However thoroughly I try to research these articles, new information continually comes to light. The performance of Victory's Favola di Notte is available on Internet Archive and I agree it sounds effective, though I haven't got a score either. Also on IA is the Potter Concerto for Orchestra. The writer of a thesis on Potter thought it a fiasco of a performance and I admit that he has a score and I have not, but it doesn't come across as lukewarm or cautious to my ears. Doubtless the Chicago SO would have played it better, but other European radio orchestras of the 1960s would have produced similar results, I ventire to suggest.
Some of Paul's operatic work in Dublin can now be heard on internet. I suppose I should revise this article, but the trouble is, I should probably revise all the articles in the series at least once a year and I would end up by doing nothing else.
I would like to thank Christopher Howell for his very informative, thoroughly-researched, enjoyable and extensive article on this forgotten conductor. As a Dubliner I read this article with particular interest as Paul was principal conductor of, what was then, the Radio Éireann (soon to become the RTÉ) Symphony Orchestra from 1961 to 1967.
For what it is worth I have a tape recording of Paul conducting Gerard Victory's Favola di Notte. As this piece was composed in 1966, it is probably a world premiere, or an Irish premiere at least. I have not seen a score of this piece but I do not hear anything cautious in Paul's tempi. It seems like a very tricky piece to bring off effectively and for me Paul does a most admirable job of it.
Regarding his issues with A.J. Potter, (and everything I say here is pure personal speculation) I take no exception to what Paul said about Irish audiences (indeed I can well believe what he said was correct) and have no problem in believing that Paul's issue with Potter was nothing to do with him being an Irish composer or from the old school but rather that he just didn't rate him as a composer, full stop. Potter unable to take this blow to his ego tried to dress up Paul's objections or lack of interest in his music in some ideological garb, much in the way many British composers who felt they were snubbed by the BBC in the 1960s invented the baseless and erroneous notion of Glock's blacklist rather than accept the possibility that maybe Glock and many of the BBC producers at the time just didn't think they were up to much compared to tonal composers of real talent like Britten and Tippett. A point I raised here before in connection with Ruth Gipps.
I wish to emphasise that my conjecture is not a reflection of my opinion of Potter's music but just an opinion on Paul's possible standpoint.
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