Vernon Handley Returns to Manchester to Record Bax Tone Poems

Session Report by Graham Parlett

All Baxians will be pleased to hear that the Chandos recording sessions in Manchester in mid-April went splendidly and without any hitches. Vernon Handley and the BBC Philharmonic were in superb form and, although he currently uses two sticks to move about on, once he was on the podium he was able to discard them and stand unaided. In fact, as soon as he raised his baton, I could see that Tod was as vigorous and alert as I have ever seen him. He had rehearsed the orchestra in The Garden of Fand and November Woods the week before the recording sessions and again on the previous day (Tuesday). After running through those works, rehearsals of In the Faery Hills and the Sinfonietta followed. The first recording session on Wednesday morning produced a wonderfully luminous and lively performance of In the Faery Hills (1909), and in the afternoon the orchestra tackled the much later Sinfonietta (1932). Anyone familiar with the work only from the Marco Polo/Naxos recording will be in for a surprise. Tod gave the first performance of the score in 1983 with the BBC Welsh Symphony Orchestra, but this new performance far surpasses both that and Barry Wordsworth’s interpretation with the Slovak Philharmonic. The finale in particular is taken at a cracking pace, and the brazen march at the end would not have sounded out of place in a Roman triumph.

On Thursday morning November Woods was recorded in a performance that I believe surpasses previous versions. The pace was slow but the cumulative power was tremendous and the climaxes overwhelming. The slower middle section was most sensitively done, with some finely played solos. The orchestra seemed to find this a most rewarding work to play and gave it everything they had. Finally, on Thursday afternoon, Tod turned to the work that means more to him than any other: The Garden of Fand. It took a while for the opening pages to come together, but in the end the orchestra, who clearly love playing under his baton, produced a most beautiful and striking account of the piece. I have never heard such a still and rapt transition to Fand’s ‘song of immortal love’ (celesta solo over soft string chords), and the climax of the piece, with the sea overwhelming the island and the immortals riding the waves, was most exhilarating.

In the BBC Manchester Recording Studio, (from left to right: Graham Parlett, Brian Pidgeon, Stephen Rinker, Richard Adams, Andrew Achenbach and in front, Vernon Handley.)

Although he must have found the sessions very tiring, Tod was in excellent form throughout, with a stream of witticisms, jokes, anecdotes, and analogies, one of which (relating to the climax of Fand’s love-song) is hardly suitable for a family website such as this one. Also present at the sessions (see photo) were Richard Adams, Lewis Foreman, and Andrew Achenbach of The Gramophone; and the production team was the stalwart triumvirate of Brian Pigeon, Mike George, and sound engineer Stephen Rinker. A scheduled release date of next March was mentioned, but nobody seemed to relish such a long wait and - well, we’ll just have to see what happens. Perhaps Chandos could be persuaded to release the disc in time for Tod’s 75^th birthday celebrations in November. It is hard to imagine a more appropriate release for such an occasion.