Richard Pennycuick <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>...  I'm trying to reconcile Robert's concept of Searle's sound with
>Rawsthorne, Arnold and Frankel.  What I know of him is much more
>hard-edged than they are but not as coruscating as Robert's other
>suggestion, Pettersson, can be (I'm thinking of the 10th).  However, I
>haven't heard any Searle that sounds like the sublime closing pages of
>Pettersson's 7th, which Mark Shanks described so accurately in a recent
>post.  Robert mentioned that Rawsthorne, Arnold, Frankel and Searle all
>wrote film scores.  Perhaps also relevant is their contemporary William
>Alwyn who, like Searle, wrote five symphonies, but far more film music.

I won't deny that Searle is (generally) a tougher sounding dude than his
contemporaries; but the question is really more one of degree than kind...
part of the problem is that HS was generally less comfortable with the
light minature (works like the lovely catriations & the Hoffnung pastiches
notwithstanding) than is the average punter's image of Arnold (in
particular); & that the symphonies really do capture the composer as his
most granitic...  one finds oneself having to compare HS's 3rd symphony
with MA's Padstow Lifeboat, which doesn't do HS many favors (comparing his
work with the MA of the 1st & 7th symphonies is a lot more useful).  The
easiest point of comparison is with HS's slow movements:  he often enters
the strange world of wasteland pastorales beloved by both MA & Frankel....

All the best,

Robert Clements <[log in to unmask]>
<http://www.ausnet.net.au/~clemensr/welcome.htm>