The Immortal Hour
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Music CD Cover
Performer: David Wilson-JohnsonPerformer: Roderick Kennedy
Composer: Rutland Boughton
Conductor: Alan Melville
Orchestra: English Chamber Orchestra
Performer: Anne Dawson
Performer: Maldwyn Davies
Edition: Music CD
Format: Import
CD Release Date: 1998-11-10
Music Label: Hyperion UK
Soundtracks:
Music CD 1
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 1. A wood, dark and mysterious...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 2. By dim moon-glittering coasts....
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 3. Though you have travelled from one darkness to another...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 4. Ye know not who I am...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 5. I have come hither...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 6. Hail, Son of Shadow!...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 7. I am old; more old, more ancient than the gods...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 8. Brother and kin to all the twilit gods...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 9. The sound of mocking laughter...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 10. Laugh not, ye outcasts of the invisible world...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 11. Fair is the moonlight...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 12. Hail, daughter of kings...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 13. Have you forgot...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 14. I have forgotten all...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 15. A king of men...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 16. Led here by dreams...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 17. I will go back...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 18. Sir, I am glad...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 19. I have come...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 20. Look, O king!...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 21. There is no backward way for such as I...
- Act 1. Scene 1. No. 22. I have heard you calling, Dalua, Dalua!...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 23. I've seen that man before who came tonight...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 24. Yes, woman, yes, I know: for silence. Hush!...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 25. But sometimes... sometimes... Tell me...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 26. Good folk, I give you greeting...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 27. Good sir, you are most welcome. I am Manus...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 28. At last I know...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 29. And your name, fair lord?...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 30. Truly, I now know full well...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 31. I, too, am lifted with the breath...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 32. Who laughed?...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 33. Dear Lord, sit here. I am weary...
- Act 1. Scene 2. No. 34. How beautiful they are...
- Act 2. No. 1. By the Voice in the corries...
- Act 2. No. 2. The Bells of Youth are ringing in the gateways...
- Act 2. No. 3. But this was in the old, old, far-off days...
- Act 2. No. 4. Hail, Eochaidh, High King of Eir?, hail!...
- Act 2. No. 5. Green fire of Joy, green fire of Life...
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 6. Etain, Speak, My Queen... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 7. No, No, My Queen... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 8. I, Too, Have Heard... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 9. The Queen! ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 10. Hail, Eochaidh, King of Eir?! ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 11. I Am a King's First Son... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 12. Dagda, Lord of Thunder and ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 13. Fair Lord, My Thanks I Give. ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 14. Have Not Great Poets Sung... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 15. In the Days of the Great ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 16. Hear Us, O Engus, Beautiful, ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 17. But Now, Fair Lord, Tell Me ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 18. I Have Seen All Things Pass ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 19. Welcome, My Queen... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 20. This Nameless Lord... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 21. How Beautiful They Are... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 22. I Have Heard... I Have ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 23. I Am a Song... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 24. I Am a Small Green Leaf in a ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 25. O Do Not Leave Me, Star of My ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 26. Hasten, Lost Love, Found ... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 27. In the Land of Youth... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- The Immortal Hour, Opera: Act 2. No. 28. They Play With Lances... - Rutland Boughton, Boughton, Rutland
- Act 2. No. 6. Etain, speak, my Queen...
- Act 2. No. 7. No, no, my Queen...
- Act 2. No. 8. I, too, have heard...
- Act 2. No. 9. The Queen!...
- Act 2. No. 10. Hail, Eochaidh, King of Eir?!...
- Act 2. No. 11. I am a king's first son...
- Act 2. No. 12. Dagda, Lord of Thunder and Silence...
- Act 2. No. 13. Fair lord, my thanks I give. Lordship I have...
- Act 2. No. 14. Have not great poets sung...
- Act 2. No. 16. Hear us, O Engus, beautiful, terrible, Sun-Lord...
- Act 2. No. 17. But now, fair lord, tell me the boon...
- Act 2. No. 18. I have seen all things pass and all things go...
- Act 2. No. 19. Welcome, my queen...
- Act 2. No. 20. This nameless lord...
- Act 2. No. 21. How beautiful they are...
- Act 2. No. 22. I have heard... I have dreamed that song...
- Act 2. No. 23. I am a song...
- Act 2. No. 24. I am a small green leaf in a great wood...
- Act 2. No. 26. Hasten, lost love, found love! Come, Etain, come!...
- Act 2. No. 27. In the Land of Youth...
- Act 2. No. 28. They play with lances...
Free Music Notes for The Immortal Hour
Free Music Review: A BYWAY OF ENGLISH OPERA WELL WORTH INVESTIGATING
Hit: 5 Stars
What if Richard Wagner had been quintessentially English? Now there's a thought. Would he have been like Rutland Boughton - nice, sometimes appealing, but rather ineffectual? Or would he still have been a despot and a monster?! On the surface, they had a lot in common. One was a wanted and exiled left-wing revolutionary who later wanted performances at his own theatre reserved for `ordinary working people', the other a committed socialist who wanted his music to be appreciated and be useful to the `working man' (his choral piece, Bethlehem, was first performed in modern dress as an act of solidarity with the miners and with the General Strike of 1926). One founded a Festival and a theatre on a Green Hill in Bavaria, revolutionary in its acoustics and in the works that were to be performed there, the other wanted to found a similar Festival on the Somerset Levels near a Green Hill/Tor at Glastonbury, a grandiose scheme that barely got off the ground. The key work to be performed at the first opera house was a massive 4-evening cycle based on Germanic myths, the key work for the other festival was to be a cycle of 5 operas based on the English Arthurian myths. The one developed the very Germanic theory of `Gesamtkunstwerk', the other the very English theory of `Choral Drama'.
It all leaves one feeling a little underwhelmed by Boughton, despite his ambitions. Yet he wrote the opera that had more consecutive performances than any other serious opera anywhere in the world. That was The Immortal Hour, first produced at his inaugural Glastonbury Festival in 1914 and later to run for 216 consecutive performances in London (+ another run of 160 performances the following year). In its day, it was as popular as a Lloyd Webber musical. And, if not in the Wagner class, it's a heck of a sight more musically interesting than Lord L-W. Admittedly, the Boughton symphonies and concerti are often let down by less than riveting basic melodic and thematic material. That's not true of the opera. Many of the motifs here really stick in the memory, not least the haunting evocation of `The Immortal Hour' itself. There are memorable arias and set-pieces, too. The song, "How beautiful they are, the lordly ones' became something of a party-piece for tenors between the wars. But Midir's big aria when he reminds Etain of her fairy history is a wonderful piece of invigorating vocal writing.
Dramatically the piece is flawed, it's true. Boughton lacked Wagner's ability to turn intractable dramatic material into tautly structured, psychologically penetrating music-drama. The Dalua Prologue is atmospheric but overlong. The knees-up at the court of King Eochaid also outstays its welcome (but, then, the same might be said of The Meister's Grail Knights!). But the scene in the peasant's hut when Eochaid and Etain fall for each other and the final scene when Midir lures Etain back to the Land of Faery and leaves her husband heartbroken are both moving and musically very satisfying.
The opera really didn't deserve the descent into total obscurity it suffered after the War. This recording helped to revive a limited renaissance in interest in Boughton's works. It probably remains the most satisfying of them and that makes it well worth listening to. Alan G. Melville and the ECO play the music as thought they believe in it and the result is uplifting and satisfying. Standing out among the singers are David Wilson-Johnson as King Eochaid and Maldwyn Davies as Midir. If you have any interest in the byways of English opera before Grimes, this is a disc well worth investigating.
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