Ernest Tomlinson (b. 1924)
Long regarded as one of the leading figures in the field of
light music, Ernest
Tomlinson was born at Rawtenstall, Lancashire on 19th September, 1924 into a musical family. He started composing when he was only nine, at
about the same time that he became a choirboy at Manchester Cathedral, where he
was eventually to be appointed Head Boy in 1939. Here, and at Bacup and Rawtenstall
Grammar School, his musical talents were carefully nurtured, and he was only
sixteen when he won a scholarship to Manchester University and the Royal
Manchester (now Northern) College of Music. He spent the next two years
studying composition, organ, piano and clarinet until, in 1943, the war effort
demanded that he leave and join the Royal Air Force. Defective colour-vision
precluded his being selected for aircrew and the new recruit, having his
request to become a service musician turned down on the grounds that he was too
healthy to follow such a career, found himself being trained as a Wireless Mechanic,
notwithstanding that many of the components he was required to work with were colour-coded.
(The future composer, however, was duly delighted with his assignment, which he
thoroughly enjoyed and which almost certainly contributed to a later interest in
electronic music). He saw service in France during 1944 and 1945, eventually
returning to England where, with the cessation of hostilities, he was able to
resume his studies. He finally graduated in 1947, receiving the degree of
Bachelor of Music for composition as well as being made a Fellow of the Royal
College of Organists and an Associate of the Royal Manchester College of Music
for his prowess on the King of Instruments.
Ernest Tomlinson then left the North of England and headed
south to London where, for several years, he worked as a staff arranger for
Arcadia and Mills Music Publishers, providing scores for radio and television
broadcasts as well as for the stage and recording studios. He maintained his
interest in the organ by taking up a post at a Mayfair church, but
increasingly, composing came to play the dominant rôle. He had his first piece
broadcast in 1949 and by 1955, when he was able to earn his living entirely by
composing, he was to be heard on the radio with his own Ernest Tomlinson Light
Orchestra and later with his group of singers. While not neglecting the
larger-scale forms, including several works in symphonic-jazz style, the first
of which, Sinfonia '62, won the million-lire First Prize in the Italian
competition for "Rhythmic-Symphonic" works, three concertos, a
one-act opera Head of the Family, a ballet Aladdin, Festival of Song for
chorus and orchestra as well as a substantial and varied body of works for
choir and music for brass and wind bands, it was as a writer of light orchestral
pieces that he was to become best-known. In this area, he has produced a
considerable number of works ranging from overtures, suites and rhapsodies to
delightful miniatures, of which Little Serenade is probably the most
popular.
From the time that he first directed a church choir when he
was just seventeen, Ernest Tomlinson has been active as a conductor, firmly
believing that involvement in performance is vitally important for a composer.
From 1951 to 1953, he was musical director of the Chingford Amateur Dramatic
and Operatic Society in Essex. In 1976, he took over the directorship of the Rossendale
Male Voice Choir from his father, Fred, a post he held for five years, during
which time he led the singers to victory in their class in each of the three
years of BBC Television's Grand Sing Competition. Not long afterwards, in
association with the Rossendale Ladies Choir and its conductor Beatrice Wade,
he helped form the Rossendale Festival Choir which quickly went on to win a
number of competitions. Then, at the official retiring age of 65, he founded
yet another new group, the Ribble Vale Choir, with which he is still actively
involved.
In the orchestral field, Ernest Tomlinson has often
conducted performances of his own works, one of the most notable occasions
being in 1966 when he was on the rostrum in the Tchaikovsky Hall, Moscow for
his Symphony '65, played by the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra and Big
Band - the first time a symphonic jazz work had been heard in Russia. In his
home country, he was responsible for the founding of the Northern Concert
Orchestra, with which he gave numerous broadcasts and concerts, the emphasis
being on the light orchestral repertoire.
A man of boundless energy, Ernest Tomlinson has also found
time to serve for several years on the Executive Committee of the Composers'
Guild of Great Britain and was its Chairman in 1964. In addition, he has been a
composer-director of the Performing Rights Society since 1965. In 1984, he
founded The Library of Light Orchestral Music, which is housed in a huge
barn at his farmhouse home near Longridge, Lancashire, and currently contains
around 10,000 pieces, including many items that would otherwise have been lost.
And finally, his wartime training has been put to excellent use in his ability
to utilise technological developments within the musical sphere, whether by realising
scores electronically or by perfecting computer publishing and cataloguing
systems.
Much respected by fellow professionals in the musical world,
as witness his receipt of the Composers' Guild Award in 1965 and two Ivor Novello
Awards (one for his full-length ballet Aladdin in 1975, the other for services
to light music in 1970), Ernest Tomlinson's services have been called upon in
other areas as well. A keen sportsman, he played wing-threequarter for the
prestigious Saracens Rugby Union Club and then for Chingford in Essex. For many
years he could be found padded up and ready to do battle on behalf of Eynsford
village cricket team in Kent and, later, his home town of Longridge in
Lancashire. He still enjoys an early morning cycle ride, while for relaxation
he lists do-it-yourself, electronics and, last but by absolutely no means
least, the joys of family life - of which, with a wife, tour children and eight
grandchildren, there are many.
This, then, is Ernest Tomlinson: composer, conductor,
organist, administrator, librarian - and consultant for Marco Polo's British
Light Orchestral Music series.
[1] Comedy Overture
Comedy Overture was written in 1956, a new year of
some significance for Ernest Tomlinson since he was now free from the
responsibilities of full-time employment. The freedom to devote his time to his
own compositions acted as a spur to invention and this Comedy Overture was
the first work written under those new circumstances. Clearly this was a
happy time, as the piece bustles along in ebullient mood from the outset. After
a fanfare-like opening the overture is built around two contrasting themes, an
energetic opening one and a contrasting jocular second theme. There is a
calming in the middle section as if taking stock of the themes already
presented, before the overture builds to a reworking of the opening section.
The overture ends with a confident flourish based on the opening of the work.
First Suite of English
Folk-Dances
[2] No. 1 Jenny Pluck Pears
[3] No. 2 Ten Pound Lass
[4] No. 3 Dick's Maggot
[5] No. 4 Nonesuch
[6] No. 5 Hunt the Squirrel
[7] No. 6 Woodicock
January 1950, and a full house at the Royal Albert Hall,
London, for the New Year Festival of Folk-Dance, promoted by the English
Folk-Dance and Song Society. Towards the end of the first half, following
folk-dances from various parts of Britain, the lights slowly faded, leaving the
hall almost in darkness. The audience hushed and there came a haunting melody
on solo violin; the dim lighting revealed three gracefully dancing couples
dressed in the attire of the 1600s. This was the old English dance Jenny
Pluck Pears with accompaniment provided by just two violins. For one
young composer it was magic. The next dance was to the equally enchanting,
though quite different melody, Newcastle.
The young composer in question was, of course, Ernest
Tomlinson who, together with his wife Jean, had been invited to the event by his
sister Freda, a keen folk-dancer. From that experience came the composer's
resolve to express some of those lovely tunes through the medium of full
orchestra. Tomlinson began working on ideas for his Suite of English
Folk-Dances soon afterwards. First, though, he had to complete his suite Four
Pastoral Dances, the Passepied from which had already been
broadcast. At that time light-orchestral music formed a major share of
broadcasting, but performances of whole suites were rare. This worked to
Tomlinson's advantage as individual movements could be offered for broadcasting
as and when completed. With a full-time copyist/arranger job to hold, with the
post as organist at the Curzon St. Christian Science Church, not to mention
jaunts on the rugby field every Saturday, this left little time free for
composition. The first performances of the individual movements of Four
Pastoral Dances came separately between 1949 and 1951. (Even the first
'complete' performance was spread over four weeks.)
The treasure-trove from which the English folk-dances were
selected was the first edition (1650), of John Playford's The English
Dancing Master. Here were set down the steps of the most popular dances of
the day, together with the melodies used. As The Dancing Master, this
book, with additions and changes, was reissued in various editions until 1728.
The shape a suite needs, and the variety within it as one movement follows
another, determined the choice of tunes. Four of the Playford tunes,
regretfully discarded at the time, had to wait another 25 years or so, before
being incorporated into Tomlinson's Second Suite of English Folk-Dances, which
is included in his first CD in this series (Marco Polo 8.223413).
The folk-dances being short, they were offered for
broadcasting in pairs and accepted for performance by the London Light Concert
Orchestra under Michael Krein. Jenny Pluck Pears and Ten Pound Lass were
completed first and broadcast in September 1951. Then came the fifth and sixth
movements, broadcast in January 1952. The fourth movement, Nonesuch, was
then completed readily enough, which left Dick's Maggot. To those of us
who know this piece so well, it is surprising to learn that the composer found Dick's
Maggot by far the most difficult movement to write. All sorts of variants
were tried and he was not very confident about the version that grudgingly
arrived. With five movements of the suite already written the temptation to
discard Dick's Maggot was great. Fortunately for us this temptation was
resisted, as it has become easily the most successful movement from the suite.
Amongst other things it was used for three or four years as a signature tune in
Steve Race's 'Invitation to Music' programme on BBC radio.
Once Dick's Maggot was completed the way was now
clear for a complete performance of the suite, which was given by Michael Krein
and the London Light Concert Orchestra in August 1952. Dedicated to his sister,
it has since become one of the most performed suites written since the war.
Light Music Suite
Three movements are included from Tomlinson's Light Music
Suite, written in 1971. Unusually, the work does not call for the services
of trumpets and trombones, so the brass section is limited to four horns and a
tuba.
[8] Pizzicato Humoresque I
Of the several distinctive musical forms established by
light-orchestral music one of the most common is what is often called, simply,
a 'quicky'. This is a fast two-in-a-bar rhythmic piece, usually incorporating
jazz-derived syncopations here and there. A common type of 'quicky' presents
melody by pizzicato strings and that is just what this piece does, highly
syncopated, interspersed with busy figurations from the wood-wind and hustled
along by rhythm guitar. In the middle section plucked strings alone present the
theme, which is then taken over by the full wind.
[9] Serenade to a Wayward Miss
A serenade melody, yes, but one which just won't settle into
the usual two, three or four in a bar, hence the title. Five-time it is, which
engenders a novel lilting accompaniment from the strings to support the solo
oboe melody, soon taken up by muted violins. In the middle section the clarinet
offers its own version of waywardness until the strings take over the
narrative, settle things down, take a brief rest from five-time and enable the
main serenade theme to return, played first by violas then rounded off by the
solo oboe. A shimmer or two from the strings and the strains of the serenade
die away.
[10] Waltz for a Princess
Which princess the composer had in mind is not revealed. But
surely it is a princess from the make-believe world of fairy-tale, beautiful to
look at in glittering attire and dancing the lightest of graceful steps.
[11] Shenandoah
Ernest Tomlinson's entry into the all-important world of
broadcasting came not by way of composition but through arrangements of
traditional tunes. The first one was of Dashing Away With the Smoothing
Iron, played by the Charles Shadwell String Orchestra in December 1948. The
next melody selected to help ease the way into broadcasting and publication was
the lovely sea-shanty Shenandoah. In the sailing ships of old every task
called for manual labour, which seamen made a little easier for themselves by
singing shanties. It is evident, not least from the different versions that
have come down to us, that Shenandoah was one of the most popular of all
sea-shanties. Shenandoah was the name of a celebrated Indian chief, after whom
an American town and a tributary of the Potomac River are named, yet in the
words of the shanty, it is "Away I'm bound to go 'cross the wide
Missouri". The beautiful melody, unusually slow for a shanty, is more
evocative of a journey up "you rollin' river" than "the stormy
ocean". There's yearning too: "Oh, Shenandoah, I love your
daughter". The words, like the music, have come to us in various forms,
each singer reading into them his own vision of events and circumstances long
past.
[12] Cumberland Square
Back to the 1950 Festival of Folk-Dance, an experience made
even more memorable by the total contrast of the dance that followed the two Playford
dances quoted above. The full lights came on, and the floor was soon thronging
with dancers from all over Britain and guests from abroad, in every kind of colourful
costume, who danced that most favourite and exhilarating community dance, Cumberland
Square 8. This is particularly spectacular when viewed from above - as from
the gallery of the Royal Albert Hall! The dancers don't just stay with their
own eights but also trip their way diagonally through the neighbouring eights
and back again, presenting a dazzling, ever-changing mosaic. Fundamental to the
enjoyment of this dance are the two rollicking tunes invariably used. They are
both Scottish, the first known by the poem Robbie Bums set to it: My Love
She's But A Lassie Yet and the other, Cock o' the North. Though
it was not until 1960 that Tomlinson scored his Cumberland Square, that
1950 experience was still vivid in his memory, as is seen in this sparkling
arrangement. As in the dance itself, the orchestra plays the first tune and its
repeats, then the second tune similarly and then returns to the first. Trust
Tomlinson to spot that the two tunes can be played together in perfect
counterpoint. So in their last appearance they are both played at the same time.
[13] Rhapsody and Rondo for Horn and Orchestra
In 1954 Frank Wade took over as the head of the British
Broadcasting Corporation's new Light Music Department. One of his first
decisions was to step up the BBC's enterprising policy of commissioning new
works for its annual Light Music Festival. The festival was broadcast on radio,
a much bigger force than television at that time, and so performances reached a
very wide audience. Composers commissioned to produce new works for the
festivals included Ronald Binge, John Addison, Geoffrey Bush, Phyllis Tate,
John Gardner and many others.
Approached by Geoffrey Brand, the producer of the festival
for eleven years from 1956, about the commission, Tomlinson said he would like
to write a piece for Dennis Brain. At that time Dennis Brain was at the height
of his fame as performer on the French horn. There was, quite simply, no player
in the world who could match his effortless technique allied to a musicianship
which gave his interpretations a perfection to be marvelled at. When reporting
to the composer that Dennis Brain had accepted the assignment, Brand's next
words were, "But don't write it so that only Dennis Brain can play
it", an astute piece of advice which was conveniently forgotten. Brain's
own concern was of a different kind. "Please, not another 6/8 rondo!"
Those who know the horn repertoire will know w hat he meant. The orchestral
horn's affinity, from the earliest days, with the hunting-horn has
pre-conditioned composers - Mozart included - to write innumerable tunes of
what one might call the 'tantivy-tantivy' kind. Fortunately, Tomlinson had
quite different rondo themes in mind. A draft of the horn part was sent to
Dennis Brain and the two eventually met during a break in a recording-session
at Walthamstow Town Hall. The composer was relieved to find his rondo themes
were all eminently playable, given a few tiny modifications, the desirability
of which Brain, instrument to hand, illustrated there and then.
When eventually it came to rehearsal with the BBC Concert
Orchestra and soloist, all went well on the first run-through until it came to
the rondo. Tomlinson set what he felt was a good bright tempo but Brain
immediately stopped him. "Ernest, you'll have to take it much faster than
that, I've been practising at this speed," and proceeded to demonstrate.
An audible gasp went round the orchestra. The first performance took place on
the following day to a packed Royal Festival Hall and a radio audience of
millions, the concert being broadcast live throughout Europe. Tragically, this
was almost certainly the last première Dennis Brain gave. Only two months later
came the shattering news that he had been killed in a car accident.
With the whole music profession mourning it was three years
before it seemed fitting to offer the work to another horn-player. Then Alan
Civil took the work in hand, gave several performances and helped edit it for
publication in 1962. Other soloists followed, including Ifor James and Michael Purton.
It was Mike Purton, formerly the principal horn with the Hallé Orchestra, who
proposed this work for a concert to be played by the BBC Philharmonic
Orchestra, conducted by Sir Edward Downes, as part of the 14th International
Horn Workshop, at the Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester, in July
1992. The soloist was Richard Watkins.
As the title suggests, Rhapsody and Rondo is in two
contrasting sections. First comes the slow rhapsody, which explores the lyrical
and dramatic aspects of horn-playing, followed by a rondo where the virtuosity
and frolicsome aspects of the instrument are exploited to the full. Towards the
end of the rondo the horn takes a rest as the orchestra begins a fugal passage
- a fugal passage with a difference though. The 'voices' enter in turn - strings,
piccolo, tuba and basses, bassoon, trombones and then trumpets - in true fugal
manner, except that each quotes a different tune, selected from the themes
heard earlier. The orchestra invites the horn to join in but by then there are
no tunes left so the solo horn plays instead a snippet of the classical work
which, more than any other, made Dennis Brain a household name. The orchestra
eventually brings the soloist to order and he returns to quicken things up, and
bring the work to a high-note conclusion.
That quotation towards the end of the Tomlinson rondo, of
the tune which at that time seemed almost personal to Dennis Brain and which he
had played in the first half of the concert, was the subject of much subsequent
discussion. The composer's intention had been to use that piece of whimsy, much
appreciated by the audience, on just that one occasion. Indeed the quotation
was written out of some later performances of Rhapsody and Rondo. Now,
all these years later, to hear that passage as it was played at the first
performance serves as are minder of a great musician and of the inspiration
Dennis Brain's playing has been to so many.
[14] Passepied
Passepied was a popular dance in French court circles
during the 1600s and 1700s, often featured in opera and ballet. It is a dance
which trips along in three-time, like a quick minuet. Or does it? Both Delibes (Le
Roi s'amuse ballet music) and Debussy (Suite Bergamasque) made the
'mistake' of writing passepieds in two-time, much like a Bourrée. So the young
Ernest Tomlinson can be forgiven for doing likewise. Passepied is the
earliest of his compositions to establish itself, the one whose first broadcast
led to more of his pieces being welcomed and thus can be said to have launched
his career as a composer. It was written early in 1947 with a view to
impressing a certain young lady whom Tomlinson had first met in 1937,
holidaying at the farm where they now live. They lost touch during the war but
chance brought them together again ten years later. This spurred the aspiring
composer to show that he had moved on a little since the 'Symphony' in D minor
he had played to her at the age of twelve.
The years 1947 to 1949 represented the frustrating time most
composers go through in their early days, the long haul of submitting music to
publishers only to have piece after piece rejected. In 1949 Tomlinson obtained
a copyist / arranger post at a small publisher, Arcadia Music. He chose his
moment to play to his new boss, Harry Ralton, all the pieces he had been
hawking around. Somewhat to his surprise it was Passepied that the
publisher picked out. The piece was then scored for orchestra and submitted to
Michael Krein, conductor of the London Light Concert Orchestra, which was
broadcasting regularly. Nothing more was heard until some months later, in
October, when the composer and the young lady for whom Passepied had
been written were on their honeymoon in Keswick in the Lake District. A
telegram from the publisher interrupted their idyll: "SEND SCORE AND PARTS
OF PASSEPIED IMMEDIATELY." A hurried scramble for a Radio Times revealed
that Passepied was scheduled for a broadcast a few days later. Long
inured to rejection the composer had prepared no performing material.
Fortunately, there was still time for a colleague to get the work done and the
broadcast took place as scheduled. The welcome that Passepied received
from other broadcasting orchestras was the best kind of encouragement Tomlinson
could receive, and more pieces followed, several based on dance-forms.
Played on the oboe, to a simple accompaniment on pizzicato
strings, the melody of Passepied has a haunting quality that memory
clings to. Muted strings, horns, wood-wind and lastly celeste add to the
interest in the middle section, but the music remains distant and elusive
throughout.
[15] Rigadoon
Rigadoon, written in 1958, provides a contrasting
dance to pair with Passepied. The French dance Rigaudon became
very popular both in folk-dancing and court circles in the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. In England it was usually called a Rigadoon. Its nature,
a lively two-in-a-bar dance, has attracted many composers. This one is taken
from Two Miniature Dances published in 1958. The dancing violins are
particularly effective, answered in turn by dancing flutes.
Dances from Aladdin
[16] Birdcage Dance
[17] Cushion Dance
[18] Belly Dance
In 1974 the Northern Dance Theatre, based in Manchester (now
the Northern Ballet Theatre), commissioned Ernest Tomlinson to write the music
for a full-length ballet, Aladdin. The choreographer was Laverne Meyer
and the Musical Director Christopher Robins. The ballet was first performed at
the Royal Northern College of Music in September 1974 and subsequently received
over a hundred performances around Great Britain. The Aladdin story was planned
so as to include a variety of set dances. From these no fewer than four
orchestral suites were extracted and later broadcast. Dances from Aladdin won
an Ivor Novello Award for the best light-orchestral work of 1974.
Three dances are chosen for this CD, all from Act II, which
is set in the Sultan's Palace. The first two are danced by the ladies of the
harem for the delectation of the Sultan. First is Birdcage Dance, birdcages
being, so one is led to believe, a basic feature of such establishments; then
comes the Cushion Dance - yes, one presumes cushions are too. The Belly
Dance is performed after Aladdin has arrived decked out in all his finery,
thanks to the wizardry of his slave the genie, and ushered in by the sultan's
warrior slaves. In the short divertissement which follows a climax is reached
with this Belly Dance, which was something of a show-stopper in the
ballet itself. It begins as a solo dance to the alluring tones of the
saxophone, first in free rhythm, then as motivated by aggressive repetitive
percussive figurations which dominate increasingly to the end of the dance. The
rest of the company joins in and the music and action become ever wilder as the
dance proceeds.
[19] A Georgian Miniature
As 'play-out' to the CD a piece as gentle as the previous
one is tempestuous. In 1962 came an invitation for Tomlinson to write a set of
period pieces for a background music library. Shortly before, he had arranged
for orchestra eight tuneful harpsichord pieces by the Georgian composer Thomas
Arne. Steeped in the idiom of the time, it came naturally now to compose a set
of six Georgian Miniatures in similar idiom.
The particularly charming Air from this set was
picked out by the publisher for dissemination in its own right. In its original
form it was quite short and a new section was composed, featuring flutes and
clarinets in contrast to the oboe solo of the air itself. A repeat of the air,
varied in instrumentation, completes the piece. In this form A Georgian
Miniature was published and widely performed. Yet the composer himself did
not hear this full version until, thirty years on, he conducted the Bratislava
Radio Orchestra in this recording of it.
© 1994 Hilary Ashton
Richard Watkins
Richard Watkins, principal horn with the Philharmonia, is
rapidly acquiring a reputation as one of the leading horn-players of his
generation. He has appeared as a soloist in major London concert-halls under
conductors of the highest distinction and also performed at Buckingham Palace
and St. James Palace. In addition to his recordings of classical horn
repertoire, he has been closely associated with the promotion of music by
contemporary composers, including work written for him by Sir Peter
Maxwell-Davies and first performances of compositions by David Matthews, Nigel
Osborne and Colin Matthews. He is professor of horn at the Royal College and
Royal Academy of Music in London.
Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra (Bratislava)
The Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra (Bratislava), the oldest
symphonic ensemble in Slovakia, was founded in 1929 at the instance of Milos Ruppeldt
and Oskar Nedbal, prominent personalities in the sphere of music. Ondrej Lenárd
was appointed its conductor in 1970 and in 1977 its conductor-in-chief,
succeeded recently by Robert Stankovsky. The orchestra has given successful
concerts both at home and abroad, in Germany, Russia, Bulgaria, Denmark,
France, Spain, Italy, Great Britain, Hong Kong and Japan. For Marco Polo the
orchestra has recorded works by Glazunov, Glière, Miaskovsky and other late
romantic composers and film music of Honegger, Bliss, Ibert and Khachaturian as
well as several volumes of the label's Johann Strauss Edition. Naxos recordings
include symphonies and ballets by Tchaikovsky, and symphonies by Berlioz and
Saint-Saëns.