Hellawell ISABELLA'S BANQUET by ScoresOnDemand

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HELLAWELL

Isabella’s Banquet

for SATB Choir a cappella

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PIERS HELLAWELL

Isabella’s Banquet

for SATB choir a capella

Score

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Text by Isabella Beeton, from the Book of Household Management (1888 edition)

Instrumentation

SATB choir a capella

Isabella’s Banquet was commissioned by Gerry Mattock and Beryl Calver-Jones.

Isabella’s Banquet

While I have done my share of setting resonant poetic texts – love poetry for example – I have a particular fondness for verbal richness that occurs as a by-product of texts designed for practical use, and can well understand how Milhaud was drawn to catalogues of agricultural implements and seeds for his texts. My own Hilliard Songbook found the descriptions of precious stones in a treatise on portrait painting: recitations of raw materials are often full of unexpected beauties.

The title Isabella’s Banquet refers not to an imaginary dinner but to the omniscient tome from which are drawn the texts used in this work – Isabella Beeton’s Book of Household Management (1888 edition). This unique compendium was for many years the oracle on household wisdom; as a result it now contains a matchless record of the 19th Century’s middle-class domestic practice, encapsulating the household minutiae of Victorian Britain as surely as The Diary of a Nobody or Elizabeth Gaskell’s Cranford. At its heart is of course an enormous body of cooking knowledge, yet a book that contains recipes for Parrot Pie and (in its Australian cooking section) Roast Wallaby also covers, in its 1641 pages, wisdom on everything from the ‘Liabilities of Dog Owners’ to ‘Treatment of a Person Struck by Lightning’. More important than any of this, however, is the exemplary and often colourful language of the book as literature, and it is this, rather than any particular topic or ‘quaintness’ as to content, that has governed the choice of texts.

The main songs are, nonetheless, grouped relating to areas of food, for Isabella is at her most poetic when describing ingredients. Between these collages of text, about cooking with ﬁre, beverages, sheep, spices and fowl, – are brief duets drawing words of wisdom from Mrs Beeton’s Chapter 1, ‘The Mistress’. The work opens with a setting of the verse from Proverbs xxxi that heads this, the opening chapter of a unique book.

Duration: 20 mins approx.

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Dedication

STRENGTH AND HONOUR ARE HER CLOTHING; AND SHE SHALL REJOICE IN TIME TO COME. SHE OPENETH HER MOUTH WITH WISDOM; AND IN HER TONGUE IS THE LAW OF KINDNESS.

Memorandum I

Early Rising is the parent of health. To self-indulgence, all are more or less disposed. Cold or tepid baths should be employed every morning.

The Fire

Fire - Simple as is this mode.

Fire was discovered.

Fire -

Fire - (subsequently) to the Croat mode.

Fire -

Fire - for drying and cooking their meat.

Fire -

Fire - proper (and) commodious methods in the preparation.

Meat, then -- (a) pleasing perfume and ﬂavour...

Meat, then - placed on burning fuel.

Meat, then -

Meat, then - placed on burning fuel was found better than raw.

Meat, then –

Meat, then - ozmazome condensed (by) carbonisation.

Meat, then -

Meat, then - richly and pleasantly ﬂavoured.

How the great Achilles … regaled the Grecian leaders on bread, wine and broiled meat.

Esau’s -

Esau’s mess of potage.

Esau’s -

Esau’s mess of potage, for which he sold his birthright.

Esau’s –

Esau’s mess of potage, for which he sold his birthright, must have been prepared.

Memorandum II

Frugality and Economy are home virtues. To manage a little well is a great merit.

The Beverages

Beverages... innumerable in their variety: water, toast-and-water, barley-water, eau sucré,

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lemonade, orangeade, apple and pear, capillaire.... sherbert

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Fermented liquors (are) punch... hot spiced wines bishop hot spiced wines egg-ﬂip, egg-hot, hot spiced wines ale-posset, sack-posset, hot spiced wines punch...

“Strong, brisk, family tea”; Twankay, Hyson (and) Gunpowder are green teas... (corruptions of) Chinese words.. Bohea, Congou, Souchong.

Memorandum III

Friendships should not be hastily formed. A friendship which makes the least noise is very often the most useful.

The Fowl

Gallinaceous family… from quail to turkey… a light aliment… well-fattened and tender

Fowl to the cook as is canvas to the painter

Most esteemed (are) the Poland, or Black, the Dorking, the Bantam, Malay or Chittagong. The Poland (is) easily fattened…

The Cochin-China: distinguished Asiatic – sensation from the landing of an invading host. Then began the Cochin furor. Natives of Shanghai… Cochin chicks: Cochin eggs: laid by the fabled golden goose. … musical trumpeting of our own morning herald.

Memorandum IV

Visits of Friendship need not be ceremonious… The courtesies of society should ever be maintained.

The Sheep

Numerous varieties of sheep; different regions of the earth. Ovis Ammon, or the Argali... Ovis Tragelaphus, bearded sheep of Africa;

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Ovis Musmon, the Musmon of Southern Europe; Ovis Montana, the Moufﬂon of America.

Gentle and Timid Disposition of the sheep... a high degree of domesticity, obedience and affection.

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Memorandum V

Charity and benevolence are duties. It is the spirit of charity which imparts to the gift a value… by far its better part.

The Spices

*Cayenne: most acrid and stimulating spice…

*Capsicum: the Guinea, the Cherry and the Bell Pepper.

*Black Pepper: aromatic spice… fruit of a species of climbing vine… in Malabar, the eastern islands of Borneo, Sumatra and Java. Man is no longer the child of Nature, the passive inhabitant.

*Cherry Laurel… beautiful evergreen, consecrated to priests and heroes. ‘A crown of bay’, desired reward… Classic Laurel… the gift of prophecy, poetic genius, to procure pleasant dreams, symbol of victory.

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Isabella’sBanquet

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Inthe‘Memorandum’duets,anysolovoicesarepermitted;forexampleasolotenormaybeusedinsteadofbass,accordingtotessatura. (Exact)transpositionisalsofineifnecessary.Thevoicesmayalsobetakenbyallorpartofasectionratherthanbysoli,adlib.

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B.1 B.2 & E Energicoemarcato mf -sau’s mess ofpotage. E mpdim. -sau’s . messof pot-age & E mf -sau’s mess ofpot . -age E mpdim. -sau’s messof pot age& E mf -sau’s mess ofpotage - E mpdim. -sau’s . messof pot age -

E mf -sau’s mess ofpotage - E mpdim. -sau’s messof pot age -

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TheBeverages

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TheFowl

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Theopeningpassagefeaturesindividualvoices,asmanyasarewithineachsection; thepassageshouldaccumulatesoundassmoothlyaspossibleuptoA

TOTALDURATIONOFBASSPASSAGE:c.8-10”(adlib.accordingtonumberofvoicesentering)

2SOLIbegin,notcoordinated;remainingbassesenterindividuallyatc.3”intervals.Fermataadlib.

*Eachvoiceenters

i)avoidingsynchronizationwithpreviousvoices

ii)exploringvariedspeeds/rhythms/dynamicsoneachrepeat(nb:spacingofnotesisNOTindicativeofdurations/rhythms)

iii)exaggeratingthesforzandosyllables,whichthus‘standout’

TOTALDURATIONOFTENORPASSAGE:c.7-9”(adlib.accordingtonumberofvoicesentering)

1SOLObegins;remainingtenorsenterindividuallyatc.3”intervals.Fermataadlib.

*Eachvoiceenters

i)avoidingsynchronizationwithpreviousvoices

ii)exploringvariedspeeds/rhythms/dynamicsoneachrepeat(nb:spacingofnotesisNOTindicativeofdurations/rhythms)

iii)exaggeratingthesforzandosyllables,whichthus‘standout’

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TOTALDURATIONOFALTOPASSAGE:c.6-8”(adlib.accordingtonumberofvoicesentering)

1SOLObegins;remainingaltosenterindividuallyatc.3”intervals.Fermataadlib.

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*Eachvoiceenters

i)avoidingsynchronizationwithpreviousvoices

ii)exploringvariedspeeds/rhythms/dynamicsoneachrepeat(nb:spacingofnotesisNOTindicativeofdurations/rhythms)

iii)exaggeratingthesforzandosyllables,whichthus’standout’

TOTALDURATIONOFSOPRANOPASSAGE:c.5-7”(adlib.accordingtonumberofvoicesentering)

1SOLObegins;remainingsopranosenterindividuallyatc.3”intervals.Fermataadlib.

*Eachvoiceenters

i)avoidingsynchronizationwithpreviousvoices

ii)exploringvariedspeeds/rhythms/dynamicsoneachrepeat(nb:spacingofnotesisNOTindicativeofdurations/rhythms)

iii)exaggeratingthesforzandosyllables,whichthus’standout’

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APPENDIX:alternatveversion,à8,ofbb340-342

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Piers Hellawell

Piers Hellawell (b. 1956) has worked with leading artists such as the LSO, Schubert Ensemble, Dame Evelyn Glennie and the Hilliard Ensemble, who toured his Hilliard Songbook pieces worldwide. Orchestral works include Cors de chasse (for Håkan Hardenberger, Jonas Bylund and the Philharmonia Orchestra) and the BBC commission Dogs and Wolves (2006), while Syzygy was premiered in 2013 by the Stockholm Chamber Brass/Swedish Chamber Orchestra. 2016 saw Hellawell’s Wild Flow commissioned for the BBC Proms, and a UK tour of Up by the Roots – a collaboration with poet Sinéad Morrissey – as well as a composer feature at Detroit’s Great Lakes Festival. Hellawell has been Professor of Composition at Queen’s University of Belfast since 2002, and has spoken widely on issues of music and cultural ownership as Gresham Professor of Music in London, 2000–2003.

Piers Hellawell (*1956) hat mit vielen namhaften Künstlern und Ensembles zusammengearbeitet, u.a. mit dem London Symphony Orchestra, dem Schubert Ensemble, Evelyn Glennie und dem Hilliard Ensemble, das seinem Hilliard Songbook zu internationaler Bekanntheit verhalf. Zu Hellawells Orchesterwerken zählen Cors de chasse (für Håkan Hardenberger, Jonas Bylund und das Philharmonia Orchestra), das BBC-Auftragswerk Dogs and Wolves (2006) sowie Syzygy, das 2013 von Stockholm Chamber Brass und dem Swedish Chamber Orchestra uraufgeführt wurde. 2016 entstanden Wild Flow für die BBC Proms sowie Up by the Roots – ein Gemeinschaftsprojekt mit der Dichterin Sinéad Morrissey, das bei Konzerten in ganz Großbritannien und Nordirland zur Aufführung kam. Im gleichen Jahr bildete sein Schaffen einen Schwerpunkt des Great Lakes Festival in Detroit. Hellawell ist seit 2002 Professor an der Queen’s University in Belfast. Von 2000 bis 2003 hatte er die Londoner Gresham-Professur für Musik inne und setzte sich bei seinen Vorträgen mit Fragen des kulturellen Eigentums in der Musik auseinander.