Sunday 29 January 2017

A Saga Drawn From History

Every great composer has gone through an apprenticeship, a period of learning by doing, in which the works composed are often derivative in style, awkwardly plagiarizing earlier works from more mature minds.  In the master-composer-in-training, you can nonetheless see the gradual evolution of a distinctly personal style and approach to writing music throughout these earlier works.

Harder to distinguish is the moment when a composer can finally be said to have arrived fully as a mature artist in his/her own right.  Writers on music continually try to pin down that moment, and as often find that it eludes precise definition.

English composer Edward Elgar provides a striking example.  Look at most music texts, and you are likely to read that Elgar arrived in his full artistic maturity with the Enigma Variations for orchestra and The Dream of Gerontius for soloists, chorus, and orchestra, both composed in 1899-1900.  Those are definitely mature, fully ripened masterworks, but I would suggest that Elgar had already reached the point of mastery with at least some sections of another major choral-orchestral work written four years prior to Gerontius, which is called Scenes From The Saga of King Olaf -- and usually referred to in short form simply as King Olaf.

The story of this 95-minute dramatic cantata is rooted in the real-life Saga hero Olaf Tryggvason (ca. 950-1000), who was the only Christian figure of significance in the Sagas, and indeed lived as a Crusader, bringing Christianity to his native Norway.

If there's a reason why Elgar didn't quite reach the peak with King Olaf, it really starts with the text he was setting -- a loose adaptation of a story told in Longfellow's Tales of a Wayside Inn which cuts out all the sex and a fair bit of the bloodshed.  The tattered remnants form a "knock-kneed libretto"| as Jerrold Northrop Moore so aptly said, but one which still inspired some truly remarkable music from the composer.

The very opening, a mist-laden downwards procession of chords in the strings, establishes an epic tone which is always present in the various choral movements -- and that tone is further emphasized in the opening lines for the chorus, "There is a wondrous book of legends in the old Norse tongue."

This opening chorus sets out several significant themes or motives which will recur.  More still appear in the following Challenge of Thor, a vigorous choral movement with a quick marching ostinato bass which propels the music relentlessly forward. While the voice of Thor is represented by the chorus, the ensuing response by King Olaf brings in the tenor soloist, singing with youthful ardour and energy. 

There follows the single biggest musical structure Elgar had yet attempted, and The Conversion -- in spite of its almost laconic title -- is a dramatic, almost operatic, scene of considerable power.  While the confrontation between Olaf and Ironbeard (bass), the adherent of the old Norse gods, features dramatic singing from the soloists, the music truly gathers depth and weight in Ironbeard's death solo.  Then the chorus has a lengthy movement in slow tempo, depicting the conversion of the people to Christianity, and the music slowly swells to a mighty climax underlain by rolling drums.

The three scenes depicting Olaf's three (attempted) marriages are, alas, the definite weak links in the score.  Each of the three -- Gudrun, Sigrid, and Thyri -- is depicted by the same soprano soloist.  The text allows Gudrun no room at all to develop, which is a pity since she is the daughter of the slain Ironbeard and tries to murder Olaf on their wedding night.  I certainly imagine that she might have a great deal to say on her own behalf!  The much older Sigrid has one fine moment as she sternly proclaims her adherence to the old gods, but it's only a moment.  The love duet between Olaf and Thyri shows some promise but this kind of romance was not Elgar's strong suit.

On the other hand, these three scenes are separated by two masterly, totally unique, yet utterly different, choral movements -- the up-beat drinking song which turns deadly cold in The Wraith of Odin and the light, chattering gossip chorus of the ballad Thyri. 

All the forces Olaf has set in motion eventually gang up on him and the great sea battle of The Death of Olaf summons the various motives from throughout the work, building them up into a Wagnerian climax of overwhelming force as his enemies surround and kill him.

The lengthy Epilogue pictures Olaf's mother at midnight prayer in her convent, hearing a voice in the night time (her son?  the text is unclear) affirming the victory of Christ and of peace over war.  This choral movement swells to a final glorious climax with a ringing high note from the soprano soloist, and then gradually dwindles away in a golden glow which, almost magically as it seems, merges back into the misty opening chords as the choir sings the final lines: 

A strain of music ends the tale,
A low, monotonous funeral wail
That with its cadence wild and sweet
Makes the Saga more complete.

While King Olaf is some distance from being a complete masterwork, its best pages show acute imagination and inspiration, and considerable skill in handling both voices and orchestra.  The Challenge of Thor, The Wraith of Odin, and The Death of Olaf  can certainly stand comparison with many much better-known works, and well deserve more frequent hearing.  Take the piece as a whole and I think you'd agree that, while not a mature masterwork, it's certainly very much more than just an apprentice or student piece.