John Veale (1922-2006)

[Peter1953]

Dear all, a few years ago I heard a lovely slow movement of a Violin Concerto which I've never heard before. Sounded rather romantic, and it happened to be the 2nd movement of John Veale's Violin Concerto. I bought the disc (coupled with Britten's Violin Concerto), and saw that Veale was born in 1922 (at the time of the release of this CD still living, in November 2006 he passed away). I was somewhat amazed, because this Violin Concerto was all in a tonal idiom, although written in 1982-84. Quite romantic, and certainly the Largo, which Veale called Love music. What is your opinion of this concerto?

Wikipedia gives the information that Veale wrote, amongst other works, 3 Symphonies and a Clarinet Concerto. I wonder if any member ever heard one of these works, and how they sound? Any chance of being recorded and released?

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I just found out that there is an informative website www.johnvealecomposer.co.uk

[JimL]

And he apparently liked cats, too.

[Peter1953]

It's evident that Veale doesn't speak to the imagination. Maybe he was already discussed in the former Forum.
In the (late) 1950s he became persona non grata because he wasn't a part of the avant-garde coterie, so engendered by William Glock's appointment as Director of Music at the BBC (according to the interesting booklet notes by Lewis Foreman). Therefore it's nice to notice that the BBC Symphony Orchestra recorded Veale's Violin Concerto.
Well, never mind. I like his romantic VC and he liked cats.

[Mark Thomas]

Thanks for the tip off, Peter. From the clips on the Chandos website it sounds right up my street and so it's downloading as I type!

[Alan Howe]

It's been on my list - well, on and off it - for years. Now that it's on order it'd better be good! 

[Alan Howe]

And it is good: in fact, I would say that this is one of the great late-20th century VCs - in line of descent from, say, Walton, but with a dreamy romanticism all of its own. And what a performance from Lydia Mordkovitch and the BBCSO under the late lamented Richard Hickox! An absolute stunner of a CD...

[gentile]

It might be of interest for admirers of Veale's Violin Concerto to be aware that his Clarinet Concerto from 1953 has also been issued on CD (ABC Classics 456 678-2, played by Paul Dean and the Queensland SO under Richard Mills). It is a 15 minute piece in three sections played without a break, very similar in style to his Violin concerto. The dreamy theme of the first section comes near to British film music of the age.
The CD includes also the rarely performed clarinet concerto by Walter Piston (written in his academic brand of modernistic neoclassicism), the Dance Preludes by Lutoslawski and another concerto by the soloist's brother, Brett Dean (1961), in which I found little interesting. Actually this recording seems now hard to find but it is advertised in Amazon (though at a high price):

http://www.amazon.com/Ariels-Music-Dean/dp/B00006I8MI/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1275070543&sr=1-9

[jthill]

Actually BBC3 had a mini-festival of two of Veale's works  the week of 21 Dec 2006 on Afternoon Performance.  David Porcelijn (another champion of the unsung) conducted the BBC Orchestra of Wales in the 1st Symphony on the 21st and the Metropolis Overture on the 22nd.  I managed to snag a copy from the internet broadcast in somewhat tubby sound.  As best I can describe, at least in these two orchestral works, Veale is an amalgam of Walton and Roy Harris.  In fact, I believe Veale spend some time in the US studying with Harris - it shows in his brass writing.  Maybe CPO (Porcelijn's venue), Naxos, or Chandos could put these out.

P.S. My first post  !

[albion]

In addition to the three substantial scores (Symphony No.1, Metropolis and Panorama) now in BMB, did anybody manage to record other works by John Veale broadcast in or around 2006? 

I think that the large-scale Symphony No.2 (1964) might have been played (however I could well be mistaken about this - unfortunately I haven't been able to find any further details of performers or date), but Symphony No.3 (1997) was definitely broadcast on 11/12/2006 with Barry Wordsworth conducting the BBC Concert Orchestra.

[eschiss1]

according to John Veale Composer, the 2nd symphony has yet to be performed by a professional orchestra. they might have broadcast the 1968 performance referred to, though... I don't know.- Eric

[albion]

Thanks Eric - I was probably being optimistic! A pity, as No.2 (at 40 minutes) is Veale's most ambitious purely orchestral work. On the evidence of his other music (including the Chandos recording of the 1984 Violin Concerto) it would be fairly safe to assume that this would be a piece worth hearing.

[britishcomposer]

The John Veale Memorial site has a 'Listen' button for the Clarinet Concerto but it doesn't work for me:

http://www.johnvealecomposer.co.uk/opus.asp

Is it my browser? I tried both Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox; in vain.