Programme - University of London Symphony Orchestra

RESPIGHI 

FOUNTAINS OF ROME 

VAUGHAN 

WILLIAMS 

TUBA CONCERTO 

BERLIOZ 

SYMPHONIE 

FANTASTIQUE 

TUBA 

OLIVER BROWNE 

CONDUCTOR 

MATTHEW WOOD 

7.30pm Sat 4th June 2011 

St. Stephen’s Church, Gloucester Road 

TICKETS 

£10 adults / £8 concessions / £5 students 

Part of the St. Stephen’s Festival 2011 

@ulsymphony 

ulso.co.uk 

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Programme 

RESPIGHI 

Fountains of Rome 

VAUGHAN WILLIAMS 

Tuba Concerto 

interval 

BERLIOZ 

Symphonie Fantastique 

PLEASE ENSURE THAT YOUR MOBILE PHONE IS 

SWITCHED OFF FOR THE DURATION OF THE PER- 

FORMANCE.

2 UNIVERSITY OF LONDON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA 

FOREWORD 

Dear guests, 

Good evening and welcome to ulso’s Summer Concert. Tonight’s 

performance marks our fifth concert of the 2010–11 season 

and we are very pleased to be back at St. Stephen’s and to be 

involved in their Festival of Faith and Music. As well as being 

part of our biggest season to date, this concert is also the first 

outing of the new committee and the first time the orchestra has 

collaborated with a guest conductor, Matthew Wood. 

It has been extremely enjoyable to work with Matthew on this 

project. With a shorter than usual rehearsal period, Matthew 

has worked intensively with the orchestra while maintaining a 

relaxed atmosphere, which is, of course, important when taking 

on a new partnership. Our tuba soloist tonight, performing 

Vaughan Williams’ Tuba Concerto, is Oliver Browne, a former 

member of ulso. It is a great pleasure for the orchestra to play 

with him and we wish him all the best in his future endeavours.

I’d like to thank both Matthew and Oliver for all of their work 

this term—it is truly much appreciated. 

The orchestra’s next project will be a tour to Taormina in Sicily 

in July, where we will be performing at the remarkable Teatro 

Antico. The programme we will be working on will include Gershwin’s 

Piano Concerto in F, Rachmaninov’s Symphony No. 2 

and Verdi’s Requiem. I’m also pleased to announce that we will 

be performing a selection from our tour repertoire at a concert 

in aid of Cancer Research UK at St Luke’s, Chelsea, a few days 

before we depart for Sicily. Details can be found on our website 

or by asking members of the orchestra. 

Now that we are at the official end of ulso’s 2010–11 season, I’d 

like to thank the orchestra’s Friends and our sponsor, Faber Music 

Ltd. Their support this year has been vital to the work of the 

orchestra and without it we would not be able to perform such 

fantastic repertoire or in such atmospheric venues as we have. 

I’d also like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude 

to all the members of the new committee. Upon being elected, 

each new member responded to their duties immediately and 

with great commitment. I have been invariably impressed with 

their helpfulness and energy and feel safely assured that next 

year will be as successful as it will be enjoyable. 

Finally, I want to thank you all for coming along tonight. I hope 

you enjoy the performance and look forward to seeing you at 

future concerts. 

Mercedes Malcomson 

ulso Chair 

FOREWORD 

3


SOLOIST 

Oliver Browne 

Oliver began playing the tuba whilst still at school and was a 

member of the National Youth Orchestra of Wales, National 

Youth Wind Orchestra of Wales, National Youth Wind Orchestra 

of Great Britain and the National Youth Brass Band of 

Wales. Oliver also won many solo prizes including the bayv/ 

rwcmd “Brass Champion of Tomorrow”, the National Eisteddfod 

of Wales and was awarded most outstanding wind player at 

the Swansea Music Festival. Oliver was runner up in the Young 

Musician of Dyfed in 2004, which led to a solo recital at the 

prestigious St David’s Cathedral Festival. 

In 2005 Oliver passed his atcl recital diploma with distinction 

and during this time, the American composer Paul Basler com-


SOLOIST 

posed a piece for tuba and piano entitled “Serenade for Tuba 

and Piano” and dedicated it to Oliver. 

In September 2005 Oliver began studies at the Royal Northern 

College of Music. Whilst at the college Oliver was a member 

of the Fairey Band and also deputised with various brass bands 

including the ybs and Fodens Bands. 

In 2006 Oliver transferred to the Royal Welsh College of Music 

and Drama to study with Nigel Seaman. At the rwcmd, Oliver 

played in every major college ensemble and was a featured soloist 

with the college brass band. Oliver was also a member of 

the Cory Band and in 2008 was the band’s featured soloist at 

the rncm Festival of Brass. Whilst at the rwcmd, Oliver was 

awarded the Leonard and Marian Jones Distinguished Music 

Scholarship Prize, the Linda Mowatt Brass Prize and the 

Ernest and Doris Haigh Memorial Award. Oliver also played 

in master classes with many professional musicians including, 

James Anderson, Yasuhito Sugiyama, Fine Arts Brass Ensemble, 

Onyx Brass Ensemble and David Gordon Shute. 

Outside of college, Oliver is a busy freelance tuba player and has 

worked with the bbc National Orchestra of Wales, Welsh National 

Opera, Southbank Sinfoina, Video Games Live and was 

recently on trial with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. 

Oliver is currently a postgraduate student at the Royal College 

of Music in London, studying with Lee Tsarmaklis and Owen 

Slade. n

CONDUCTOR 

Matthew Wood 

Australian-born conductor Matthew Wood now resides in the 

uk where he regularly works with some of the finest orchestras 

in the country and throughout Europe, South America and 

Australia. 

From 2007–2010 Matthew held the position of Associate Conductor 

with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and has 

conducted other leading orchestras in the uk including the Philharmonia 

and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. 

He is a regular guest conductor of the rte National Sympho- 

7


CONDUCTOR 

ny Orchestra of Ireland, and has recently made his debut with 

the Orquesta Sinfonica Nacional de Chile. In Australia he has 

conducted numerous orchestras and ensembles including recent 

performances with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra and the 

Tasmanian Symphony Orchestras. Upcoming engagements include 

work with the Royal Ballet Covent Garden, the Orquesta 

Clasica Santa Cecilia Madrid, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra 

and the contemporary opera company Tête à Tête. 

He is also in demand as a conducting teacher and is a regular guest 

lecturer and conductor at the Royal Northern College of Music 

where Matthew held the coveted position of Conducting Fellow 

from 2005–2007. During this time he was selected to conduct the 

London Symphony Orchestra, as part of their conductor discovery 

series, and received tuition from conductors Sir Mark Elder 

and Sir Colin Davis. 

Matthew completed his undergraduate music studies, graduating 

with first class honours at the University of New South Wales, 

majoring in composition. He then undertook postgraduate conducting 

studies at the Sydney Conservatorium where he received 

numerous scholarships before concentrating his studies under renowned 

conductor pedagogue Jorma Panula. n


On Stage this Evening 

VIOLIN I 

Mervyn Chong Leader 

Olivia Jarvis Co-Leader 

Yean Chooi 

Naomi Fenton 

Sophie Frankford 

David Glanville 

Rebekah Harper 

Venetia Jollands 

Susannah Peterson 

Eun-Joo Yoon 

VIOLIN II 

Eleanor Corr Principal 

Sophie Poteratchi Co-Principal 

Sophie Belinfante 

Catherine Blanchard 

Helena Buckie 

Natalie Harrower 

Heidi Heinemann 

Chan Ning Lee 

Luba Tunnicliffe 

Stella di Virgilio 

VIOLA 

Joseph Fisher Principal 

Duncan Anderson Co-Principal 

Jessica Gillingwater 

Fraser Keddie 

Cyrus Lyons 

Áine McCarthy 

Stephanie Preston 

Jack Vosper 

‘CELLO 

William Harvey Principal 

Cameron Smith Co-Principal 

Jamie Cameron 

Olivia Clayton 

James Gow 

Bethan Lloyd 


Robin Tyler 

Hilary Wood 

DOUBLE BASS 

Sophie Roper Principal 

Ralph Whyte Co-Principal 

Henry Drysdale 

Rhian Hartshorn 

Clare Larkman

FLUTE 

Joshua Batty Principal 

Rosanna Ter-Berg 

Louisa Theart 

OBOE 

Fiona Myall Principal 

Marissa Pueschel 

COR ANGLAIS 

Chloe Greenwood Principal 

CLARINET 

Max Welford Principal 

Oliver Janes 

BASS CLARINET 

Chris Turner Principal 

BASSOON 

Ashley Myall Principal 

Natalie Watson 

Stephen Garman 

Jemima Oosthuizen 

HORN 

Lauren Reeve-Rawlings Principal 

Andrew Turner 

Finlay Bain 

Anna Drysdale 

TRUMPET 

Jason Evans Principal 

Sindre Molmen 

Max Bronstein 

Ryan Linham 

TROMBONE 

Sam Sankey Principal 

Nick Hagyard 

BASS TROMBONE 

Nick Prince Principal 

TUBA 

Chris Barrett Principal 

TIMPANI 

Christopher Rowland Principal 

PERCUSSION 

Lizzy Thompson Principal (& timps) 

Sam Berridge 

Matthew Thurtell 

11


Programme Notes 

RESPIGHI Fountains Of Rome (1915–1916) 

OTTORINO 

RESPIGHI 

(1879–1936) 

Respighi’s “Roman trilogy” includes three large symphonic poems 

that are easily his most famous works: Fountains of Rome 

(1916), Pines of Rome (1924), and Roman Festivals (1928). Respighi 

describes the first chapter of this trilogy, Fountains, as an 

expression “of the sentiments and visions suggested to him by 

four of Rome’ s fountains, contemplated at the hour when their

PROGRAMME NOTES 

characters are most in harmony with the surrounding landscape, 

or at which their beauty is most impressive to the observer.” 

The work was first performed in 1917, but received a poor reception 

from the audience. Discouraged, Respighi set the score 

aside until he was contacted by Arturo Toscanini, who, in February 

1918, requested a piece for a concert in Milan. Toscanini 

was deeply impressed by the work, and the Milan audience was 

wildly enthusiastic. Toscanini subsequently became a champion 

of Respighi’s music, and was responsible for conducting Fountains 

and other works in concert around the world. 

According to Respighi, “The first part of the poem, inspired by 

the fountain of Valle Giulia, depicts a pastoral landscape: droves 

of cattle pass and disappear in the fresh, damp mists of the Roman 

dawn.” The melodies are colorful and fluid, with sinuous 

woodwind lines winding above a quiet background. 

The following stanza is an abrupt change of pace—Respighi 

notes: “A sudden loud and insistent blast of horns above the 

trills of the whole orchestra introduces the second part, The Triton 

Fountain. It is like a joyous call, summoning troops of naiads 

and tritons, who come running up, pursuing each other and 

mingling in a frenzied dance between the jets of water.” This is 

a wonderfully playful and capricious stanza that leads without 

a pause into the next section, The Fountain of Trevi at Midday. 

This is much more forceful, in character with what the composer 

calls “a solemn theme borne on the undulations of the orchestra. 

The solemn theme, passing from the woodwind to the brass 

instruments, assumes a triumphant character. Trumpets peal: 

13



Across the radiant surface of the water there passes Neptune’ 

s chariot drawn by seahorses and followed by a train of sirens 

and tritons. The procession vanishes while faint trumpet blasts 

resound in the distance.” 

The final movement, The Fountain at the Villa Medici at Sunset, 

begins without a pause, with a light texture of solo violin 

and warbling woodwinds. “It is the nostalgic hour of sunset. The 

air is full of the sound of tolling bells, the twittering of birds, the 

rustling of leaves. Then all dies peacefully into the silence of the 

night.” n 

VAUGHAN WILLIAMS Tuba Concerto (1954) 

In the last decade of his life, Ralph Vaughan Williams began 

experimenting with ‘unusual’ instruments, including a wind machine, 

tuned gongs and a flugelhorn in his 7th, 8th, and 9th 

symphonies, and a romance for harmonica. However, it is his 

Concerto for Bass Tuba and Orchestra in F minor that really 

displayed the extent of the aging composer’s musical experimentation. 

The tuba was a relatively new addition to the orchestra, the instrument 

itself only coming into being in the mid-nineteenth 

century, and solo works for the tuba were scarce, an orchestral 

concerto unheard of. 

Commissioned to mark the Golden Jubilee of the London 

Symphony Orchestra in 1954, the tuba concerto was premiered 

on the 13th of June by Philip Catelinet, the then-principal tubist 

of the lso, and was conducted by Sir John Barbirolli. The 

first recording of the concerto was also made that year by the


RALPH VAUGHAN 

WILLIAMS (1872–1958) 

same artists. 

Although the initial reviews were mixed, some describing the 

concerto as an ‘elephantine romp’, Vaughan Williams’ tuba concerto 

was the first of its kind, and is still considered to be a cornerstone 

of the instrument’s repertoire. 

15



The tuba concerto is in conventional 3-movement form—Prelude: 

Allegro moderato; Romanza: Andante sostenuto; Finale: 

Rondo alla Tedesca (Allegro). Notable within the concerto are 

two cadenzas, one in the first movement, and one in the last. 

However, it is the Romanza movement which is the most popular, 

and has been transcribed to many other instruments including 

bassoon, ’cello, and piano. n 

BERLIOZ Symphonie Fantastique (1831) 

Although it was Berlioz’s discovery of Beethoven that led him 

to composing his Symphonie Fantastique, his work marks a departure 

from the German ideal of pure instrumental music (‘absolute’ 

music, as it called). Unusually for the time, Berlioz wrote 

his own programme notes to accompany performances of the 

work, outlining the story that underpins the symphony’s five 

movements, i.e. its programme. Berlioz originally insisted that 

an understanding of the work’s programme was essential for 

understanding its dramatic scheme, although he later relaxed 

this imposition as his confidence in the piece’s musical structure 

grew. 

The symphony’s five movements are unified through the use of 

a theme: the work’s idée fixe. This is identified with the protagonist’s 

loved one. The symphony was written during the period 

of Berlioz’ infatuation with the Irish actress, Harriet Smithson, 

whom he had seen playing the part of Ophelia on the Parisian 

stage in 1827. Although Berlioz did not meet her until 1832 

at the premiere of Lélio, his work intended as a sequel to the 

Symphonie Fantastique, he sent her frequent letters in the mean 

time, to which the actress failed to respond. The symphony’s 

protagonist is easily identified as Berlioz and the protagonist’s

eloved as Smithson. 


Berlioz revised the programme on a number of occasions; one of 

the main changes in the process was that while originally only 

the latter two movements were meant to represent an opiuminduced 

hallucination, he later saw the whole work as representing 

such a dream state. The first movement represents memories 

HECTOR BERLIOZ (1803–1869) 

17



of an artist’s melancholy, and presumably libido, before the first 

sight of his loved one. The slow introduction portrays the ‘flux of 

passion, the unaccountable joys and sorrows he experienced before 

he saw his beloved’; the Allegro describes ‘the volcanic love 

that his beloved suddenly inspired in him’. The next movement 

represents the artist at (or imagining himself to be at) a ball 

where he sees his loved one, as can be heard in the two breaks 

in the waltz in which the idée fixe is heard. The ‘scene in the 

countryside’ that follows depicts the protagonist seeking solace 

away from the city. He hears two shepherds dialoguing on their 

pipes, represented by two oboes, one onstage, the other offstage. 

His peace is short-lived as he becomes tormented by paranoia 

that the object of his desire will betray him. Towards the end of 

the movement, one shepherd recommences his tune, although 

the other does not answer this time; instead the response is the 

distant sound of thunder (timpani). 

It is at this point in the proceedings that Berlioz originally intended 

the artist to ‘poison himself ’ with opium. The first fantasy 

that follows is the ‘march to the scaffold’, in which the artist, 

having killed his beloved, is condemned to death. Prior to the 

musical depiction of his execution, there is a brief, nostalgic recollection 

of the idée fixe in a solo clarinet, as though representing 

the last conscious thought of the soon-to-be-executed man. 

Immediately following this is a single short fortissimo G minor 

chord is the fatal blow of the guillotine blade; the series of pizzicato 

notes following represents the rolling of the severed head 

into the basket. After his death, the final nine bars of the movement 

contain a victorious series of tutti G major chords, seemingly 

intended to convey the cheering of the on-looking throng. 

In the finale, the artist finds himself at a witches’ Sabbath. 

Strange and disgusting creatures have gathered to celebrate the 

artist’s death. The idée fixe is transformed into a grotesque dance


tune, elaborated with grace notes and trills, on a shrieking E-flat 

clarinet as his beloved arrives and joins the orgy. The dies irae, 

a mediaeval funeral hymn, features prominently in the movement 

and is first heard in the bassoons; Berlioz intended it a 

‘burlesque parody’. Following the dies irae, a fugue—the witches’ 

round dance—appears before the two themes, the fugue and the 

dies irae, are superimposed. 

The final movement marks Berlioz’s most direct response to 

Beethoven. The latter’s ninth symphony precipitated a crisis in 

the genre, with composers struggling to respond to the Ninth’s 

innovations, most especially its choral finale. Berlioz invokes 

the dies irae, an implicitly vocal melody, as a reaction against 

Beethoven, with darkness and grotesquery triumphing rather 

than light and truth. 

Berlioz’s relationship with Smithson would similarly not end 

happily. Although the two married in 1833, they separated in 

1840, as the actress, no longer popular and heavily in debt, gave 

over to alcoholism. n 

19


Acknowledgements 

Thanks are due to the following, without whom this evening’s 

performance would not have been possible: 

SUPPORTERS 

Ms Hall 

Mr & Mrs Harper 

Mr & Mrs Preston 

One anonymous 

SPONSORS 

Faber Music Ltd. 

University of London Union (ulu) 

BENEFACTORS 

Mrs Kirker 

Mr & Mrs Lyons 

Mrs Rowland 

Additionally, ulso would like to thank St. Stephen’s Church 

and Adrian Edwards for their warm support, and recognise the 

generous donation of Mrs Kirker in addition to her Friends 

membership fee. 

ULSO Committee 

CHAIR 

SECRETARY 

TREASURER 

ORCHESTRAL MANAGER 

TECHNICAL MANAGER 

HALLS MANAGER 

LIBRARIAN 

EDUCATION & OUTREACH 

FRIENDS & SPONSORSHIP 

TICKETS OFFICER 

EVENTS PROMOTER 

PRESS OFFICER 

SOCIAL SECRETARY 


Eun-Joo Yoon 

Ralph Whyte 

Ashley Myall 

Yean Chooi 

Mervyn Chong 

Natalie Harrower 

Seonaid Dey 

Chan Ning Lee 

Stella di Virgilio 

Duncan Anderson 

Cyrus Lyons 

Bethan Lloyd

Programme - University of London Symphony Orchestra

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