Voice and instrumental ensemble
Hotspur
Monodrama for soprano, 2 clarinets, violin and viola (1 player), cello and percussion
Text by Fleur Adcock
Hotspur was commissioned by Gemini with funding from the British Council. They premiered the work in Darlington, United Kingdom with Margaret Field (soprano), conducted by Peter Wiegold. Gretchen Albrecht designed 5 banners for the performance which are now in the Sarjeant Gallery in Wanganui.
About the work
Hotspur was written while I was composer-in-residence for Northern Arts, United Kingdom. It was completed at Great Bavington in Northumberland in October 1980, while Fleur and I were both fellows of the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
The piece is the lament of Elizabeth Mortimer, wife of Henry Percy, the 14th century north of England warrior known as ‘Hotspur’.
While writing it in Northumberland, not so far from the site of the battle of Otterburn, I was very aware of the harsh quality of life in those border regions in Hotspur’s day, when skirmishing and rieving was the way of survival in a wild and exposed, though beautiful landscape, with a climate sometimes benign, but often treacherous. Something of this has influenced the music.
Although the piece is not simple technically, the text called for certain simplicity. The vocal line had to be direct, and could not depart very far from the idea of the ballad except in the reflective middle movement, and in the recurring prophetic sections. The instrumental sections sometimes accompany, sometimes comment on, sometimes reinforce the expression of the text. They also often contrast suggestions of movement and stillness, or of sounds of battle and sounds of nature.
There are 5 sections in Hotspur:
- Elizabeth sings of her husband
- The siege of Newcastle
- Carrying Hotspur’s child, she reflects as she waits on the evening of the battle of Otterburn
- The battle of Otterburn
- The death of Hotspur
Scores and recordings
Buy or borrow the score from SOUNZ.
There is a recording on Volume 32 of the Anthology of Australian Music on Disc.
Anthology of Australian Music: dramatic vocal music — CD
SOUNZ also has an archival recording.
Ipu
Works with taonga pūoro, Voice and instrumental ensemble, Collaborations
For narrator, cello, piano and taonga pūoro
Text by Tungia Baker translated into Māori by Wena Tait
Ipu exists in recorded form only and was performed by Richard Nunns (taonga pūoru), Tungia Baker (narration), Judy Bailey (piano) and Georg Pedersen (cello).
About the work
Ipu tells in te reo Māori Tungia Baker’s story — reminiscent of the old teaching stories. It tells of of Waka, a canoe and Kowhai, an elegant yellow-flowered tree that grows on the Tararuas. Their mutual friend, Tui acts as a go -between, telling the Waka of Kowhai and Kowhai of Waka. Then one day, there is a great storm, which changes everything.
There are 4 sections:
- Waka, Kowhai and Tui
- Waka’s Love for Kowhai
- The Storm, and
- Aftermath.
Instrumentation
The taonga pūoro and piano parts are improvised to guidelines in the score, and the cello part is notated.
The taonga pūoro include: ipu, pahū pounamu, kōauau rākau maire, panguru, hue puruhau, poi āwhiowhio, ua roria rau karamu, pūtōrino rākaumatai, kōuaua ponga ihu, kōauau kōiwi kurī, kōauau kōiwi toroa, tumutumu, pūpū harakeke, porotiti, pūrerehua kōhatu pounamu, pukaea rakau manuka and karanga manu.
Recording
Buy or borrow the CD from SOUNZ.
Buy a digital version of the album from SOUNZ or Bandcamp.
Iris dreaming
One act opera for soprano and chamber ensemble
Text by Fleur Adcock
Iris dreaming was commissioned and premiered by soprano Joanne Roughton-Arnold. The first performance was accompanied by the Octandre Ensemble conducted by Jon Hargreaves, at the Grimeborn Festival in London in August 2016. The version with string trio was premiered with Joanne and NZTrio at the Adam Chamber Music Festival in Nelson on 6 February 2017.
About the work
Iris dreaming is based on the life of celebrated New Zealand writer and feminist, Iris Wilkinson (also know as Robin Hyde), whose short but intensely dramatic life took her from New Zealand via war-torn China to London on the brink of WWII where she killed herself in 1939, aged 33. She was a star, a significant figure in New Zealand literature, a respected journalist in her time and a pioneer of feminism.
Fiona Maddocks in her review for The Guardian noted, ‘Whitehead … mixes tonal and melodic writing with Māori and Pacific rim-inspired techniques, especially audible in music for flute and piccolo, or more overtly in the gentle, clattery wash of rainsticks.’
Instrumentation
Lyric coloratura soprano and a chamber ensemble of flute doubling piccolo, oboe, clarinets (B♭, E♭ and bass), bassoon, harp, 2 violins, viola, cello and double bass.
There is also a version for soprano and piano trio.
Score
The score will soon be available from SOUNZ.
Recordings
Films of performances both versions of the opera are available online.
Iris dreaming, London, August 2016 — video
Iris dreaming, Nelson, New Zealand, February 2017 — video
RNZ Concert’s recording of the New Zealand premiere in February 2017 is available online.
Reviews and interviews
The Waitangi Day performance in Nelson in 2017 was reviewed in the Nelson Evening Mail.
Opera Iris Dreaming tells tragic life of New Zealand writer Robin Hyde — Nelson Evening Mail
A review by Elizabeth Kerr of the Nelson performances was broadcast by RNZ Concert on Upbeat.
Adam Chamber Music Festival Waitangi weekend reviews — talk
Joanne was interviewed for Kim Hill’s programme on RNZ National.
Joanne Roughton-Arnold: Iris Dreaming — interview
There is also an interview with Joanne and me, filmed before the Nelson performances.
Festival conversations: Iris dreaming — interview
Bryan Crump interviewed me on RNZ National’s Nights programme shortly after my return from the premiere in London.
Marduk
For mezzo-soprano, flute, clarinet, violin/viola, cello, guitar, harpsichord, piano and percussion
Texts by Jacopone da Rodi, CK Norvid and William Blake
Marduk was commissioned by The Fires of London with funding from the Arts Council of Great Britain. It was premiered by them at Queen Elizabeth Hall, South Bank, London in 1973.
About the work
I devised Marduk initially as a dance-drama exploring the relationship between the divine and humankind, with 4 huge masked figures on stilts — possibly atua — moving slowly in ritualistic patterns while a ‘human’ figure tried to interact with them.
I can’t remember why, but in the end it was performed as a cantata, focusing on the vocal parts of the score, which has texts in Italian by Jacapone da Todi, Polish by CK Norvid, a chant based on the 50 names of Marduk, the god-king of the city of Babylon, and English by William Blake.
Score
The score of this work is not available.
Out of this nettle, danger
For mezzo-soprano, flute, clarinet, cello, keyboard and percussion
Text by Fleur Adcock, based on Katherine Mansfield’s writings from the last 3 years of her life
The first performance was given by Anthea Moller (mezzo) with the Australian Chamber Players conducted by Graham Hair.
About this work
The text of Out of this nettle, danger was commissioned by the Literature Board of the New Zealand Department of Internal Affairs and the music received a First Use fee from the Music Board of the Australia Council.
It is based on the letters, diaries and other writings of Katherine Mansfield. All the excerpts come from the winter of 1919–20, 3 years before her death in 1923. She was at the time 23 years old, living by the northern Mediterranean coast, as it was essential for her health that she avoided the English winters. This separated her from her husband, John Middleton Murry, who had to work in London to earn enough to keep them both.
The writings express the exaggerations of emotion engendered by tuberculosis, and trace various events of the winter – the visit by her wealthy father, bringing cigarettes and daisies but no money at a time of financial crisis; the dark days of her sojourn at Ospedaletti with her companion who, like her husband, was frequently the recipient of hatred and bitterness; happier times at Menton; and a dream that she had.
The title comes from one of her favourite quotations. ‘Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety’, spoken by Shakespeare’s Hotspur in Henry IV Part 1 and chosen by her for her epitaph.
Score and recording
Buy or borrow the score from SOUNZ.
Out of this nettle, danger — SOUNZ
RNZ Concert recorded this work in 1987.
Out of this nettle, danger — audio
Review
‘Out of this Nettle, Danger is intimate, acute, fleet, with a fascinating sensitivity to the deep implications of the text. There is a big range of percussion instruments, used with the greatest economy and power of suggestion so that no sound or thematic fragment is perfunctory, each has a voluptuous, expressive, original shape. The piece moves forward in small episodes, held together partly by text, partly by the sheer consistent quality of the imagination.’
— Meredith Oakes, The Independent
Pākuru
For mezzo-soprano, flute, clarinet, viola, cello, piano and percussion
A setting of Hone Tūwhare’s poem, ‘Thine own hands have fashioned’
The first performance of Pākuru was given by Pierrot Players conducted by Peter Maxwell Davies in 1968 in Berlin’s Akademie der Künste in a programme presenting young British composers.
About the work
Hone Tūwhare’s text comes from his first poetry collection No ordinary sun (1967).
Pākuru was first aired at the prestigious Dartington Summer School of Music, but the first public performance was in Berlin with a very poor audience as there was a strike in Berlin that day. It was the first piece I wrote when I arrived in London.
The title Pākuru means a chant accompanied by tapped sticks, or a taonga pūoro consisting of wooden sticks tapped together: there is a substantial role for percussion in the piece.
Score
Contact me if you would like to see the score.