Requiem
Herbert Howells - (1892-1983)
Howells achieved early recognition, firstly with a fairly substantial output of instrumental music and later with his songs which were coloured by the love of his native Gloucestershire. Despite his long life, severe health problems kept him out of the First World War. He married Dorothy in 1920. Howells seemed to have eschewed the more avant-garde experimentation with music that was taking place in Europe and America. He produced a tonal style, and it is said that he was gifted at 'creating metrically complex music that flows like the finest silk'. Notoriously over-sensitive to criticism, he perceived that his second piano concerto had not been well received and ceased composing for about ten years prior to the Second World War. He was also harshly critical of himself and did not release much of his finest work for a great many years, if at all. However, a number of sad events were, in the 1930s, to bring about work ranking in the top of the English choral tradition.
Howells inherited from Holst the position of Director of Music at St Paul's Girls' School in Hammersmith: he left this post in the early 1960s but continued composing and teaching composition well into his 80s. His ashes are entombed in Westminster Abbey.
Requiem (1936)
Salvator mundi: O Saviour of the World; Psalm 23; Requiem aeternam (1); Psalm 121; Requiem aeternam (2); I heard a voice from heaven
Howell's Requiem of 1936 was set for divided mixed chorus with soprano, tenor and baritone soloists. This unaccompanied work was the first of two which arose from the tragic death in 1935 of the composer's only son Michael Kendrick Howells, aged nine, from either miningitis or polio. (He had also found Elgar's death in 1934 difficult to bear). The writing of this work and Hymnus Paradisi (1938) achieved for Howells some 'release and consolation' from a 'loss essentially profound'. Both works have strong comparisons and contrasts but, although Hymnus Paradisi was released for publication in 1950 (with some persuasion from Vaughan Williams), it was not until 1980 that the Requiem was re-assembled from manuscript and released for publication and performance.
The six movements of the Requiem open with Salvator Mundi where the smooth melancholic opening is soon followed by a splitting of the choir to achieve answering phrases to the entreaty help us and save us. Psalm 23 is a simple, stark chanting style that reflects speech values. The Requiem aeternam (1) moves from desolation to hope and Psalm 121 reflects the syllabic style achieved earlier. Requiem aeternum (2) opens and ends with a calm stillness, the mid section having built up to an enlightening climax with et lux perpetua luceat. The final movement: I heard a voice from heaven achieves an air of blissful peace and is the summation of the release from torment that Howells must have wished for his child.
Programme notes compiled by Marion Ansell