Festival concert
Winchester Cathedral - Monday 6th July 2009 7.30pm
the first UK performance of a major new work by
Sir John Tavener
Towards Silence
For four string quartets and large Tibetan bow
featuring the Medici String Quartet
Court Lane Quartet, Finzi Quartet, Harpham Quartet (Tom Jesty will play the Tibetan bowl)
Concert programme
7pm Conversation: Professor Paul Robertson and Professor Peter Fenwick
Antonio Vivaldi: The Four Seasons
Sir John Tavener: Towards Silence
for four string quartets and large Tibetan bowl.
Towards Silence
Meditation on the four states of Atma
A la memoire de Rene Gueron
In this piece, the composer uses both space and sound to explore the nature of consciousness and the tenuous yet vital creative connection that may be experienced near death.
Lasting approximately 35 minutes, this powerfully spiritual work has been composed for the Medici String Quartet, who through rehearsing and performing together act as mentors and musical guides to other talented young professional ensembles.
Since the work was originally discussed by Sir John and Paul Robertson (leader of the Medici) both men have been critically ill and close to death themselves. The performances will therefore have a very particular significance for them both.
In the summer of 2007, Paul Robertson interviewed Sir John Tavener at a conference in Bath. During their wide ranging and fascinating conversation, Sir John expressed enthusiasm to fulfill his long standing aspiration - to compose an entirely original work for four string quartets. The result is 'Towards Silence'.
Sir John Tavener writes:
‘Towards Silence’ was inspired by reading Rene Gueron’s book ‘Man and his becoming according to the Vedanta’.
From an exoteric sense ‘Towards Silence’ can be seen as a Meditation on the different states of dying, but from an esoteric sense it is a meditation on the four states of Atma.
1] Vaishvanara; The Waking State, which has knowledge of external objects and which has nineteen mouths and the world of manifestation for its province.
2] Taijasa; The Dream State, which has knowledge of inward objects, which has nineteen mouths and whose domain is the world of subtle manifestation.
3] Prajna; The condition of Deep Sleep, When the individual who is asleep experiences no desire and is not the subject of any dreams, he has become Atma, and is filled with Beatitude.
4] Turiya; That which is beyond. The greatest state (Mahattara) is the fourth, totally free from any mode of existence whatever, with fullness of Peace and Beatitude without duality.
Click here for more information on 'Towards Silence'
Antonio Vivaldi (1678 - 1741):
The Four Seasons
1: Concerto No.1 in E Major, RV 269, Spring
Allegro / Largo / Allegro (Pastorale dance)
2: Concerto No.2 in G minor, RV 315, Summer
Allegro non molto - Allegro / Adagio – Presto – Adagio / Presto (Summer Storm)
3: Concerto No.3 in F Major, RV 293, Autumn
Allegro (Peasant Dance and Song) / Adagio molto (Sleeping Drunkards) / Allegro (The Hunt)
4: Concerto No.4 in F minor, RV 297, Winter
Allegro non molto / Largo / Allegro
One of the earliest uses of music was in the accompaniment of theatrical dance and story-telling, so it is natural that composers should from time to time produce what we know as "programme music" – music written to portray events, activities or moods such as pastoral scenes or storms. Music representing the moods of the four seasons has always been popular, and baroque composers such as Werner and Fischer, among others, produced cycles of concertos representing the fours seasons. But none were to do so in such precise pictorial detail as Antonio Vivaldi in his Four Seasons concertos.
As a descriptive basis for his Four Seasons, Vivaldi took four sonnets, apparently written by himself. Each of the four sonnets is expressed in a concerto, which in turn is divided into three phrases or ideas, reflected in the three movements (fast-slow-fast) of each concerto. The published scores (by Estienne Roger of Amsterdam in 1716-7) are marked to indicate which musical passages are representative of which verses of the sonnet.
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