“KING ESTMERE”

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22325, 27 July 1934, Page 11

“KING ESTMERE”

It is a fitting tribute to Gustav Holst, who died last May, that the Otago University Musical Society should have chosen his “ King Estmere ” for performance at the concert to be given in the Town Hall Concert Chamber next Saturday. Holst, despite his name, was an Englishman, and a keen student of the folk song and of rural England, which features appear in his music. During the war he served as director of music to the British forces in Salonika, and on his return added to his many teaching posts a professorship at the .Royal College. But it was only after the compostion of his greatest masterpieces, the “Hymn of Jesus,” for double chorus, and a superb orchestral tone-poems entitled "The Planets,” that he came into his own and was recognised as one of the greatest of contemporary composers. In '* King Estmere,” which is for chorus and orchestra, Holst has taken an old English ballad and set it to music which is both quaint and delightfully fresh. The society has a strong, well-balanced choir, and under the conduetorship of Dr V. E. Galway wil' present an interesting performance of this work, which has not been sung in Dunedin before. In addition to “King Estmere” the ladies ot the chorus will be heard in Wagner’s “ Spinning Chorus,” and the men in Handel’s stirring two-part chorus, " The Lord Is a Man of War.” Miss Ethel Wallace and Mr N. F. Sansom have been engaged as violin and vocal soloists rqspectively, while the orchestra will play Mozart’s E flat Concerto, with Mies Mania Service as solo pianist, and the B minor Suite of Bach for flute and strings, Mr L. Rothwcll playing the flute part. The programme will be commenced with the “ Song of Otago University,” written by Dr W. Carmalt Jones, with the music by Dr Galway. The box plan arrangements are advertised.