Category: art forms

Douglas Young’s Snark


text

 
MusicWeb international, by Gary Higginson:

Douglas YOUNG (b.1947)
The Hunting of the Snark (An Agony in 8 Fits)
Narrator – Peter Easton
Douglas Young – Piano and Percussion
The Leicestershire Chorale and Members of the Leicestershire Schools Symphony Orchestra/Peter Fletcher
rec. Bosworth College, Desford, 14 March 1982
CAMEO CLASSICS CC9106 [53.21]

… … …

What is so marvellous is how well the young instrumental musicians at the time, played and clearly reacted to the music (their names are listed in the booklet) and my colleague at the time on MusicWeb, John Whitmore, is quoted as saying “the playing is good absolute rather than good considering”, I can’t improve on those words.

The booklet contains the original, Monty Python type, illustrations you find in any good copy of the poem, by Henry Holiday (d.1927) as well as the complete Carroll text and biographies of the performers but no composer’s note on the work.

Mounty Python type! I like that.

Besides Lewis Carroll’s textual allusions and Henry Holiday’s pictorial allusions, I now also found a piece with musical allusions. Accompanying the Bellman’s “That English is what you speak” with Greensleeves is clear, whereas I don’t know whether Young meant to allude to Schnittke when I heared Schnittke. Then again, to choose Silent Night to accompany the Baker’s gruesome end is wonderfully naughty.

As far as I know, this recording is in the market since 2014. From MusicWeb it received three reviews, with Paul Corfield Godfrey‘s review inbetween Whitmore‘s and Higginson‘s reviews. As a layman I would like to add to these that if I ever would dare to try to learn The Hunting of the Snark by heart, I would use this recording to help me memorizing the text.

 

Remark: The links in the quoted text from MusicWeb had been added in snrk.de and were not part of the original text.

Media data: Libraries Australia

Christ in the House of his Parents

Christ in the House of his Parents: Details from a stained glass window (Brechin Cathedral, source: BSMPG @ Twitter) by Henry Holiday and from a painting by J.E. Millais.

The images are quite different. Important things they have in common with other Carpenter’s Shop paintings are the depiction of Joseph as a real carpenter at work and the wood shavings.

Ballad Form in Victorian Poetry

Wikispaces being closed down. Therefore I mirrored the post Ballad Form in Victorian Poetry. It helps to understand the form of The Hunting of the Snark:

The article is the work of a student with the initials “CM” at Hobart and William Smith Colleges (partner institution of UVicEnglish), see the signature: CM/HWS/ENG 21. (Source: Alison Chapman)

(I also mirrored the wiki page on the Lewis Carroll Picture Book.)

Snark in the Woods

Update 2018-02-22: https://www.forestry.gov.uk/snarkhunter

First up on our new tour of 'The Hunting of the Snark' is @FCHaldonForest April 5th-7th, 7:30pm. Suitable for ages 6+ https://t.co/ji7dh86bhg

Take part in an unforgettable adventure to find the Snark.@tarmacdodgers pic.twitter.com/wridh9ePMO

— Burn the Curtain (@BurntheCurtain) February 21, 2018

2017-09-17

Forestry Commission of England:

NEWS RELEASE No: 16687
14 SEPTEMBER 2017

Arts Council England grant awarded for exciting forest theatre experiences

The Arts Council has awarded £139,000 to the Forestry Commission and theatre partner Burn the Curtain to develop their outdoor theatre experiences. The substantial grant will enable Burn the Curtain to tour their sell-out evening theatre show, The Company of Wolves, based on the stories by Angela Carter, to three more forest locations this autumn.

In addition, a new theatre show will be developed around the nonsense poem by Lewis Carroll, ‘The Hunting of the Snark’. The experience will tour across seven forests in 2018 and will be accompanied by ‘Snark Hunter’, an innovative app which will bring the poem to life for forest visitors across the country. […]

(Thanks to Doug Howick for drawing my attention to this.)

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