OUP: Skempton: Expectancy - Oxford University Press

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Howard Skempton

Expectancy

Vocal score

10pp pages | 297x210mm

978-0-19-336170-6 | Paperback | 25 December 2008

Also Available: Set of parts

Price: £3.50

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Set to text by John Drinkwater, Expectancy is similar in style to the 2003 work That Music Always Round Me in its ensemble, length, structure and homophonic texture.
Typical of Skempton, it appears deceptively simple, making use of repetition and carefully placed harmonies which shift subtly to match the text. A beautiful setting which was commissioned by Warwick University in celebration of 30 years of the Coull Quartet's residency and first performed by the Coull Quartet and University of Warwick Chamber Choir on 7 March 2008, at St Paul's Church, Hockley, Birmingham.

Forces or Category

SATB chamber choir & string quartet

Duration

7 minutes

Difficulty

Moderately difficult

Programme Notes

The Coull Quartet was appointed Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Warwick in September 1977 and Expectancy was commissioned by the University to celebrate the first 30 years of its residency. This new work is a setting for choir and string quartet of a poem by John Drinkwater (1882-1937), a fine writer associated both with Birminghams old Repertory Theatre and with 'leafy Warwickshire'. Drinkwater has just slipped out of copyright and this may be one of the reasons I was prompted to look again at his poetry, having set Roundels of the Year in 1993. His lyric poems are likeable and palpably musical, and Expectancy is one of his best.
Although there is no Music Department at Warwick University, there is a vigorous Music Centre based at Warwick Arts Centre, at the heart of the campus. The Chamber Choir is a fine ensemble and gave the first performance of my Two Poems of Edward Thomas in 1996.
If the first responsibility of any composer is to write richly imaginative music, the second is to ensure that it is manageable. The writing in Expectancy is not without subtle chromaticism and the role of the quartet is primarily that of a sensitive accompanist. In this way, it follows the example of Beethovens Elegischer Gesang, Op. 118, a little-known work for the same forces. It seems extraordinary that so little has been composed for mixed choir and string quartet. The fact that voices and strings are similarly flexible should be reason enough.
©Howard Skempton 2008

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