Serenade in D Major for Orchestra by Ethel Smyth (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Serenade in D Major for Orchestra by Ethel Smyth Jennifer Oates Ethel Smyth. Serenade in D Major for Orchestra. Edited by John L. Snyder. Middleton, WI: A-R Editions, 2021. (Recents Researches in the Music of the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries, v. 84) [1 score (xxiv, 190 p.) ISBN: 9781987206302, $425; 1 facsimile (viii, 140 p.) ISBN 9781987206326, $60] John L. Snyder's two-volume critical edition of Ethel Smyth's Serenade in D serves as the first commercial publication of the composer's first orchestral work. The edition consists of two volumes: a critical edition of the score and a reproduction of the manuscript. Each volume has a unique introduction allowing Snyder to maximize the use of his sources. Transcriptions of Smyth's program notes for the premiere, and over two dozen reviews are also included. Performance parts are available for rental via A-R Editions. In addition to this being the first published score of the Serenade, there is only one commercial recording (Ethel Smyth, Concerto for Violin, Horn & Orchestra; Serenade, BBC Philharmonic, cond. Odaline de la Martínez, Chandos CHAN 9449 [2006], CD). Some of Smyth's compositions are available via open-source websites, such as IMSLP, her publisher Universal Edition, or have been published in modern performance editions. At least one facsimile edition of a Smyth manuscript, her String Trio in D (see below), has been published. As far as I can tell, Snyder's marks the first critical edition of a Smyth composition. This is her first appearance in the Recent Researches in Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries series, which includes twelve volumes by British composers (four of which feature the music of Alice Mary Smith). An edition of her music has yet to appear in Musica Britannica. Indeed, no volume of Musica Britannica is devoted to women composers or a single female composer. As a seminal figure in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century music, a critical edition of Smyth's work is overdue. While her so-called "eccentricities" (e.g., being queer, a tendency to dress in a masculine manner, and a penchant for smoking cigars) helped capture the public's attention, her music earned and deserved its place in the concert halls and opera houses of Britain and on the continent. In Britain, she bucked traditions by carving out her own path and finding success without necessarily being a part of the unofficial inner circle of composers and conductors that dominated the musical scene in London. Like many British composers, Smyth benefitted from August Manns's interest. Manns, then conductor at the Crystal Palace and one of the foremost champions of British music at the time, requested an orchestral work after seeing a manuscript of one of her string quartets. She sent him the Serenade in D, her first orchestral work. The composition was first performed under Manns at the Crystal Palace on 26 April 1890. Several months later, he performed her Overture to Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra. While the Serenade in D appears to have been well received at the time, it has not been performed much since then. Smyth's Serenade in D is in four movements, though, unlike traditional symphonies, there is no slow movement. The outer allegro movements are in sonata-form while the inner two are ternary allegro and allegretto movements. The orchestration is sparse by [End Page 660] late nineteenth-century standards: 2 flutes (flute 2 doubles on piccolo at times), 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 3 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and five-part strings (including contrabasses). While Snyder suggests that Smyth chose the title Serenade based on the lack of a slow movement, the composer's program notes clearly explains her rationale: "The claim of the work to the title 'Serenade,' lies chiefly in the fact that the prevailing character of its four movements may be described as respectively lyrical and humorous; and the intention is further carried out in the composition of the orchestra (without trombones) and the dimensions of each individual movement" (p. xv and Plate 1). Locating and identifying the manuscript required significant detective work. Snyder corresponded with Smyth's estate, Universal Edition, librarians, and fellow Smyth...