Rebecca Clarke

Rebecca Helferich Clarke (Friskin) (August 27, 1886–October 13, 1979) was an English classical composer and violist best known for her chamber music featuring the viola. She is considered one of the most important British composers in the interwar period between World War I and World War II{{ref|grove}}; she has also been described as the most distinguished British female composer of her generation. {{ref|norton}}

Music

A large portion of Clarke's music features the viola, and takes advantage of the strengths of the instrument, as she was a professional performer for many years. Much of her output was written for herself and the all-female chamber ensembles she played in, including the Norah Clench Quartet, the English Ensemble, and the d'Aranyi Sisters. She also toured worldwide, particularly with cellist May Muklé. Her works were strongly influenced by several trends in music of the 20th century; Clarke also knew many leading composers of the day, including Bloch and Ravel, to whom her work has been compared.

Related Topics:
Norah Clench Quartet - English Ensemble - D'Aranyi Sisters - Music of the 20th century

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The impressionism of Debussy is often mentioned in connection with her work, with lush textures and modernistic harmonies; the Viola Sonata (published in the same year as the prizewinning Bloch and also of the Hindemith Viola Sonata) is a particular example, with its pentatonic opening theme, thick harmonies, emotionally intense nature, and dense, rhythmically complex texture. The Sonata remains a part of standard repertoire for the viola to this day. Morpheus, composed a year earlier, was her first expansive work, after over a decade of songs and miniatures. The Rhapsody sponsored by Coolidge, is Clarke's most ambitious work, roughly 23 minutes long, with complex musical ideas and ambiguous tonalities contributing to the varying moods of the piece. In contrast, "Midsummer Moon", written the very next year, is a light miniature, with a flutter-like solo violin line.{{ref|cd}}

Related Topics:
Impressionism - Harmonies - Viola Sonata - Hindemith - Pentatonic - Emotion - Rhythm

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In addition to her chamber music for strings, Clarke wrote many songs. Nearly all of Clarke's early pieces are for solo voice and piano, Her setting of "The Tiger", which she worked on for five years to the exclusion of other works during her tumultuous relationship with baritone John Goss (who was married at the time; Clarke was not), is dark and brooding, almost expressionist{{ref|grove}}; most, however, are lighter in nature. Her earliest works were parlor songs; she went on to build up a body of work primarily drawing from classic texts by Yeats, Masefield, and traditional Chinese writings.

Related Topics:
Baritone - John Goss - Expressionist - Parlor songs - Yeats - Masefield - Chinese writings

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During 1939 to 1942, the last prolific period near the end of her compositional career, her style grew less dense and strongly developed, and more clear and contrapuntal, with emphasis on motivic elements and tonal structures, the influences of neoclassicism appearing in her works. Dumka (1941), a recently published work for violin, viola, and piano, reflects the Eastern European folk styles of Bartók and Martinů{{ref|grove}}. The "Passacaglia on an Old English Tune", also from 1941 and premiered by Clarke herself, is based on a theme attributed to Thomas Tallis which appears throughout the work. The piece is modal in flavor, mainly the Dorian mode but venturing into the seldom-heard Phrygian mode. Dedicated to "BB", ostensibly Clarke's niece Magdalen, scholars speculate that the dedication is more likely referring to Benjamin Britten, who organized a concert commemorating the death of Clarke's friend and major influence Frank Bridge{{ref|pass}}. The Prelude, Allegro, and Pastorale, also composed in 1941, is another neoclassically influenced piece, written for clarinet and viola (originally for her brother and sister-in-law).{{ref|cd}} Ralph Vaughan Williams befriended Clarke in the 1940s, and conducted concerts featuring her music on several occasions.

Related Topics:
Contrapuntal - Motivic - Neoclassicism - Eastern European - Folk - Bartók - Martinů - Passacaglia - Thomas Tallis - Dorian mode - Phrygian mode - Benjamin Britten - Frank Bridge - Ralph Vaughan Williams

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Clarke's views on the social role of women—herself in particular—were incompatible with any ambition to compose music in the larger forms. Her oeuvre consists largely of short chamber pieces and songs; notably absent from her work are large-scale pieces such as symphonies, which despite her talent she never attempted to write. Some of her choral music, however, is large in conception—particularly the setting of Psalm 91, and the Chorus from Shelley's "Hellas" for five part women's chorus; both works were first recorded in 2003 shortly after their posthumous publication{{ref|mail}}.

Related Topics:
Choral music - Psalm - Shelley - Recorded

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Her work was all but forgotten for a long period of time; it was revived in 1976 during a radio station celebration of her ninetieth birthday, and with recent scholarship, particularly works by the Rebecca Clarke Society, she has since begun coming back into public awareness. Over half of Clarke's compositions remain unpublished{{ref|woolf}}, in the personal possession of her heirs, along with most of her writings; however in the early 2000s revival of interest in her music continued, with more of her works being printed and recorded, and continuing efforts being made to make her works available. Examples include two string quartets as well as one composition published in 2002, a short, lyrical piece for viola and piano entitled Morpheus, the latter composed under the pseudonym of "Anthony Trent" to avoid having her name on a recital program so often. (Reviews of the concert praised the "Trent", while all but ignoring the works credited to Clarke.){{ref|cd}}

Related Topics:
Radio station - Birthday - Heir - Printed - String quartet - Pseudonym

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