It’s hard to see these days, but scratched into a wall at Exeter Cathedral is the name of a composer who was born four centuries ago this year, in 1622, and had a curious life that took him from being a boy chorister in Exeter (hence the graffiti) to becoming a favoured figure at the court of King Charles II – despite the fact that somewhere along the way he had openly converted to Catholicism: a decision that generally killed off hopes of a career in 17th century England.
His name was Matthew Locke, re-membered mostly for the theatre and chamber music he composed in later life. But there’s also a body of choral works that he wrote in the 1630s-40s when he was still in Exeter. What makes them interesting is that they weren’t just for the cathedral choir – which, at the time, was prominent – but for the choir with an accompany-ing consort of viols, played by former choristers who took up instruments after their voices broke.
It’s music largely overlooked now: viols are bygone things and wouldn’t work liturgically. But to mark Locke’s anniversary the enterprising Two Moors Festival – a miraculous institution that against all logic makes remarkable events happen in remote locations across Exmoor and Dartmoor – organised a concert to revive it, bringing together today’s Exeter choir with the period ensemble Fretwork. It was something of a kind I’ve never heard before and maybe never will again. But for that reason alone it was special, summoning up the sounds of a lost world to an audience that was evidently mesmerised by what they heard. The choir was on good form under its director Timothy Noon. The plaintive melancholy of the viols was transcendental. And adding to the melancholic mood, James Mustard, Exeter’s Canon Precentor, threw in some stories of how the Cathedral suffered during the Civil War when Puritans destroyed its organ, abused its vestments and evicted its musicians from their homes – including the venerable organist Edward Gibbons (brother of Orlando) who was left walking the streets. Church musicians in the 21st century may not be able to pay their gas bills but don’t have it quite so bad.
As for the Two Moors Festival, it positively flourished this year, following up the Exeter concert with an entire day of chamber music – morning, afternoon and evening – that you might have heard in one of the At Homes given by Robert and Clara Schumann in the 19th century. The “home” here turned out to be something rather grander than the Schumanns ever had: an imposing pile in the middle of Dartmoor called Great Fulford House. But being still in private hands and slightly frayed at the edges it really did feel like attending a domestic salon. And the close-up, intimate performances of the Albion Quartet (in Beethoven and Schumann), contralto Jess Dandy (singing more Schumann), and baritone Benjamin Appl (singing Schubert’s Winterreise), all with input from pianist James Baillieu, had a collective magnificence hard to forget. Domestic music-making doesn’t often operate at such exalted levels. You can only do it in the context of a festival, and Two Moors is a festival to reckon with these days.
I don’t often find myself sharing intimate moments with cardinal arch-bishops, but last month I found my-self alone with Vincent Nichols in the undercroft at St Peter ad Vincula in the Tower of London, standing in respectful silence before the tomb of St Thomas More. Like many of Henry VIII’s victims, the saint’s headless body ended up in this small church, investing it with awesome-ness (as well as the appearance of a Hilary Mantel theme park). It was the striking setting for a concert given by that most majestical of vocal groups The Sixteen – organised by John Studzinki’s Genesis Foundation as a tribute to the late Queen.
Everything we heard was English, from the Tudor polyphony of Tallis and Byrd through to Tippett and Cecilia MacDowall. It was immacul-ate: The Sixteen sing like a well-oiled machine, though with expressive depth that’s far removed from the mechanical. The only thing that did-n’t go to plan was that we lost the car-dinal: he didn’t show up at the after-party as intended. Maybe he was still with Thomas More. But knowing there were times when cardinals who disappeared into the prelates of the Tower never resurfaced, it was cause for some concern.
More seriously concerning was the news that Daniel Barenboim is closing his career because of ill-health. That the announcement came through on the very day he won the Lifetime Achievement category in the 2022 Gramophone Awards was poig-nant and threatened to dampen spirits at the event. But there were other things to celebrate – not least the emerging talent of Johan Dalene, the Swedish violinist (just 22) who took the Young Artist Award. He played at the ceremony, accompanied by Leif Ove Andsnes, and was dazzling – with a fluency of technique that you only find in great performers. I sus-pect he’s on his way to being one.
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