Australian Music Centre | Breaking sound barriers

Work Overview

Lyric was composed 1935 while Hyde was a student at the Royal College of Music in London. It was broadcast from London by the BBC Empire Orchestra conducted by Eric Fogg on February 24, 1936. Its first concert performance was in Sydney, April 13, 1947, by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra conducted by Prof. Bernard Heinze. On the manuscript score it is titled Lyric for small orchestra.

In 1986, Hyde wrote a piano part as an alternative to the original harp part, for a performance by the Strathfield Symphony Orchestra in Sydney.

Of Lyric, Hyde wrote:

On a summer evening of great beauty, I had been to see "As You Like It" in Regent's Park, with Dr and Mrs Matison, of Adelaide, to whom this short piece is dedicated. The Lyric has no direct bearing on the play; rather does it conjure up the idyllic setting of the open air theatre - the long twilight, the pink tones of a softly-clouded sky deepening into grey, the last notes of birds among the trees, the smell of flowers and of grass, freshly turned up by the rows of green deck chairs, on one of which some child had left a daisy-chain hanging.

The orchestra required for such a conception is not vast, the emphasis being on harp, woodwind and strings, with a small complement of brass.

Work Details

Year: 1935

Instrumentation: Flute, oboe, 2 clarinets, bassoon, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, trombone, harp, timpani, strings.

Duration: 6 min.

Difficulty: Advanced

Dedication note: "To Dr. and Mrs Matison"

First performance: by Eric Fogg, BBC Symphony Orchestra — 1936.