Veni, Veni, Emmanuel (MacMillan)

Last updated

Veni, Veni, Emmanuel is a concerto for percussion and orchestra by James MacMillan. MacMillan began composing it on the first Sunday of Advent 1991 and completed it on Easter Sunday 1992, dates that are significant to the work itself. The work was commissioned by Christian Salvesen PLC. It received its premiere on 10 August 1992 at the Royal Albert Hall, London, performed by Evelyn Glennie and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra under Jukka-Pekka Saraste. The work is in one movement, and lasts around 25 minutes. The music draws on the Advent plainchant of the same name, which appears in its full form only at the end.

Contents

Structure

There are five main sections to the work: after the introduction is a 'heartbeat' section (representing, according to the composer, "the human presence of Christ"), followed by a 'hocket' dance; transition sequences lead in and out of the central Gaude, after which the dance reappears. The piece reaches its climax with the unfolding of the plainchant in chorale form, after which the work is closed by a coda in which the heartbeat motif and the percussionist on tubular bells have the last word.

The piece makes important use of a soloist who plays various percussion including tam-tams, two snare drums, congas, timbales, gongs, woodblocks and marimba. According to MacMillan this makes the soloist "an equal partner with the orchestra." [1]

Veni, Veni, Emmanuel is the most frequently performed concerto composed in the 1990s. City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and percussionist Colin Currie conducted by Marin Alsop gave the 300th performance on 25 March 2003 at Symphony Hall in Birmingham. [2]

Recordings

Tracking and timing

  1. Introit - Advent (2:40)
  2. Heartbeats (2:36)
  3. Dance - Hocket (4:17)
  4. Transition: Sequence I (2:34)
  5. Gaude, Gaude (5:35) (mislabeled as track 6 in some booklet printings)
  6. Transition: Sequence II (2:39) (mislabeled as track 7 in some booklet printings)
  7. Dance - Chorale (2:53) (not listed in some booklet printings)
  8. Coda - Easter (3:03)

Major sections are bolded

Tracks 9-19 are other MacMillan compositions.

See also

Notes

  1. 1001 Recordings You Must Hear Before You Die
  2. "James MacMillan's Veni, Veni, Emmanuel reaches 300".
  3. CD booklet Catalyst 09026-61916-2. OCLC   29450504.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Violin Concerto (Berg)</span>

Alban Berg's Violin Concerto was written in 1935. It is probably Berg's best-known and most frequently performed instrumental piece, in which the composer sought to reconcile diatonicism and dodecaphony. The work was commissioned by Louis Krasner, and dedicated by Berg to "the memory of an angel", Manon Gropius. It was the last work that Berg completed. Krasner performed the solo part in the premiere at the Palau de la Música Catalana, Barcelona, on 19 April 1936, after the composer's death.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Evelyn Glennie</span> Scottish percussionist

Dame Evelyn Elizabeth Ann Glennie, is a Scottish percussionist. She was selected as one of the two laureates for the Polar Music Prize of 2015.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Violin Concerto (Tchaikovsky)</span> 1878 concerto by Pyotr Tchaikovsky

The Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 35 was the only concerto for violin composed by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Composed in 1878, it is one of the best-known violin concertos.

John Harris Harbison is an American composer, known for his symphonies, operas, and large choral works.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James MacMillan</span> Scottish composer and conductor

Sir James Loy MacMillan, is a Scottish classical composer and conductor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Symphony No. 2 (Rachmaninoff)</span> Symphony in four movements composed by Sergei Rachmaninoff

The Symphony No. 2 in E minor, Op. 27 by Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff was written from October 1906 to April 1907. The premiere was performed at the Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg on 26 January 1908, with the composer conducting. Its duration is approximately 60 minutes when performed uncut; cut performances can be as short as 35 minutes. The score is dedicated to Sergei Taneyev, a Russian composer, teacher, theorist, author, and pupil of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The piece remains one of the composer's most popular and best known compositions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion</span>

The Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion, Sz. 110, BB 115, is a musical piece written by Hungarian composer Béla Bartók in 1937. The sonata was premiered by Bartók and his second wife, Ditta Pásztory-Bartók, with the percussionists Fritz Schiesser and Philipp Rühlig at the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM) anniversary concert of 16 January 1938 in Basel, Switzerland, where it received enthusiastic reviews. Bartók and his wife also played the piano parts for the American premiere which took place in New York City's Town Hall in 1940, with the percussionists Saul Goodman and Henry Deneke. It has since become one of Bartók's most performed works.

This is a summary of 1992 in music in the United Kingdom, including the official charts from that year.

"Concerning Hobbits" is a piece by composer Howard Shore derived from The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring soundtrack. It is a concert suite of the music of the Hobbits, arranged from the music heard in the film during the early Shire scenes, and features the various themes and leitmotifs composed for the Shire and Hobbits; it is intended to evoke feelings of peace. It is also the title of one of the sections of the prologue to The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien. Excerpts of the piece can be heard during an extended scene in the 2012 film The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, where it was tracked intentionally. The piece has become synonymous with the Shire and Hobbiton themes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ross Edwards (composer)</span> Australian composer

Ross Edwards is an Australian composer of a wide variety of music including orchestral and chamber music, choral music, children's music, opera and film music. His distinctive sound world reflects his interest in deep ecology and his belief in the need to reconnect music with elemental forces, as well as restore its traditional association with ritual and dance. He also recognises the profound importance of music as an agent of healing. His music, universal in that it is concerned with age-old mysteries surrounding humanity, is at the same time connected to its roots in Australia, whose cultural diversity it celebrates, and from whose natural environment it draws inspiration, especially birdsong and the mysterious patterns and drones of insects. As a composer living and working on the Pacific Rim, he is aware of the exciting potential of this vast region.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">O Come, O Come, Emmanuel</span> Christian hymn for Advent and Christmas

"O come, O come, Emmanuel" is a Christian hymn for Advent, which is also often published in books of Christmas carols. The text was originally written in Latin. It is a metrical paraphrase of the O Antiphons, a series of plainchant antiphons attached to the Magnificat at Vespers over the final days before Christmas. The hymn has its origins over 1,200 years ago in monastic life in the 8th or 9th century. Seven days before Christmas Eve monasteries would sing the “O antiphons” in anticipation of Christmas Eve when the eighth antiphon, “O Virgo virginum” would be sung before and after Mary’s canticle, the Magnificat. The Latin metrical form of the hymn was composed as early as the 12th century.

Veni may refer to:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kenneth Leighton</span> British composer and pianist

Kenneth Leighton was a British composer and pianist. His compositions include church and choral music, pieces for piano, organ, cello, oboe and other instruments, chamber music, concertos, symphonies, and an opera. He had various academic appointments in the Universities of Leeds, Oxford and, primarily, Edinburgh.

Colin David Currie is a Scottish virtuoso percussionist. He is the founder and leader of the Colin Currie Group, an ensemble dedicated to performing and recording the music of Steve Reich.

Events from the year 1992 in Scotland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Classical music in Scotland</span>

Classical music in Scotland is all art music in the Western European classical tradition, between its introduction in the eighteenth century until the present day. The development of a distinct tradition of art music in Scotland was limited by the impact of the Scottish Reformation on ecclesiastical music from the sixteenth century. Concerts, largely composed of "Scottish airs", developed in the seventeenth century and classical instruments were introduced to the country. Music in Edinburgh prospered through the patronage of figures including the merchant Sir John Clerk of Penicuik. The Italian style of classical music was probably first brought to Scotland by the cellist and composer Lorenzo Bocchi, who travelled to Scotland in the 1720s. The Musical Society of Edinburgh was incorporated in 1728. Several Italian musicians were active in the capital in this period and there are several known Scottish composers in the classical style, including Thomas Erskine, 6th Earl of Kellie, the first Scot known to have produced a symphony.

The Percussion Concerto No. 2 is a concerto for solo percussion and orchestra by the Scottish composer James MacMillan. The work was jointly commissioned by the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, the Philharmonia Orchestra, the Orchestre national du Capitole de Toulouse, the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and the São Paulo State Symphony. It was first performed on November 7, 2014 at TivoliVredenburg in Utrecht, the Netherlands, by percussionist Colin Currie and the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic under conductor James Gaffigan. The composition is MacMillan's second percussion concerto after 1992's Veni, Veni, Emmanuel.

A percussion concerto is a type of musical composition for a percussion soloist and a large ensemble, such as a concert band or orchestra. Two notable figures in the genre are the percussionists Colin Currie and Evelyn Glennie, who have separately commissioned and premiered numerous entrees to the repertoire. Two common subsets of the percussion concerto are the timpani concerto and the marimba concerto.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marjory Dougal</span> Scottish youth orchestra administrator (1943–2020)

Marjory Dougal was a highly respected and influential administrator and vice-president of the Edinburgh Youth Orchestra for thirty years.

References