Peter Phillips

The revival of interest in what was called ‘early music’ in the 1970s and 1980s was a cultural event which went beyond a new way of making sounds. There was, for example, the dress code and the eating habits which were said to go with it. There was even a political resonance: Thatcher and Reagan were widely held never to have listened to a Josquin Mass. (Not that they were alone in that. We used to invoke that shade whenever an unattractive person, like a footballer or a captain of industry, was found to be behaving in a brutish fashion.) Having just attended the 24th edition of the Utrecht Early Music Festival, I wonder what has happened to that once so powerful an outpouring of desire.

The television broadcasts of the late Pope’s funeral and the marriage of Prince Charles, coming as they did on consecutive days, gave the opportunity to compare two different styles of choral singing at their most typical. Of course I am going to go on to say that the British version, as represented on that occasion by the choir of St George’s Chapel, Windsor, represented everything that is best, indeed just about everything that is humanly possible, in liturgical singing, while the choirs gathered in Rome managed to fulfil every gloomy expectation of those who care about these things. It has been many decades since the Sistine Chapel Choir was first recorded, bringing tears of something to many people’s eyes, and it sure hasn’t got any better.

Evidence that we live in clichéd times is everywhere about us, but I didn’t think it would extend to The Magic Roundabout. The new film, for which several of my colleagues have recently been recording the title music, is being trailed as follows: ‘The Magic Roundabout lies in ruins: the evil ice sorcerer ZeBadDee is on the loose and the fate of the Enchanted Land hangs in the balance. As a frosty mist sweeps across the earth, four unlikely heroes, Brian, Ermintrude, Dylan and Dougal, step forward to challenge the chill...The destiny of the world rests on their shoulders. Only through teamwork, friendship and exceptional bravery will they deliver the Enchanted Land from a frozen fate.’ The Magic Roundabout in ruins?

I wonder how many people are in my position, wanting the BBC to be seen to represent their own special interest, quick to belabour the authorities with their righteous indignation when they feel left out. It is too easy to expect a service which is publicly owned and paid for in effect by us all to play ‘my kind of music’ with the prominence it affords other repertoires, the desired prominence reflecting our private opinion of its worth. Incidentally, I still think that since Josquin was as great a genius as Beethoven he deserves more air-time, but I’ve said this before. Perhaps there are people complaining that the symphonies of Franz Schmidt or George Lloyd or even of Karol Szymanowski are under-represented.

Sitting in the Globe Theatre towards the end of last season, I began to have one of those out-of-mind experiences which only music is supposed to be able to give. The play in question was Measure for Measure, always known to be a difficult one to interpret satisfactorily, a difficulty which presumably increases if one is not in possession of all that might be of help. Full of untried concentration we welcome the players and lend them our ears. Off goes the Duke: ‘Of government the properties to unfold/ Would seem in me to affect speech and discourse,/ Since I am put to know that your own science/ Exceeds, in that, the lists of all advice/ My strength can give you...’ What? Could you possibly say that again more slowly?