This is a joy. Delian exoticism at its finest: previously on Classical Explorer, we reported on a performance of his more famous Lakmé via Chelsea Opera Group at Cadogan Hall; now we preset a luxuriously recorded Hassan.
This is the complete incidental music, including spoken contributions from Zeb Soames (who is narrator and who also takes the role of Ishak). The Britten Sinfonia is on fine form, as are the Britten Sinfonia Voices – just the occasional sense of strain in the upper violins comes through. The Britten Sinfonia performed the work at both Milton Court (Barbican) and Saffron Hall, so the music was within them, and it shows..
For an introduction to the piece, try this, an audio guide in preparation for performances at the Cheltenham Festival:
.. and here’s one by Zeb Soanes himself:
The piece is set in the Baghdad of legend: Hassan is a portly merchant in love with a woman who does not reciprocate his feelings. Suddenly adopted by the city’s ruler, his new status is banished by all the violence and corruption around the four.
To get an idea of the lushness of this score, and its poignant, atmospheric invocation for the exotic, try the Prelude to the first act:
There is a lot of wit here in this tale of magic potions. The music is luxurious, and sometimes sort of post-Debussian – listen to the the flute writing in this evocation of “Moonlight”:
A wordless chorus, first heard towards the end of the first act, initially seems to invoke Holst’s “Neptune” from The Planets, but later in the work (at the start of the third act) they seem more aligned to Debussy’s “Nuages”.
The Britten Sinfonia is on cracking form. Some might their Delius a little more lush, but to me this approach is the right one – it avoids unnecessarily over-burdened textures.
The recorded history of Hassan is a distinguished one, so this recording stands in a fine lineage. Roy Henderson conducting His Majesty’s Theatre Orchestra and Chorus in 1922/3 can be heard using this search on the CHARM website (these are transfers of acoustic HMVs, but good transfers); performances of much life m and the CHARM sound files reveal much detail. Vernon Handley (a conductor I still consider as under-rated to this day) and Beecham are the mainstays of the Hassan discography. Beecham, of course, had real resonance with Delius’ music, and neither should we forget two recordings of excerpts by the Hallé Orchestra, one with Barbirolli (including the Serenade with Robert Tear) and one with Constant Lambert (1941); but Jaime Phillips’ new Hassan on Chandos is the modern recording to have. Use it to supplement hose two, or experience init in its own right. Either way, this Chandos release is a winner.
Here, as a supplement, is the Beecham:
This disc is available form Amazon here.
