Aaron Rabushka wrote:

>...Havergal Brian--now THERE's a man who knows how to use a large
>percussion group!

Just where does he do this?

I've listened to Brian several times over the years, but have not been won
over.  His almost hour-long Symphony #3 strikes me as very much a loose
work lacking in discernible focus, and as structurally flabby.  Of course,
this may be a matter of my own 'lens;' or maybe it's just the work, which
is the only one I've got, after having given up on his VC.  In fact, I
haven't managed to listen to it very closely as I can't get past my overall
impression of a loose composition lacking rigour of shape or any economy of
means.  As for the percussion specifically:  the timpani tattos in movement
#9 sound cliched to my ear, and second rate to what one's likely to find,
say, in any of Rozsa's Greco-Roman film scores.

I usually clam up about composers who simply don't appeal, but in this
case maybe I'd appreciate some signposts.  In short, I'm so far baffled as
to why Hyperion -- or Robert Simpson, a composer more rigorous than whom
it's hard for me to imagine -- would devote any attention to Brian.

Again, as to works using prominent percussion, I'm not sure why to
my mind they require a certain overarching compositional 'tightness,'
often contributing to it as well.  This is the impression I get with
Bartok (Music for...; the 2-Piano Concerto), Holmboe (passim), Revueltas
(Alcancias; Troka; Sensemaya; La Noche de los Mayas) Thea Musgrave
(Seasons) and KA Hartmann (later symphonies) -- five composers who come
immediately to mind for outstanding use of percussion.

Bert B, in Ottawa