High Voice and Orchestra
SKU: HL.14020965
Composed by Sir Peter
Maxwell Davies. Music
Sales America. 20th
Century. Score. Composed
1999. 92 pages. Chester
Music #CH60950. Published
by Chester Music
(HL.14020965).
ISBN
9780711936959.
The
story centres on the
English princess Caroline
Mathilde (1751-1775),
sister of George III, who
at the age of 15 was sent
to Denmark to marry the
17-year-old eccentric and
schizophrenic Danish
King, Christian VII. The
ballet portrays her
unhappy marriage, the
King's growing madness
and her fatal love-affair
with Struensee, the
King's influential
physician, which leads to
their arrest, his
execution and her exile,
at the age of 20,
separated from her two
young children. This
suite begins with the
act's opening number: a
boisterous, stamping
dance to which the people
rudely mock Queen
Caroline Mathilde and her
lover Struensee. After
this comes a dark Adagio,
The Conspiracy, in which
the theme passes like
persuasion from mouth to
mouth, its variations
suggesting the different
attitudes of the
conspirators, firmly
controlled by the
brass-driven gestures of
the Queen Dowager. The
conspiracy then works
itself out at a court
masked ball, from which
the suite includes two
dances: a gavotte, and a
slow, lubricious
passacaglia that is a pas
de deux for Caroline
Mathilde and Struensee.
The Arrest comes with a
gathering rush of music
that envelops the King,
the Queen and Struensee,
leading to a vociferous
climax in which they are
held apart. In The
Execution, slow white
music for wordless female
voices, harp and low
strings is interrupted by
pathetic, alienated
outbursts from the King.
The suite ends, as does
the ballet, with a quiet
adagio lament for
clarinets and alto flute
as the Queen goes into
exile. Score. Duration c.
33mins.
