Broadstock Symphonies
Journeys
through light and dark
(from
the cover notes of the Etcetera CD)
Dr Linda Kouvaras
The concept of duality is a time-honoured constant in much
of Western philosophy. In its Manichaean inception, good
battles evil, forming a significant basis to the core of
Christian doctrine. For Plato, the spirit is separated off
from the body, the divine from the human: the human soul is
in direct conflict with the base instincts of biology, and
is threatened by the seduction of the promise of carnal
pleasure and the material world. Duality also underpins
Western classical sonata form: the opening “exposition”
section presents the (usually) two main thematic groups,
which contrast strongly with one another and are cast in
oppositionally positioned tonic and dominant key areas
respectively.
Sonata form was the primary structural determinant for
symphonies, sonatas, and concertos from the classical and
romantic eras. Romantic symphonic works, epitomised in the
output of Beethoven (Symphonies 3, 5 and 9), Schumann,
Berlioz, Liszt, and Mahler, enveloped a whole human
experience in the outlines of a symphony, unified by the
identity of the artist. In his own symphonies, Brenton
Broadstock has found a way to honour this tradition, while
using an original and contemporary musical language. Rather
than relying on the traditional means of pitting
contrasting themes against one another in dominant and
tonic areas, Broadstock’s symphonies are monothematic: he
achieves the dualistic struggle of opposites with
contrasting areas of
energies
in the music. In all his symphonic works to date, the
listener is taken on a metaphorical journey of
transformation, from light to dark, or vice versa. His
great, over-riding interest in indeed
all
of his output is in exploring the
fact
of duality, acknowledging the existence of “good” and
“evil” in the world, in our lives, and within his own
personality.
Before Broadstock feels he can commit one note of music to
manuscript, he must have an extra-musical catalyst, where
duality can be examined within the framework of a more
specific, subsidiary idea. The play of light against dark,
for example, is a constant within his output. His titles
and statements reveal an exploration of and preoccupation
with
ur
facets of existence, pointedly human, often
autobiographical, and sometimes generalised to encompass
the broader range of human existence.
CD 1 contains the first three symphonies. The First
Symphony,
Toward the Shining Light
(1988), is dedicated to his son, Matthew, and, like the
Second Symphony, commissioned by the Melbourne Symphony
Orchestra with the generous assistance of the Performing
Arts Board of the Australia Council in 1989 as part of
Broadstock’s composer-in-residency with the orchestra in
1988-1989. This work has an intensely personal
pre-compositional impetus. In the composer’s words,
“The title is taken from the book,
The Pilgrim's Progress,
by John Bunyan, but the relationship to the book ends
there. What fascinated me about the book was its
metaphorical association -- the achievement of goals, the
realisation of dreams, the pursuit of happiness, security,
wealth, power or anything that gives some meaning and
purpose to our existence. This is a very personal work. It
is almost autobiographical and biographical. It relates,
almost programmatically, the birth of my first-born son
Matthew, the gradual realisation that he was severely
handicapped and the acceptance, not understanding, of his
condition. For me, it is this acceptance that is the
‘shining light’ of the title. It is my greatest hope that
he, and others like him, will one day achieve their
‘shining light’ so cruelly denied them in this life.”
Thus
Broadstock’s First Symphony embraces the idea that
positivity is potentially inherent in adversity. It opens
with a slow horn solo, exposed, vulnerable and “trusting”,
forming the main theme of the work. This theme is subjected
to all the Classical/Romantic traits of thematic
transformation, as it traces the composer’s realisation and
growing acceptance of Matthew’s condition. The work is cast
in one continuous movement with contrasting sub-sections:
an opening slow section (Track 1); a fast, disturbing
scherzo-like section (Track 2) which leads, after a brief,
shuddering fermata, to a quieter pulsing section that
returns to the pensive opening idea (Track 3). The shock of
the scherzo returns (Track 4) before breaking up, and a
brooding final section begins (Track 5), accelerating to a
furious climax that leads to the final resolution of the
solo horn theme that began the work, finishing on an
optimistic B major chord.
A less positive outcome occurs in
Stars in a Dark Night,
Broadstock’s Second Symphony (1989), dedicated to fellow
Australia composer Barry Conyngham. During his work in the
1970s as a music therapist, Broadstock worked with many
schizophrenics; but it was twelve years later, while
browsing through a second-hand bookshop in Carlton, that he
was struck by the title of an obscure book:
Stars in a Dark Night.
The book is a collection of letters by English poet and
composer/songwriter Ivor Gurney, a poet and musician who
suffered from schizophrenia; the “stars” represented both
the precious letters he received while in the “dark night”
of the trenches during World War 1, and also the
ever-decreasing periods of sanity in the “dark night” of
his mental deterioration. Gurney’s book inspired
Broadstock’s Second Symphony (1989) which borrows the same
title; the dynamics of the schizophrenic condition --
lucidity and rationality degenerating quickly and
unpredictably into irrationality and mental distress --
constitute the structural processes of the music. In this
work, Broadstock reflects on the fact that there is no cure
for schizophrenia; and the fluctuations between the
representations in the music of ‘insanity’ and ‘sanity’
mirror the fine line between control and the lack of it
that exists -- Broadstock believes -- for indeed
all
of us, not only for those diagnosed as schizophrenic. In
this work, unlike the First Symphony, the final ‘message’
is one of negativity, as evidenced in the music itself,
where:
“In this work there are two musics, essentially two
different pieces, struggling with each other, but both are
derived from the same musical idea -- musical ‘split
personality’! One music is slow, lyrical and gentle, often
tinged with an underlying bitterness; the other is fast,
angry, strident and all-consuming! The transition from one
to the other is sometimes violently juxtaposed.”
The work is formed as an unequal arch of sixteen smaller
sections of contrasting fast and slow material, divided
again into five larger sections. The opening (Track 6) is
propelled forward by violent, frenetic string figures to a
contemplative horn theme that halts the proceedings,
underneath which (Track 7) the percussion and brass rush
forward again to the abyss of the deranged mind. Outbreaks
of violence fragment repeatedly into quieter and more
frankly terrifying despair (Track 8) as if the lulls in
violence -- like smoke and ruin over the trenches of Europe
-- are etching deeper scars into the mind of the young
soldier. A beautiful, swaying melody (Track 9) seems to
disintegrate into the upper reaches of the violins as the
mind becomes unhinged and launches (Track 10) into
catastrophe (representing transformation / loss of sanity).
The fast, “angry” music gets shorter in duration and more
angry at each appearance, culminating in this high climax.
Broadstock “wanted to create the atmosphere of a ‘war-zone’
in this work, to reflect both the external war that Gurney
was physically placed in, and an internal war that was
raging within his mind and body.” So, once again,
Broadstock explores the dualistic idea of positivity
(light) and negativity (darkness) which may unpredictably
dominate our psyche at any given period in our
lives.
Eternal clouds of man’s desire
Blackened
heart
Bloodied hands
Voices from the fire
Voices from the Fire,
Symphony No. 3 (1992) is dedicated to his parents “who have
given their lives in ther service of others -- two of the
most humane people I know”, and commissioned by the
Australian Broadcasting Corporation, with the generous
assistance of the Performing Arts Board of the Australia
Council, to mark the ABC’s 60th anniversary in 1992. In the
composer’s programme notes, the work
“comments
upon, and compares, the destruction of two minorities — the
Jews in the Second World War and the Tasmanian aborigines.
The work is divided into two movements. The first, of 13
minutes (Tracks 11-12), is structured upon a series of
savage orchestral ‘gunshots’. It was inspired by footage I
had seen of naked Jews, lined up in front of a pit, and
being shot one by one. These shots become a structural
determinant in the movement punctuating music of passion,
fear, anger and horror. The second movement (Tracks 13-14)
is an elegy, filled with pathos and bitterness, for the
last Tasmanian aboriginal Truganinnie and for all victims
of human kind’s inhumanity — a threnody for the destruction
of a race.”
The first movement begins with the 'gunshot' gesture (Track
11); then under more frantic woodwind figures, the brass
and strings shudder and violently disassemble melodic
fragments before returning to this savage gesture (Track
12). The violence continues, almost unabated, reaching a
climax of orchestral noise — a “choir of the destroyed” —
which melts into the static threnody of the dead; an
orchestral vocal choir – the bass drum solemnly marking
time (Track 13). The elegy layers mournful solo voices
above a gradual orchestral crescendo to a horn-led
apotheosis of an ethereal other-worldly atmosphere — the
voices of the souls — “the victims of the fire of
inhumanity”. This subsides (Track 14), with brief jerks of
protest, into several unsettled solos for tuba, bass
trombone and finally, a poignant lone alto flute is heard
above the vocal choir of the dead.
CD 2 opens with
Born from Good Angel’s Tears,
Broadstock’s Symphony No. 4 (1995), commissioned by the
Faculty of Music for its Centenary Celebrations with the
generous assistance of the Performing Arts Board of the
Australia Council, and is dedicated to the Ormond Professor
Warren Bebbington. Like the other symphonies, this work is
monothematic and undergoes processes of thematic
transformation. It is the most consistently gentle,
transcendental and reflective work on the disk, yet the
exultant climaxes do not lack in intensity despite the
relatively slow pace of the work.
The title comes from the charming fairy story (written in
1976) by the Finnish Art/Drama Therapist Dr Sirkku
Hiltunen:
“The
Good Angel looked down from Heaven and saw all the trouble
on earth. She saw many wars…people were destroying each
other…nature had turned against them…She saw floods and
earthquakes…She saw intense heat. Severe drought caused
thirst and starvation. There was death, incurable diseases,
and unlimited misery everywhere.
Good Angel felt pity for the people on the earth because of
their great suffering…
Then Good Angel looked into the depths of human depths, for
she believed that all suffering had opened the eyes and
hearts of people. But Good Angel was overcome by heavy
grief when she saw that the hearts had become cold. Not
even the sight of death could touch their hearts…People did
not care about the consequences of their deeds…Everywhere
people were waging wars against each other with their
thoughts, words, and deeds.
When Good Angel saw all of this, she understood why it was
necessary to have so much suffering on the earth. She
became overwhelmed by even heavier sorrow and deeper pain.
She turned her head away from the earth, covered her face
with her hands, and wept. Good Angel wept and wept, and her
tears began rolling further and further down. Suddenly when
her tears touched the surface of the earth, they became
small human beings. These little boys and girls stayed
children all their lives. Because they were born of the
tears of Good Angel they kept their connection to Heaven
all their lives.
When we look into the eyes of these children…we will see
mirrored not our outer beauty but our inner selves…”
The
inexorable slowness and beauty of the opening intervals
(Track 1) -- a theme in embryo -- builds to the first real
radiant statement of the theme: horns, seemingly optimistic
yet tinged with sadness. There is no “great reckoning”; the
music falls downwards into an almost impossibly slow
section (Track 2) of reflection. The return of the horn
theme transforms itself almost surprisingly, and with
re-found vigour, into the final section (Track 3). The same
slow melodic intervals are wound ever-tighter, over more
rhythmic accompaniment of ever-increasing tempo, to a final
triumphant statement of the same theme, before finishing in
an optimistic blaze. The conclusion seems to assert that
from suffering can come joyousness; our “inner selves” are
reflected in the tears of the Good Angel, tinged with pain
but, finally, beautiful.
The quote which accompanies Broadstock’s Symphony No.
5,
Dark Side
(1999), is from Mark Twain: “everyone is a moon, and has a
dark side that he never shows anyone.” The work was
commissioned by Andrew Wheeler and the Krasnoyarsk Symphony
Orchestra, with the assistance of grants from the Civitella
Ranieri Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation.
Dark Side
is perhaps the most directly autobiographical work on the
disk, and refers to earlier orchestral and chamber works of
the composer and early influences, such as pop music.
The work is set in a vast, neatly balanced, biographical
structure of two movements. It begins enigmatically (Track
4), building to a first choral statement from the horns and
trumpets (Track 5) that is still self-doubting and wistful.
This theme is transformed, becoming at one point a
beautiful and reflective trombone solo, before an
introspective string section (Track 6) builds the emotional
momentum again to an even more glorious statement of the
first climax, which in turn is lulled into a beautiful
extended section of acceptance (Track 7). Even here there
are brief moments of quiet brass unease, but the movement
finishes calmly: an elusive and ultimately affirming quote
from the First Symphony’s major theme dissolves into a
final shimmering page of orchestral light.
The second movement begins (Track 8) with a quiet, pulsing
rhythmic vigour. It builds to a brief and abruptly halted
climax before shifting gear (Track 9) and rushing headlong
into the first moment of repose (Track 10). There follow
sections of fast and overtly aggressive music juxtaposed
with the now elaborated calmer music, before the gauntlet
is cast down, rushing powerfully to a loud and abandoned
climax. This is exhilarating music. It seems to acknowledge
a youthful delight and wilfulness, an optimism, that
Broadstock has only rarely allowed himself: a musical
representation, in fact, of the composer’s duality.
Dark Side
“does not refer to anything sinister, only that we all have
our unknown or little-known side — our island of existence,
our individuality, our inner self — that no one else can
ever truly know.”
©2001 Linda Kouvaras
Dr
Linda Kouvaras is a composer, pianist and musicologist who
lives in Melbourne, Australia. Her website is
www.amcoz.com.au/composers/composer.asp?id=1328