctant recognition in continental Europe? We would suggest that one reason could be an affi nity of features in his music with the concept of English national music. This attempt to discuss the British reception of Nielsen does, of course, not imply that Nielsen’s music is English. From a constructivist position, national musics are based on cultural common-views in a population of people identifying themselves with a certain concept of a nation which they regard their own. The concept of English national music had Ralph Vaughan Williams as chief engineer and champion. Based on Cecil J. Sharp’s scientific investigation of the English folk song, Vaughan Williams developed a theoretical background on which English composers could (and later would) create their compositions, and his thoughts became prevalent through the English musical establishment. Such ideas of English music did not by accident or as some kind of revelation find their way to the hearts and minds of English listeners and critics. The success was due to a deliberate effort by a national movement, and a most crucial feature was the introduction of folk song singing in elementary schools, instilling these particular views into following generations of listeners. Though mainly concerned with the music of England, Vaughan Williams’ ideas were not limited by nationality as such, but were general guidelines for every composer in every nation of the world. In many ways Nielsen’s music can be seen to fi t Vaughan Williams’ characteristics for good music. When fi rst established, ideas of national music are embedded in a value system that considers such music of high quality and thus music – like Nielsen’s – which has affi nities with the image of English national music, is more likely to be recognized and appreciated as ‘good’.

Traditions of Russian Folklore in P. A. Vyazemsky’s Poems “Another Troika” and “In Memory of the Painter Orlovsky”

2020 ◽  
pp. 56-65
Author(s):  
Сейран Акопович Джанумов
Keyword(s):  
19Th Century ◽  
Folk Songs ◽  
Folk Song ◽  
National Character ◽  
Literary Critic ◽  
Nature Poetry ◽  
Image Structure ◽  
Functionally Diverse ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
The Relationship

Статья посвящена проблеме взаимоотношений литературы и фольклора на материале двух стихотворений русского поэта, литературного критика XIX в. П. А. Вяземского (1792-1878) « Еще тройка» (1834) и «Памяти живописца Орловского» (между 1832 и 1837), в которых слиты воедино народно-песенная образность, традиционные фольклорные мотивы и проникновенный лиризм. Отмечается, что обращение Вяземского к фольклору глубоко органично и вполне закономерно для него, неразрывно соединено с его пониманием народности литературы, поэзии природной, самобытной, а не заимствованной. Делается вывод, что связь рассмотренных в статье стихотворений Вяземского с устным народным творчеством нашла выражение в широком и функционально разнообразном использовании поэтики народных песен, пословиц и поговорок, а также мифологических персонажей русского фольклора. Применяя фольклорные образы и мотивы, Вяземский меньше всего заботится о соблюдении местного, национального колорита, так называемого couleur locale (фр.). Введение поэтических формул русского фольклора всегда обусловлено идейно-художественным замыслом, содержанием и образным строем стихотворения. Именно органичная, нерасторжимая и глубокая связь творчества Вяземского с русской национальной стихией, литературными и народнопоэтическими традициями обеспечила его произведениям непреходящую ценность и эстетическую значимость. The article considers the problem of the relationship between literature and folklore based on two poems by the 19th-century Russian poet and literary critic P. A. Vyazemsky (1792-1878), “Another Troika” (1834) and “In Memory of the Painter Orlovsky” (between 1832 and 1837). The poems merge folk song imagery, traditional folk motifs and heartfelt lyricism. The author notes that Vyazemsky’s appeal to folklore is deeply organic and quite natural for him, inextricably linked with his understanding of the national character of literature, nature poetry, and originality. The author demonstrates that the connection of Vyazemsky’s poems with oral folk art manifests itself in an extensive and functionally diverse use of the poetics of folk songs, proverbs and sayings, as well as in references to mythological characters of Russian folklore. Using folk images and motifs, Vyazemsky downplays the depiction of local, national color (so-called “couleur locale”). The introduction of poetic formulas of Russian folklore is due to the poet’s ideological and artistic design and corresponds to the poem’s content and image structure. It is the organic, indissoluble and deep connection of Vyazemsky’s poetry with the Russian national element - literary and folk poetic traditions - that provides his works with enduring value and aesthetic significance.

Vaughan Williams: Nationalism and Folk Song

Ars Nova ◽  
1972 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-34
Author(s):  
G. King
Keyword(s):  
Folk Song ◽  
Vaughan Williams

scholarly journals Extralinguistic Aspects of the English Concept Stiff Upper Lip

2012 ◽  
pp. 259-264
Author(s):  
V. S. Sosedova
Keyword(s):  
National Character ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Upper Lip ◽  
English Culture

The article concerns one of the basic Anglo-Saxon linguocultural concepts Stiff Upper Lip, which is an integral part of English national character. The analysis of such factors as geographic, historic, cultural and physiological ones gives a chance to delve into the essence of the concept and explain its importance for English culture.

scholarly journals What is English music? The Twentieth Century Experience

2007 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 147-166
Author(s):  
Niall O'Loughlin
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
National Identity ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
Folk Music ◽  
National Character ◽  
English Music ◽  
The 19Th Century

Many countries in the 19th century wanted to assert their national character, with music being one way of doing so. We can distinguish four ways in which in music national identity can be established: composers may use the folk music, they can base their music on folk music, they can set the words of a nation to music and the last possibility can be found in the idea of an association of certain music with specific events and festivities in a tradition. The author discusses in detail these four possibilities of the establishment of Englishness in music in 20th century.

DON KAY (b. 1934)Four Bird Songs from Shaw Neilson (2005)

2021 ◽  
pp. 120-122
Author(s):  
Jane Manning
Keyword(s):  
Natural World ◽  
Folk Song ◽  
Bird Songs ◽  
Close Affinity ◽  
Standard Notation ◽  
The Voice ◽  
Vaughan Williams

This chapter describes Tasmanian composer Dan Kay’s Four Bird Songs from Shaw Neilson (2005). The texts for this pleasing, fluent cycle are by the farmworker-poet Shaw Neilson, and reflect his close affinity with the natural world, especially the life of waterbirds. Kay’s palpable empathy with these unsophisticated but burningly sincere poems draws music of clarity and refinement. The frequent modal melodies and minor harmonies cannot help but call to mind Vaughan Williams and the English folk-song tradition, but Kay manages to inject an individual flavour by means of chromatic shifts and varied rhythms, especially in the last two, slightly longer, songs. A light young baritone with a safe high register would be ideal here. The piano writing is clear and uncluttered, with simple, repeated figurations, and there is no need to force the voice. Standard notation is used throughout.

Alan Rawsthorne and the Baroque

Tempo ◽  
1946 ◽  
pp. 252-255
Author(s):  
Wilfrid Mellers
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Folk Song ◽  
Musical Culture ◽  
Unique Case ◽  
Musical Tradition ◽  
Musical History ◽  
Musical Evolution ◽  
Eighteenth And Nineteenth Centuries ◽  
Vaughan Williams

When, during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the English musical tradition gradually declined, fundamentally for social and economic reasons, one of the symptoms of decay was our failure to absorb the significant trends of contemporary musical evolution. It is for instance pertinent that although Haydn and Mozart were frequently played in London in the first half of the nineteenth century they exerted virtually no influence on our contemporary composers, who were unable to assimilate the implications of their sonata idiom. The great social-dramatic phase of instrumental evolution we simply by-passed, so that it's hardly surprising that when Holst and Vaughan Williams should have come to work towards the renaissance of our musical culture they should have returned to the great days—to Tudor polyphony and, behind that, folk-song and hence to a fundamentally vocal conception of their art. (The unique case of Elgar, whose magnificently ripe symphonics are as it were the culmination of a symphonic tradition that had never happened, we may legitimately regard as a ‘sport’ in our musical history.)

scholarly journals Folk music in the repertoire of the amateur student choir

2012 ◽  
pp. 35
Author(s):  
Olga Kosiborod
Keyword(s):  
Folk Music ◽  
Folk Songs ◽  
Folk Song ◽  
Practical Work ◽  
Critical Component ◽  
Musical Culture ◽  
Methodological Basis ◽  
Cultural Functions

This paper examines the problem of student band repertoire policy and the use of folk songs the concert - performing practice is. The goal is to consider some theoretical aspects related to the folklore and folklorisation of choral academic singing and practice of implementing it in the field of amateur choral performances. The oretical studies of domestic scientists and practical work of the author were used as a methodological basis for the article. Folk song was, is and will be a critical component of the musical culture and it is, naturally, presented in the repertoire of the student collective works of this genre and is the most important component for the implementation of all socio - cultural functions inherent in the amateur team.

scholarly journals English Folk-Song and English Music

1910 ◽  
Vol 51 (809) ◽  
pp. 428 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rutland Boughton
Keyword(s):  
Folk Song ◽  
English Music

National music to national redeemer: the consolidation of a ‘folk-song’ construct in Edwardian England

Popular Music ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Francmanis
Keyword(s):  
Education System ◽  
Potential Application ◽  
Oral Tradition ◽  
Folk Song ◽  
National Character ◽  
Popular Song ◽  
Victorian Era ◽  
Musical Renaissance ◽  
Musical Heritage ◽  
National Resource

The Musical Renaissance of the late Victorian era incurred both rediscovery and reappraisal of the English musical heritage. The isolated endeavours of a handful of pioneering collectors from the oral tradition stimulated the institution of a Folk-Song Society with the aim of gathering what remained of a rapidly disappearing national resource. This article examines competing interpretations of the nature and potential application of folk-song. Cecil Sharp, who quickly assumed leadership of the folk-song movement, adopted and refined the notion that communal origin and transmission imbued folk-song with the national character and spirit. Its strategic use in the education system would, he believed, promote not just musical revival but a general national revival as well. In counterpoint to Sharp's folk-song construct, the hiterto marginalised contribution of musical antiquarian Frank Kidson is reassessed. From an ever-diminishing position of authority, Kidson continued to dismiss Sharp's new orthodoxy by insisting that most of what passed for ‘folk’ was nothing more than the remnants of old popular song. The article concludes by seeking to explain why Sharp's construct endured.

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