"I’m still not completely sold on it as a work of art: much of it still strikes me as high-minded mumbo jumbo with rather too high an opinion of itself, particularly in Part 3. I appreciate I’m in a minority on that front, though, and even I’m prepared to admit that this is the most convincing recording of it I’ve heard to date. And for that it’s Davis, more than Tippett, that we have to thank."
"more than Tippett", eh?
I have to wonder what age the writer is. His final paragraph suggests the limitations of youth, as well as a measure of projection, not least in that phrase, "too high an opinion of itself".
Part 3 of the work is, to many minds - especially those with vivid memories of the hell that was WW2 - profoundly moving.
I recall being seated across the aisle from Tippett at the Royal Festival Hall during a performance of this haunting work, when, during the opening chorus of Part 3, the composer's hand lifted off his seat-rest and traced in the air the shape of the music that accompanied those piercing words, "the cold deepens. The world descends into the icy waters where lies the jewel of great price". A truly indelible memory.
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