Jan van Gilse - Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2 (David Porcelijn)

Information

Composer: Jan van Gilse

• Symphony No. 1 in F major
• Symphony No. 2 in E flat major

Netherlands Symphony Orchestra

David Porcelijn, conductor

Date: 2008

Label: CPO

-----------------------------------------------------------

Review

The life and music of Jan van Gilse (1881-1944) are almost completely unknown outside his native Netherlands and largely forgotten inside it. A capable composer, numbering Humperdinck among his teachers, his first two symphonies (of four) confirm his technical ability and show a stylistic development from High to Late Romanticism. Although both works were well received at their initial performances, Gilse remained a marginal figure despite being closely involved in Dutch musical life and artists’ rights. Half-German on his mother’s side and having pursued his early career in Bremen and Munich, he was branded a Germanophile after the Great War and hounded from his conductorship in Utrecht (not least by the young Willem Pijper, to his shame). Back in Germany in the 1930s, he bitterly opposed Hitler’s regime and returned to the Netherlands, banned his works in Nazi-held territories (as the Bavarian Hartmann did) and joined the artistic resistance during the Occupation. He died before the liberation, a broken man following the execution of his two sons.

Tragic as were the closing years of his life, his music is full of life and drama. The personal voice is not especially distinctive but the symphonies here – student works both – are well made, attractive to the ear and substantial concert items. Where the First (1901) is a pleasant, stylistically conservative setting-out of his stall as a creative artist, the Second (1902-03, rev 1928; in three movements, fast, not-quite-so-fast, slower) is a more profound utterance, influenced by Bruckner, Mahler and Wagner without being radical. David Porcelijn directs fine accounts and the Netherlands Symphony Orchestra respond warmly to the music. Splendidly recorded, too, this disc – one assumes Nos 3 and 4 will follow soon – is a long overdue act of restitution.

— Guy Rickards

-----------------------------------------------------------

Jan van Gilse (11 May 1881 – 8 September 1944) was a Dutch composer and conductor. He studied in Cologne, Berlin, and Italy, and served as conductor of the Utrecht Municipal Orchestra (1917–1922) and director of the Utrecht Conservatory (1933–1937). In 1935, he founded the Dutch Musical Interests foundation to support Dutch composers. During World War II, van Gilse and his sons joined the resistance; both sons were killed, and van Gilse died in 1944, likely from pneumonia. His music evolved from German late Romanticism to modernism, with his opera Thijl hailed as a Dutch masterpiece.

***

David Porcelijn (born 7 January 1947) is a Dutch composer and conductor. He studied flute, composition, and conducting at the Royal Conservatoire of Music in The Hague. Porcelijn has conducted major orchestras worldwide, including the London Philharmonic and the BBC Symphony. He held leading roles with ensembles such as the Adelaide and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestras, and the RTS Symphony Orchestra in Belgrade. A co-founder of Ensemble M, he promoted contemporary music from 1974 to 1978. Porcelijn has recorded extensively and taught conducting in both the Netherlands and Australia.

-----------------------------------------------------------