Stanford’s Veiled Prophet to be broadcast

[Jimfin]

Thank you so very much! Wow, my first two full Stanford operas in the space of a few weeks!

[Jimfin]

Well that's a beautiful work! Absolutely wonderful to hear it: love the orchestral and choral passages and look forward to getting to know it more.

[Mark Thomas]

Yes, there's much to admire in The Veiled Prophet, especially bearing in mind Stanford's youth when he wrote it. For me, Act I was competent and tuneful but not particularly inspired. The work really came to life in the second act as Stanford's dramatic instinct took over and the pacing matched his melodic gift. The vocal writing is exciting, the orchestral colour vivid (as you'd expect) and the lengthy build up to terrific climaxes shows that he clearly knew his Meyerbeer. This, his first opera, is a very different type of work to The Travelling Companion, and it gets an appropriately gutsy, no-holding-back performance here. The sound via the internet stream is a little thin-toned, but it's to be hoped that a commercial recording (if there is to be one) will rectify that. All in all, even after hearing The Travelling Companion, something of a revelation.

[Kevin]

Yes, another winner from Stanford, not a surprise at this point. I'm probably the only one but as far as English composers are concerned I prefer him to Elgar(who IMO overshadows just about everyone else unfairly, sadly)

[Alan Howe]

I prefer him to Elgar

Fair enough. But I could never do that; did Stanford ever reach the heights of the two symphonies,VC or CC?

Mind you, I prefer Raff or Draeseke to Brahms, so who am I to talk?

[Kevin]

Here's a link to a streamed version of the opera(doesn't look like their will be a recording after all, hope I'm wrong)

https://www.rte.ie/player/movie/the-veiled-prophet/131026471997