Programme Note

Song for Strata Florida

Hallelujah

Prelude and Hymn

My music is lyrical by nature and the word ‘song’ features in the title of a number of works. So it was a natural progression that led to the composition of these three pieces. They are all in the final analysis songs without words, but their connection with words gradually becomes more or less overt as the sequence of songs unfolds. They all also have in one way or another religious connotations.

The first piece Song for Strata Florida is a straightforward instrumental transcription of a complete setting for children’s choir and harp of the beautiful poem Ystrad Fflur by T Gwynn Jones. Like the song itself the transcription aims to reflect the timeless beauty of this abbey in West Wales.

In contrast the starting point of the second song without words is a single word – Hallelujah!

The extended setting of this one word was composed for a concert celebrating the life of the conductor and music educator Helena Braithwaite. Here, the original 8 part choral setting is reconceived for the five string instruments.

The third piece of the set is in two parts – a prelude then a hymn tune. For many years I have played the organ for my local church (All Saints Church Cellan) and for the reopening of this beautiful Grade 2 * listed building after restoration I composed a setting of the hymn “For all the Saints”. Conscious of the potential for invidious comparisons with the great setting by Ralph Vaughan Williams to the tune ‘Down Ampney’ I composed my own setting in Welsh. I subsequently wrote this chorale prelude type version where the melody is first stretched out in very long-breathed notes before a simple exposition of the Welsh hymn setting concludes the work.

Ystrad Fflur gan T Gwynn Jones

Mae dail y coed yn Ystrad Fflur

Yn murmur yn yr awel,

A deuddeng Abad yn y gro

Yn huno yna’n dawel.

Ac yno, dan yr ywen brudd

Mae Dafydd bêr ei gywydd

A llawer penaeth llym ei gledd

Yn ango’r bedd tragywydd.

Er bod yr haf pan ddêl ei oed,

Yn deffro coed i ddeilio,

Ni ddeffry dyn, a gwaith ei llaw

Sy’n distaw ymddadfeilio.

Ond er mai angof angau prudd

Ar adfail ffydd a welaf,

Pan rodiwyf ddaear Ystrad Fflur

O’m dolur ymdawelaf.

Ystrad Fflur  translated by Martin Locock

In Ystrad Fflur the leaves of trees

Are murmuring in the breeze

There twenty Abbots sleeping sound

Lie quietly in the ground

And there beneath the solemn yews

Sweet Dafydd found his muse

And many leaders bold and brave

The silence of the grave

Though summer on its brightest day

Wakes trees to leafy sway

A man, his work, his life, his all

Can pass beyond recall

Not here the absent void of death

And ruins of our faith

My sorrow quietens, then is gone

When Ystrad’s soil I stand on