A few insights on the orchestral pieces of the lively and prolific Richard Rodney Bennett (“A Collage Artist” will be the post’s title) to be finished as soon as I, one, do a little necessary sex writing, and, two, actually buy the complete Chandos 4-volume set of the work of John’s distinguished mentor, conducted by John. For now, here’s a recording from a BBC broadcast (yes, bonny John is conductor) that starts off with a few words from the composer himself:
Above my beloved John at 28 and his major musical influence, Richard Rodney Bennett (1936-2012) [download PDF of Feb 2020 issue of Gramophone with John’s interview here]: Concerto for Stan Getz (I know I knocked their album Orchestral Jazz and rightly so, but this is a swell picture)
By the way John, with your brimming schedule I can imagine you’re not much of a reader, but I’m sure like many you like having useful books at hand, so here are three in pdf:
- Sacred Architecture of London by Nigel Pennick / I read a lot of Nigel Pennick. Same Peter Ackroyd. This is a nice companion to the book you were reading in lockdown, London: The Biography (“My Beloved Conductor John Wilson’s Lockdown Listening List: Keely Smith, Teddy Wilson, Walton, Elgar, Brahms, Ireland, Debussy, Peter Ackroyd; Plus Yusef Lateef“). If you liked London, I especially recommend Ackroyd’s Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination.
- The Lost Gods of England Brian Branston examines the archaeological evidence related to Anglo-Saxon worship and interprets it afresh…
- Grown in Great Britain, DK Publications 2008 / I created a few down home recipes for you in my posting (“Alt.Spiritual Gateshead, UK and Five Easy Cooking Recipes for My Bonny Geordie, BBC Conductor John Wilson“)—with this book you can think up your own.
NOTE: “[The English temperament] is disciplinable, and steadily obedient to certain limits, but retaining an inalienable part of freedom and self-dependence, [with a propensity for] spending its exertions within a bounded field, the field of plain sense, of practical utility.” ~ Matthew Arnold The Study of Celtic Literature (1867)
"I'll Be Dead Before You Break My Heart" 
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