Birtwistle - Verses for Ensembles (1969) (with score)

Performers: Netherlands Wind Ensemble Percussion Group The Hague Cond: James Wood "In Verses for Ensembles, written to a commission from the London Sinfonietta in the winter of 1968-69, Birtwistle exploited the verse-and-refrain concept with greater brilliance and virtuosity than ever before. The ensembles of the title are families of instruments - a quintet of woodwind, a brass quintet and percussion. Throughout the work the groups either operate as units or soloistically; an instrument detaches itself from the ensemble and assumes an independent role, in the process articulating the verse-and-refrain structure of the entire work, a scheme in which the discrete blocks of material may be baldly juxtaposed or overlaid, but never homogenised into a continuous whole. The tensions created by this method of construction are enormous, and it seems as if the instruments become embroiled in a ritual of mysterious power. It is an early example of the 'secret theatre' that was to become increasingly characteristic of Birtwistle's later output. There is a visual element to the work also, which enhances the feeling of arcane ceremony: the instrumental groups are arrayed on the stage in symmetrical ranks, the higher woodwind to the left, their lower siblings to the right, the brass in a row above them, while the percussion – pitched and unpitched – rise in rows above that. Around the periphery of the ensembles are four solo positions: the two on raised platforms at the rear of the playing area are used exclusively by the trumpets; the two at the very front are shared at various moments in the work by the trumpets, horn or woodwind. It is the migrations of the players between these positions that provide their own map of the work, providing a visual image of linear movement which the music itself seems to do its best to deny." (Andrew Clements) "For me, the most thrilling example of "Dionysiac" Birtwistle comes with his explosive early London Sinfonietta commission - Verses for Ensembles. This eruptive, electrifying, 30 minutes for thirteen wind and percussion players is one of the most physically exciting works of music I know. Not that it is all fire and fury, by any means. There are tense moments of stillness and others where the music is allowed to decay into silence. The form is still fragmentary, but what fragments these are! And what boldness and character in the instrumental writing! I am not aware of Birtwistle ever having expressed any enthusiasm for the music of Janacek, but the strongly gestural and repetitive nature of his own writing, not to mention his fondness for forcing wind instruments to "speak" out of the extremes of their register, suggest a certain affinity with the Czech composer." (Robert Jones - typeevelley.com)