Announcing David Johnson’s 12 Preludes and Fugues for solo piano

Divine Art Records is pleased to announce the recording, to take place later this summer, of Scottish composer and musicologist David Johnson’s 12 Preludes and Fugues for solo piano, performed by Christopher Guild.  

The only son of Sir Ronald Johnson, a high-ranking civil servant and organist at St-Columba’s-by-the-Castle, and Lady Elizabeth, director of Edinburgh’s Holst Singers and organist at Rosslyn Chapel in Midlothian, David Johnson (1942-2009) was an internationally renowned scholar of Scottish music, whose PhD thesis at Cambridge formed the basis of his most regarded work, Music and Society in Lowland Scotland in the 18th Century.  His reputation rests largely on his groundbreaking work in Scottish early music, but many who knew him (among them Professor Nigel Osborne of Edinburgh University, recorderist John Turner and historian and linguist James Reid-Baxter) believe his compositional activity should have been more widely known, beyond Johnson’s own artistic and academic circles.  His oeuvre includes choral and instrumental music, but whilst having been widely performed is scantily represented on disc.  

Johnson’s 12 Preludes and Fugues are collectively one of only two significant pieces he wrote for the piano (the other being a five-minute, single movement Sonata) and were written for composer-pianist Ronald Stevenson (1928-2015).  Written in the early-mid 1990s and published in 1995, they are highly distinctive for their melding of a soundworld not far removed from that of composers of the first half of the 20th Century, such as Hindemith or Prokofiev, with quotations from Bach, allusions to the work of Hugh MacDiarmid, and their direct quotations of popular tunes such as ‘Johnny Cope’ and ‘The Animals Went Marching Two by Two’ – all expressed with a Scottish inflection.  The motivic backbone, however, is one borrowed from Aberdonian composer Shaun Dillon (1944-2018): the Scots-Gaelic word bheatha, ‘life’, which in musical terms is represented by the notes B-flat, B, E, A.  In turn, Johnson uses this to form a tone row, and uses the pitch-scheme as a plot for the keys across the 12 works in the suite.  It is difficult to think of a similar work in the emerging canon of Scottish piano music, which makes Johnson’s 12 Preludes and Fugues, like his seminal work on 18th century music, a distinguished contribution to the nation’s musical story.

Christopher Guild is slowly emerging on the international music scene for his work with British, particularly Scottish, piano music.  He recorded 10 albums for Toccata Classics, encompassing 6 CDs of Ronald Stevenson, the complete piano music of Francis George Scott, and music by Ronald Center and William Beaton Moonie.  He has also recorded the complete piano music of Bernard van Dieren for Piano Classics and featured as collaborative pianist on a violin and piano recital with Diana Galvydyte for Champs Hill Records.  This will be Chris’s first recording for Divine Art.

David Johnson: 12 Preludes and Fugues

• Title:  David Johnson: 12 Preludes and Fugues
• Label: Divine Art
• Catalogue number: DDX 21124
• Works: 12 Preludes and Fugues (by David Johnson)
• Performer: Christopher Guild (piano)
• To be recorded 22 August 2023
• At The Old Granary Studio, Beccles, Suffolk
• Release date:  early 2024, exact date to be confirmed

Tracks

1) Prelude 1 in B flat (Allegretto ritmico); 2) Fugue 1 in B flat (Allegretto con energìa); 3) Prelude 2 in B (Grave); 4) Fugue 2 in B (Allegro non troppo, leggiero); 5) Prelude 3 in E (Allegretto non troppo); 6) Fugue 3 in E (Allegro moderato); 7) Prelude 4 in A (Largo);8) Fugue 4 in A (introducing “The animals went in two by two”) (Allegro con spirito); 9) Prelude 5 in F sharp (Allegretto grazioso); 10) Fugue 5 in F sharp (Allegretto non troppo);11) Prelude 6 in G (Meditation on Hugh MacDiarmids “O Jesu parvule”: for Ronald Stevenson) (Largo); 12) Fugue 6 in G (Chorale prelude, “Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern”) (Andante moderato); 13) Prelude 7 in C (Lacrimoso, quasi improvisando);14) Fugue 7 in C (Allegro); 15) Prelude 8 in F (with apologies to the 1635 Scottish psalter) (Solenne); 16) Fugue 8 in F (Allegretto ritmico); 17) Prelude 9 in D (Allegretto, insouciant, poco rubato); 18) Fugue 9 in D (Con energìa, non troppo allegro); 19) Prelude 10 in E flat (Lento); 20) Fugue 10 in E flat (Risoluto); 21) Prelude 11 in A flat (Andante tenebroso); 22) Fugue 11 in G sharp (on “Johnnie Cope”) (Alla breve); 23) Prelude 12 in D flat (Largo misterioso); 24) Fugue 12 in C sharp (Andante moderato)

Christopher Guild is becoming increasingly well known for his work on the piano music of Scotland and the rest of the British Isles. He has performed as soloist and chamber musician at some of the most prestigious concert venues in the UK, including the Wigmore Hall, St John’s, Smith Square, the Purcell Room and the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse. Following studies at St Mary’s Music School, Edinburgh, and with Andrew Ball at the Royal College of Music, London, his career was launched with invitations to tour the UK under the auspices of the Countess of Munster Musical Trust Recital Scheme; and to perform on the South Bank in London as a Park Lane Group Young Artist. While still a student, he performed as an orchestral keyboardist with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and City of London Sinfonia. He has worked with numerous composers, among them Judith Weir, and co-founded the Edison Ensemble, a contemporary-music group based in London. After a year’s tenure as the Richard Carne Junior Fellow in Performance at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance. He lectured on Francis George Scott and Ronald Stevenson at the Musica Scotica Annual Conference in 2019, and has written articles on Scottish classical music for iScot magazine.

“Guild offers a sensitive reading of these interesting and varied works that is insightful, colourful, brimming with rhythmic vitality, and meticulously presented on this high-quality recording”

Frances Wilson, The Cross-Eyed Pianist

“I defy anyone not to be entranced by Christopher Guild’s premiere recording of Ronald Stevenson’s A Rosary of Variations on Seán Ó Riada’s Irish Folk Mass”

The Classical Reviewer

“The entire recital is played with great empathy and genuine feeling: there is no sense of condescension”

– MusicWeb International

“A colouristic tour de force, vibrantly brought to life by Guild.”

– Gramophone

“Christopher Guild is a strenuous advocate of Scottish composers and played this varied programme with an emphatic, ringing style giving the resonance of the instrument full, rich rein.”

Threeweeks Edinburgh.com (review of Edinburgh Fringe concert)