Streaming Audio
Listen online to a full-length recording of this work.
performed by Queensland Symphony Orchestra, Rudolf Pekarek (conductor)
Access to this recording is courtesy of the ABC's classic amp website.
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CD
Kelso overture & works recorded at her 90th birthday concert / Miriam Hyde.
Library shelf no. CD 1046 [Available for loan]
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Work Overview
Kelso Overture was written early in 1959, in happy
anticipation of moving to a property in Kelso Street, Burwood
Heights in Sydney.
Scored for big orchestra, it opens jubilantly in D major with an
upward-leaping 6th, and vigorous rhythmic drive. The same theme,
modified in a more ardent melodic line, is soon heard at a high
pitch on the cellos, with the appeal of a sustained string tune.
This is the chief unifying material of the overture.
Several secondary themes, however, make a conspicuous
contribution. After a running woodwind passage (which at the last
moment gives place to the more telling trumpet) the strings
settle into an insistent rhythmic background, over which staccato
woodwind figures incisively prance. This section incorporates a
repeated phrase, with an ornamental semiquaver triplet in its
otherwise forthright statement. Trombones are heard cutting
against it, in contrary motion.
Later, this motif "stands on its own", announced by cor anglais
and extensively developed by woodwind and horns. It has something
of the primitive about it, some echo perhaps of tales and tunes
from the Aborigines by Lake Albert (Sth. Aust.), passed on by the
composer's father, from memories of boyhood days at "Warrengie"
station. The old bottlebrush tree in the garden at Kelso Street,
too, stands as a link with the bush as it was before suburban
dwellings encroached on it.
Finally this theme on horns, combined with the renewed thrust of
the first subject, forms an exuberant coda.
The first three performances were by the Queensland Symphony
Orchestra late in 1960 and early 1961, conducted by Rudolf
Pekarek, to whom it was dedicated.
- Miriam Hyde.
Work Details
Year: 1959
Instrumentation: 3 flutes/piccolo, 2 oboes, cor anglais, 2 clarinets, bass clarinet, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 2 tenor trombones, bass trombone/tuba, timpani, percussion, strings.
Duration: 6 min.
Difficulty: Advanced
Dedication note: Dedicated to Rudolf Pekarek
Subjects
- In the form/style of: Overtures
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