20010 – A London Overture

John Ireland

Arranged for large brass ensemble by Roger Harvey

4 trumpets (1st = Eflat; 4th + flugel), 4 horns, 3 trombones, tuba, timps, 2 perc

Difficulty: Hard

Price: £45.00

Programme note:
John Ireland was born into a well educated middle class family in Bowdon near Manchester, England on 13th August 1879 . He entered the newly-established Royal College of Music in London at the age of fourteen but he shortly he became orphaned and had to struggle to make his own way studying piano, organ and composition. His composition teacher was the renowned Sir Charles Stanford, who taught many of the distinguished generation of English composers to emerge at the end of the 19th century including Vaughan Williams, Holst, Bridge Eugene Goossens, Bliss, Howells and George Butterworth.
Ireland's music is rooted in the German Romantic tradition but also shows characteristics of the school of 'English Impressionism' though this piece has more in common with Brahms' Academic Festival Overture than Debussy's La Mer
The London Overture, 1936, is a reworking of an earlier piece for brass band, 'Comedy Overture', written for the Crystal Palace competition in 1934.
It comprises, like Elgar's Cockaigne, impressions of London scenes. The slow introduction suggests a nocturnal, rather sombre and mysrerious city. After a short cadenza the allegro introduces the main theme which Ireland suggested was the cry of a bus conductor at 'Picadilly'.
There is a lyrical second section and a generally busy atmosphere before the introductory ideas return. A lovely, peaceful chorale provides central repose before the recapitulation and, with much use of the 'Picaddilly' theme a rather brusque coda.

Performance notes;
Trumpet 1 is Eb (or piccolo) trumpet
Trumpet 4 is Flugel throughout.
This is a long play for a brass ensemble so it should be treated with some caution interms of dynamics and style to avoid it becoming too arduous to complete and stylistically heavy.
Treat it rather like chamber music aiming for clean style, careful balance and texture and ensuring a variety of dynamics. Importantly, loud dynamics should be treated
with great care, reserving full-blooded fortes for a very few tutti, climactic moments.