EJ Moeran

[HotFXMan]

Just to weigh in here on the Moeran Myth. It is actually quite common in academic discourse to talk about a "myth" surrounding a poet, writer or composer. Usually it is used to describe a common set of assumptions about the figure which align nicely with contemporary beliefs but is not based on any serious academic research. When such work is done it is not correct to call it an alternative myth, but instead an academic argument, which can only be refuted by equally comprehensive work.

Succinctly and elegantly put. Thank you for clarifying what I had failed to communicate effectively.

[HotFXMan]

Just catching up on this interesting discussion ... I'd like to ask 'HotFXMan' which is his favourite recording of the Symphony ...

I don't really have a favourite as such. Each recording (even the amateur ones) has merits, and, of course, the more times the work is played and recorded the better (from my somewhat biased perspective). However, when I listen to the symphony, it does tend to be the Sir Adrian Boult/New Philharmonia Orchestra original Lyrita LP version that I select on my player. This was one of the first LPs that I bought as a teenager and it holds additional personal memories.

Incidentally, it was not so much the symphony that attracted me to Moeran's music, but a chance hearing of part of the Cello Concerto that I caught on Radio 3 some time in the early 1980s. It was a studio broadcast and I don't recall who was playing it, but I do remember that the middle movement made me stop whatever I was doing at the time and just sit listening in awe.

[vandermolen]

I don't really have a favourite as such. Each recording (even the amateur ones) has merits, and, of course, the more times the work is played and recorded the better (from my somewhat biased perspective). However, when I listen to the symphony, it does tend to be the Sir Adrian Boult/New Philharmonia Orchestra original Lyrita LP version that I select on my player. This was one of the first LPs that I bought as a teenager and it holds additional personal memories.

Incidentally, it was not so much the symphony that attracted me to Moeran's music, but a chance hearing of part of the Cello Concerto that I caught on Radio 3 some time in the early 1980s. It was a studio broadcast and I don't recall who was playing it, but I do remember that the middle movement made me stop whatever I was doing at the time and just sit listening in awe.

Thank you. I had a similar experience hearing Miaskovsky's Cello Concerto on the radio c. 1975. Of course it was the Dilkes LP which introduced me to Moeran, which is why I remain very loyal to it - I have never heard a more moving performance of the slow movement. Boult's magisterial Lyrita recording was/is one of the treasures of the Lyrita catalogue. As I already owned the Dilkes recording I didn't get the Boult version for many years but Boult did introduce me to the marvellous Sinfonietta on a fine Lyrita LP, coupled, I think, with Bax's 'November Woods' and Holst's 'Fugal Overture'. The Boult/Coetmore recording of the Cello Concerto is by far the most deeply felt, even though her playing was not, by then, entirely secure.

[Roasted Swan]

Just to weigh in here on the Moeran Myth. It is actually quite common in academic discourse to talk about a "myth" surrounding a poet, writer or composer. Usually it is used to describe a common set of assumptions about the figure which align nicely with contemporary beliefs but is not based on any serious academic research. When such work is done it is not correct to call it an alternative myth, but instead an academic argument, which can only be refuted by equally comprehensive work.

This is how it feels when someone puts something so neatly and coherently that you wished you were able to frame your own thoughts so well! - thankyou Calyptorhynchus!!

[Biffo]

Perhaps ignorance is bliss in some cases. I have a modest selection of Moeran's music and know very little about him except a bare biographical outline obtained from record booklets, consequently I am am unaware  of any 'myths'. My favourite album is from Chandos and has the Violin and Cello concertos. I have just listened to Lonely Waters (Handley/Ulster) from that album,  a beautiful piece dedicated to RVW.

[HotFXMan]

I ... know very little about him except a bare biographical outline obtained from record booklets, consequently I am am unaware  of any 'myths'.

In fact, by reading the LP cover notes and CD liner notes, you will already be aware of many of the "myths" - although you will not necessarily recognise them as such. The "Moeran Myth", as I put it in my PhD thesis, has become so embedded in the conventional wisdom about the composer that extracting and expunging it has been particularly difficult. For example, some years ago, I provided the BBC (at their request) with an updated biographical note, which they are supposed to use whenever such material is required for broadcast. However, the last time I heard anything by Moeran on Radio 3, the same (incorrect) information that has been current for the past thirty or more years was presented alongside the music. The same has been true of most of the Moeran CDs published during the past ten years.

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

It seems as if exploding a myth is akin to effecting a 'paradigm shift'. Entrenched 'truths' are hard to topple. Let's hope the rectified Moeran view finally gains currency!

[Pohjolas Daughter]

In fact, by reading the LP cover notes and CD liner notes, you will already be aware of many of the "myths" - although you will not necessarily recognise them as such. The "Moeran Myth", as I put it in my PhD thesis, has become so embedded in the conventional wisdom about the composer that extracting and expunging it has been particularly difficult. For example, some years ago, I provided the BBC (at their request) with an updated biographical note, which they are supposed to use whenever such material is required for broadcast. However, the last time I heard anything by Moeran on Radio 3, the same (incorrect) information that has been current for the past thirty or more years was presented alongside the music. The same has been true of most of the Moeran CDs published during the past ten years.

Well, I'm certainly intrigued by your latest research and look forward to hearing/reading it in the future.  I have a couple of recordings of his music:  On Chandos Classics--Symphony in G minor/Rhapsody for Piano and Orchestra and his Overture for a Masque.  Also, a later recording on Naxos of his Cello Concerto, Serenade, Lonely Waters and Whythorne's Shadow.  The liner notes are from Andrew Burn and Paul Conway respectively.  I suspect that the 2013 (Naxos one) would then be out-of-date as it were?

PD

[J]

It seems as if exploding a myth is akin to effecting a 'paradigm shift'. Entrenched 'truths' are hard to topple. Let's hope the rectified Moeran view finally gains currency!

Getting the facts right is of course important, but to equate the "truth" about Moeran with bagfuls of correct facts is a quite threadbare notion.

A "rectified Moeran view" in that regard is merely preparatory to understanding (a much more uncertain effort), and whatever of such emerges from Dr Maxwell's study is going to obscure at the same time it reveals, notwithstanding his meticulous research.
That is inevitable.

It's on the level of understanding that I would use the word "myth" rather than the level of facts, and in that relation myth does not mean contrary to truth, but the necessary approach to truth.  In no definitive way are we going to get "the" truth about Moeran from Dr Maxwell's pen, no matter how accurate all his facts might be, but we are going to get a myth that one hopes offers a great deal of insight about the man, - perhaps even a revelation.

Anyhow, I'm anxious for the book to arrive.

[calyptorhynchus]

To stand aside from the biography and so forth, what I find remarkable about Moeran's music is the consistently high quality of it. I think I have heard every single piece of his that has been recorded and there is hardly a poor one amongst them. The only Moeran music I didn't enjoy much were his art songs (but then my introduction to English song when I was a teenager was Finzi's Hardy settings, and few English songs match up to those).

[vandermolen]

Getting the facts right is of course important, but to equate the "truth" about Moeran with bagfuls of correct facts is a quite threadbare notion.

A "rectified Moeran view" in that regard is merely preparatory to understanding (a much more uncertain effort), and whatever of such emerges from Dr Maxwell's study is going to obscure at the same time it reveals, notwithstanding his meticulous research.
That is inevitable.

It's on the level of understanding that I would use the word "myth" rather than the level of facts, and in that relation myth does not mean contrary to truth, but the necessary approach to truth.  In no definitive way are we going to get "the" truth about Moeran from Dr Maxwell's pen, no matter how accurate all his facts might be, but we are going to get a myth that one hopes offers a great deal of insight about the man, - perhaps even a revelation.

Anyhow, I'm anxious for the book to arrive.

I think that this is a very good point. Most 'myths' are based on some essential truth (see Rollo May's 'The Cry for Myth' for example). I'm sure that Geoffrey Self's book, for example, whatever its shortcomings, does give us insights into Moeran's character and personality, as well as his music.

[HotFXMan]

I think that this is a very good point ...

Well, I am sorry but I do not. The common dictionary definitions of the word "myth" are variously:

a widely held but false belief or idea.
a misrepresentation of the truth.
a fictitious or imaginary person or thing.
an exaggerated or idealized conception of a person or thing

None of these has a place in academia except as targets to be discredited by rigorous research, and they certainly do not apply to the results of my work.

[HotFXMan]

... It's on the level of understanding that I would use the word "myth" rather than the level of facts, and in that relation myth does not mean contrary to truth, but the necessary approach to truth.  In no definitive way are we going to get "the" truth about Moeran from Dr Maxwell's pen, no matter how accurate all his facts might be, but we are going to get a myth that one hopes offers a great deal of insight about the man ...

It is difficult to respond to this reasonably. Words such as "drivel" and "twaddle" spring readily to mind.

[HotFXMan]

I apologise to those reading this discussion thread for being a bit defensive about my work. However, I have devoted the past sixteen years of my life to Moeran and have, I believe, achieved a level of knowledge and understanding about the composer and his work that far surpasses that of anybody else. To be told that all I have done amounts to no more than a new myth about the man is intolerable.

I hope that those of you that have bought or will buy or otherwise read my book will enjoy it, and that it may inform, surprise, and provoke discussion. However, at the risk of sounding petulant (for which I also apologise) I will not be visiting this forum again.

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

That's a pity. We're not all relativists.

[Pohjolas Daughter]

I'm sorry to hear that HotFXMan as I was looking forward to reading your contributions here and elsewhere on the forum.

Hopefully, I can read your book via a college library (probably can't check it out, but sometimes they will set aside a book(s) for me to use at a desk in the appropriate library--once things get back to 'normal' that is).

Best wishes,

PD

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Well, I did some checking around online and then called my local library and have put in a request to see whether or not I could get a copy of the book through inter-library loan.  We'll see what happens! 

PD

[J]

That's a pity. We're not all relativists.

Nor am I. 

Of course I'll now be villified (or ridiculed) for driving off the august scholar, - who's taken his cricket stick and run home, - with my "drivel" and "twaddle".

This isn't an Oxford or Cambridge classroom.  It's a discussion forum where one can freely throw out ideas and offer reactions without concern for academic proprieties or violating other posters' excessive self-regard.

Nonetheless I'm no ignoramus, and the points I made were an offhand expression of legitimate and serious issues.

Do I regret spending 65 US dollars on this guy's book?  Kind of, - at the moment (what a bad publicist he is).

BTW, Maxwell using a dictionary to pin down the meaning of a quite nuanced and many-shaded notion like "myth" shows he's not above in his own right the vulgarity he accuses me of.

[calyptorhynchus]

What a pity he left and you stayed.

[J]

What a pity he left and you stayed.

Of course.  We know you're the lapdog who the honorable gentleman gave a nice little pat to earlier.

No apologies.