Granville Bantock's Prelude to "The Bacchanals"

[Dundonnell]

I have just downloaded Bantock's Prelude to "The Bacchanals" for orchestra from I Tunes (actually the first time I have used I Tunes ).

All the references I had previously discovered dated the piece as 1929, revised 1945. Lewis Foreman's note for the performance/recording of the work by the American Symphony Orchestra is headed "1929/45" but then says that the orchestral score is dated December 26, 1939.

Confused

[albion]

All the references I had previously discovered dated the piece as 1929, revised 1945. Lewis Foreman's note for the performance/recording of the work by the American Symphony Orchestra is headed "1929/45" but then says that the orchestral score is dated December 26, 1949.

Lewis Foreman's ASO note -

In 1910, Bantock produced five choral songs and dances for The Bacchae in the translation by Gilbert Murray, then recently-appointed Regis Professor at Oxford. This must have been for a now forgotten stage production, but the music then disappeared and was not published for over twenty years.

During the First World War and after, Bantock was obsessed by Hebridean folksong, first heard in the Hebridean Symphony, generally agreed one of his finest works, and the chamber opera The Seal Woman. We find him returning to Greek plays when he sketched the Prelude to "The Bacchanals" (Bantock's word) by Euripides in piano score, dated August 17, 1934, using motifs from his earlier choruses. He subsequently produced the Comedy Overture The Frogs (of Aristophanes). Dated August 27, 1935, it was written for the 1936 season of Queen's Hall Promenade Concerts, and enjoyed a brief popularity, was recorded, and was even arranged for brass band. Bantock returned to The Bacchae soon after war broke out in 1939, and the orchestral full score of the Prelude is dated December 26, 1939. Although semi-retired, Bantock was not done with Greek drama, and he produced three more orchestral overtures, really miniature tone poems: the "symphonic overture" Agamemnon (Aeschylus) (1940); Overture to a Greek Comedy ("The Women's Festival—Thesmophoriazuesae") (1941); and his last work the comedy overture, The Birds by Aristophanes (1946).

So, if the above text is factually accurate, a dating of 1934-39 would appear to be more correct ...

[Dundonnell]

Thanks, John

I should have typed '1939' (rather than '1949') in my original post

Yes, 1934, orchestrated 1939 is what Lewis Foreman says in the body of his text-which makes the heading of 1929/45 simply inexplicable. Anyway, I shall amend my Bantock catalogue