Programme Notes

Quintet for Piano and Strings

The Quintet for Piano and Strings was one of Rawsthorne's final works. It was commissioned by the Music Department of Cardiff University, then under the professorship of Rawsthorne's friend the composer Alun Hoddinott, and premiered by yet another composer, John McCabe and the University Ensemble of Cardiff in March 1968.

Lasting around 15 minutes, the Quintet plays continuously, but falls into four easily defined sections, the final Allegro being more of a coda than a movement in itself. Although the work could not be called serial (the piece begins and ends very firmly in the composer's favourite key of C!), the opening flourish contains all twelve notes of the chromatic scale which provide the composer with much of his material for what is to follow.

The first section really begins with a gentle Allegretto, interrupted only by an angry repeat of the opening unison, before a more restrained conclusion marked Piu lento. The second section (Allegro) is a sort of scherzo that opens with another variant of the opening flourish, this time divided up between the strings and in a less intense mood. In general, this section is lighter if not exactly light-hearted, but includes the first hearing of what the composer called 'a rather brash tune' which later makes a further appearance in the work's final pages. The scherzo dissolves into a slow movement, which as with so many of Rawsthorne's slow movements, is still and beautifully expressive - managing to be melancholic and thoughtful without a trace of sentimentality. The final section or coda stutters to life with a slightly unnerving feeling of joviality before 'the brash tune' reappears and after a questioning three bars, the work ends in a triumphant C major with a final burst of the opening idea.

© Oxford University Press 2004

Sonata for Cello and Piano

The instruments in Rawsthorne’s Sonata to embroider and elaborate the main theme each in its own terms. At turbulent climaxes the cello often falls silent; as a practical composer, Rawsthorne knew well that the cello could not compete on equal terms when the piano unleashes its full strength. The piano leads, too, throughout the opening Adagio – note the first rising six-note phrase (a), and the five-note (b) which is echoed by the cello even before it has ended. These are the “head-motives” of the whole work, providing the starting-point for many later developments. The two main themes of the first Allegro spring directly from (a) and (b). A third theme which appears at the climax of the movement reappears as the main theme of the following Adagio, a sombre and passionate movement, with a lighter-hearted central episode. In the last bars, an affirmative figure for piano anticipates the robust main theme of the second Allegro, later transformed when it appears in the cello’s lower registers against the feather-light semiquaver piano accompaniment. The last movement returns to the mood and slower tempo of the opening Adagio, a revisiting of past scenes paralleled in the final section of Elgar’s concerto.

© Christopher Palmer
reproduced by permission of Oxford University Press

String Quartet No. 3

Commissioned by Harlow Arts Council for the 1965 Harlow Festival and first performed in July 1965 by the Alberni Quartet

Allegro deciso-Allegretto-Allegro deciso-Andante-Molto vivace

The 3rd Quartet is the last and, at just under twenty minutes, the longest of Rawsthorne's quartets. In common with a number of other late Rawsthorne works, the 3rd Quartet includes music of considerable intensity that rarely, as is the case with other two quartets, for example, seems to relax. The work is in four closely related sections that are performed as one movement with only the shortest pause for thought coming in the middle. The opening six bars are marked Allegro deciso and provide the material for the whole work, the thematic ideas worked out in the following Allegretto that makes up most of the first half. In a note for the first performance the composer wrote 'I myself feel that the composition of the form of a piece of music is as much a creative act as the invention of the material, the two things clearly go hand in hand' - these words might well serve as Rawsthorne's artistic credo, and are well illustrated by the clear and concise nature of this Quartet.

The second half of the work is marked Andante (Alla Ciacona) - another example of Rawsthorne's love of variation forms. The ghostly opening returns briefly again before the final Molto vivace bursts in, a sort of rather lively but not particularly light-hearted Gigue. Un-nerving cross-rhythms between the four instruments gradually lead to a climax during which references are made to earlier parts of the work, before a final, again typical Rawsthornian no-nonsense cadence.

© Oxford University Press 2005

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