There is only one place these days where the music of Charles Villiers Stanford (1852–1924) sends its hearers into reliable ecstasy, and that is in choirs and places where they sing. Otherwise he is something of a bust. Despite having written seven symphonies, nine operas, 11 concertos (including three piano, two violin, a cello and a clarinet), eight string quartets and countless songs, piano pieces and other chamber works, he is now celebrated for a tiny fraction of his output.
Stanford himself thought that to be renowned as a composer of Anglican Church music was not enough. He wanted to be measured alongside international (i.e., German) stars, and so went to Berlin to study with the leading teachers of the day, and in particular to meet Brahms. His respect for Brahms’s take on the romantic orchestral tradition never wavered, and he was responsible for several first performances in the UK of some of the master’s most important works.
In return the Germans showered first performances on him: in addition to operatic productions in Hanover, Hamburg, Leipzig and Breslau, his ‘Irish’ Symphony (No. 3) was performed in Berlin and Hamburg early in 1888. Championed by Richter and Bülow, this symphony was also chosen for the opening concert of the new Concertgebouw in Amsterdam (November 1888) and Mahler included it in his concerts with the New York Philharmonic in 1911. On 14 January 1889 Stanford enjoyed the rare privilege of conducting a concert in Berlin entirely of his own music, a concert which included the Fourth Symphony, specially commissioned for the event. Not bad for a composer who, even though he was Irish by birth, would have been tainted at the Berlin HQ by the stigma of coming from ‘Das Land ohne Musik’.
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