STEPHEN FRY - OF CLASSICAL MUSIC

By chance, it's heard by the great conductor Arturo Toscanini, who suggests that the slow movement might benefit from being re-scored for full string orchestra. Barber obliges and Toscanini premieres the piece in the November of '38. Again, a bit Uke Carl Orff and his Carmina B, while it could only have been written in the twentieth century, its language is that of another time, with just a sheen of the 1930s. In Barber's case, it sounds like late Mahler more than anything else. Of course, the public loved it. Still do, in fact. It's known simply as Barber's Adagio.

1939. Taken on its own, Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez -particularly the slow movement - seems to be simply evoking memories of a small Spanish town, and, indeed, it was meant to do precisely that. But when you take into account not only the fact that the thirty-eight-year-old Joaquin Rodrigo had been blind since the age of three, but also the year in which it was written, the melancholia of the slow movement seems to blend in well with events. Rodrigo's Concierto WAS written at the onset of war, but was a personal tribute to the Spain to which he had just returned, from Paris. Delightful. But now, as the saying has it… 'Time and Tide are a jolly good read and a now outdated form of soap powder'. So let's kick on.

Of course, to be fair, the first thing that people bring to mind when you say 1939 is not Rodrigo and his concerto. Hitler's determined efforts to unite much of the world in war have finally come to fruition. There is, indeed, a war on. Musically speaking, the war will play its part, takes its toll, as it were. This will particularly be the case when composers come to reckon up the emotional effects of six years of battle. But also I'm thinking in particular, here, first of the French composer, Olivier Messiaen, who had enlisted in the French Army when war broke out. Born in Avignon in 1908, and tutored early on by Paul Dukas, he was then thirty-one and was soon captured and sent to a German prison camp at Gorlitz, in Silesia. It was here diat he wrote what is often referred to as the greatest quartet of the twentieth century. He called it, not surprisingly, considering the view he must have had from his writing desk, the Quatuor pour In fin du temps-the 'quartet for the end of time'.

Luckily for Messiaen, he was repatriated in 1942 and went back to his job as organist of Trinity Church, Paris, a post he held until his death in 1992. Also writing through the war was Shostakovich. He was in the fire brigade at first, in Leningrad. Bad eyesight had kept him from active service, but he was soon moved to the then Soviet capital, Kuibishev, where he put some of his experiences into a new work, his Seventh Symphony. To quote the composer himself, 'Neither savage raids, German planes nor the grim atmosphere of the beleaguered city could hinder the flow of ideas'. It's known as the 'Leningrad? Symphony and, once again, Marquess of Fry rules apply - go hear it live to get a better idea of how impressive it is.

Over in the US, two important composers were brushing shoulders. Aaron Copland had, by 1942, found his voice, as they say in composerland. He had been through a period of experimentation but, at the age of forty-two, was now at home with some of the more Native American folk sounds that found their way into music. He had also done the double - that is, achieved that rare thing of critical acclaim and popular acclaim. In addition, he had also pointed the way for film composers for years to come, who would imitate his 'grand canyon' chords and soaring tunes - more of this later.

Just leaving America in 1942, after a stay of a few years, was twenty-nine-year-old Benjamin Britten, who had gone back to face the Tribunal for Conscientious Objectors and do his part in the war effort - by taking part in official concerts. This he did and, not long after his return, he had come up with one of his most beautiful pieces to date, the Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings. It is, in effect, a song cycle setting a selection of poems by, among others, Blake, Keats and Tennyson to sometimes sublime, sometimes searing Britten music. It is also, in a way, war music.

J never forget a quote I heard about the great jazz trombonist, Jack Teagarden. It was basically along the lines of how he was able to play the tune of virtually any jazz standard and make it sound like it was the way the composer had intended it should be played. I often think of this when I hear Copland's Appalachian Spring. It isn't so much that it sounds the way the composer intended - for that we have recordings conducted by the man himself. No, it's more that Appalachian Spring sounds as if it has been around for ever, a bit like the way I've heard Sir Paul McCartney talk about his song 'Yesterday'. It's said he dreamt the tune one night, and, when he woke the next day, he wandered round with it in his head. Occasionally, he would ask someone, 'Have you heard of this tune?' and hum a few bars. No one he asked seemed to know the tune. After a while, and somewhat reluctantly, he came to realize that the tune was his, and that it had come to him in a dream. Again, forgive me for harping on, but various parts of Appalachian Spring seem like that. Yes, I know it has a Shaker tune -or the 'Lord of the Dance', as we used to call it - in the middle, but it's not that. It just feels like Copland almost wrote down the notes to a great piece, that somehow gives the impression it has been around for centuries.

He did all this, of course, in 1944. Yes, I really have hopped, skipped, jumped and taken away the first number I thought of and, well, jumped on ahead.

It's the year of the D-Day landings, the Battle of the Bulge and the VI flying bombs in London. It's also the year Marechal Petain is imprisoned at Belfort, and Hitler's generals try, but fail, to assassinate him. Elsewhere, there's TS Eliot's Four Quartets, The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, and No Exit by Jean-Paul Sartre. And, briefly, in the art world, there's the loss of Mondrian and Kandinsky, but Picasso and Braque have gone all, well, organic, I suppose, as they produce The Tomato Plant and The Slice of Pumpkin, respectively. Sod the Turner Prize, just enter them for Best in Show (Section 1, small garden produce). Now, I really need to take a leap, here, so stay with me, if you will. I want to end up in 1957, so I'm going to have to take you on something of a magical mystery tour.

M

ove in, down the bus, please. Pill all the seats. Thank you. A few rules first: no food or drink, please - this is a bus, not a refectory. No standing in the aisles, no talking to the driver - that's me - and no sticking your tongue out at the composers. In fact, no rude gestures of any kind. OK, there'll be a whipround for the driver - that's me - at the end, large notes only, please. OK, we're off.

Over to your left, way over to your left, in fact, is Benjamin Britten in 1945. He's busy on his opera - are you hearing me at the back? -on his opera Peter Grimes. Also, you may notice Evelyn Waugh, just behind him, waving a copy of Brideshead Revisited - don't wave back, please, it only encourages them - as well as Frank Lloyd Wright's new Guggenheim Museum. If you're thinking it's a bit peaceful, then well done. Yes, the war has ended.

On your right, in 1946 - please don't get out of your seats - you'll see David Lean filming Great Expectations, Eugene O'Neill signing copies of The Iceman Cometh - available from the driver at the end of your journey - as well as what appears to be the sleeping figure of John Logie Baird. In fact, he is… dead. Any minute now, wait a mo- yes, there he is. Benjamin Britten again - gosh, he is busy, isn't he, ladies and gentlemen. Obviously hit a purple patch - and this year he's finishing off The Toung Person's Guiie to the Orchestra, using a little tune by our old friend, the composer Henry Purcell. Keith, can you not do that with the skylights, you wouldn't do it at home! I know you don't have skylights at home, but stop it anyway.