A tribute to John
Beckett
by Lindsay Armstrong
From a speech made at a concert of Bach
Cantatas at St Ann’s, Dawson Street, Dublin on Sunday 11th February, 2007,
dedicated to the memory of John Stewart Beckett.
John
Beckett was a pioneer, trail blazer and innovator in the cause of early music
in Ireland. Returning to Dublin from London in the early 1970s where he had
distinguished himself as a member of the Renaissance music group Musica
Reservata, he conceived the idea of presenting an annual series devoted to
Bach’s church cantatas. The choice of St Ann’s Church as the venue was sealed
when he discovered that the building was completed in 1723, the same year that
Bach became Cantor in St Thomas’s Church in Leipzig. An auspicious link was
established from the outset.
The first
series took place in 1972 and it was apparent immediately that here was
something new and very special. John conveyed energy, sincerity, freshness; but
above all, a magisterial authorithy as to how this music should be performed.
He was direct; he was blunt. Diplomacy was not exactly a Beckett trait, but the
power and conviction of his personality opened our ears, our minds, our hearts
to this wonderful music. Even his initials J. S. B. seemed to us to be but
confirmation that the spirit of Bach was embodied in that burly and forceful
figure.
Those of us
who were privileged to take part in and those of us who were present at those
performances were touched by an experience which has influenced and affected us
ever since. The continuation of the tradition that Beckett started, reflected
in this present series, and in the many current developments in early music in
the country, can trace their origins in John Beckett’s endeavours.
John’s
Cantata series ran for ten years from 1972 to 1981, during which time some
sixty-five Cantatas were revealed, and I use that word advisedly. The concerts
achieved almost a cult following. A formidable team of soloists (Irene
Sandford, Bernadette Greevy, Frank Patterson and William Young), a specially-formed
choir, The Cantata Singers (trained by David Milne), and the New Irish Chamber
Orchestra, led by Mary Gallagher with John O’Sullivan and Betty Sullivan on
continuo, were inspired by John to give consistent performances of an
outstandingly high quality.
It was not
only in Dublin that these performances were admired. A BBC music producer,
Nicholas Anderson, finding that many Cantatas were not in the BBC’s archives,
came to Dublin several times to help fill those gaps, by recording John’s
series. This happy association culminated in an invitation from the BBC for the
whole ensemble to give an all-Bach concert – two major Cantatas and two
Sinfonias – in the Royal Albert Hall, as part of the 1979 Henry Wood Promenade
Concerts. Almost immediately after this Prom appearance the group performed at
the Flanders Early Music Festival in Bruges, the first of two visits in
consecutive years. When the New Irish Chamber Orchestra toured China in 1980,
John was the conductor and naturally a Bach Cantata – this time the Wedding
Cantata (No. 202) with Irene Sandford – featured in all the programmes.
While
fiercely self critical and almost perversely depreciating of his own efforts,
John always remained proud of the recording he made of Bach Arias with
Bernadette Greevy and the New Irish Chamber Orchestra. This is still available
on CD on the Claddagh label. I can vouch for the excellence of the disc – I am
playing oboe on it!
John
revered the music of many composers other than that of Bach. Monteverdi,
Purcell, Haydn, Mozart (though a little more grudgingly as he felt Mozart did
not write such good development sections), Schubert, Chopin, Brahms, Fauré and
especially Mahler. He also cherished an ambition, unfortunately not realised,
to conduct a concert consisting entirely of Strauss waltzes!
He had
intensely strong musical dislikes. The works of Handel and Vivaldi were
anathema to him. Messiah was consigned to outer darkness and he once
told me that the only worthwhile piece in it, the recitative ‘Thy rebuke has
broken his heart’ must have been written by somebody else, as it was too good
for Handel!
Vivaldi
fared even worse. It was, in John’s view, one of Art’s great tragedies that
Bach stumbled across some Vivaldi scores in the library in Weimar. Even a hint
of Italianate style in a Bach movement would produce a sorrowful shake of the
head and an expression of regret for what he called ‘Bach’s Vivaldi mode’!
Not
surprisingly, being a cousin of the great writer Samuel Beckett, John had a
gift and flow of language. Many people came to his Cantata series not only for
the music, but also to hear John’s pithy and idiosyncratic introductions.
His
aphorisms were many, memorable and incisive. One example must suffice.
Exhorting the choir for better diction he told them in the sternest Beckett
voice, ‘I want your words to be so clear that I can feel the spittle of your
consonants on my chin’.
In all,
John was a remarkable and unforgettable person and the artistic debt we owe him
is immense.
Now that
the passage of time has washed away any trace of the dust and rust of
prejudice, we can see his achievements for what they truly are: musical
monuments etched in high relief, uncompromising, adamantine, noble, beautiful.
I am not
going to ask you to stand for a moment’s silence in his memory – John would
have deplored such outward show on his behalf. But I am sure he will be in our
thoughts during this afternoon’s performance and none more so than at the words
of the second verse of the Chorale in Cantata No. 102:
Help, O Lord Jesus, help me,
Before sudden death takes me,
So that I today and evermore
May be prepared for my journey home.
Afterwards,
when we leave this place, perhaps to repair to some old watering hole, to drink
a dish of tea or a cup of wine, we will reminisce about he who is gone, and
give thanks for the insights he brought to Bach, whose music he loved and
served so well.
(Reproduced
by kind permission of Lindsay Armstrong.)
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Updated February, 2007.