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"The Reluctant Masquerade" was completed in 2000, with both music and libretto by James Stevens. (See below for programme notes). Preparations for this World Première recording, made in Prague, were started in 2002 and completed in 2006, at the composer's expense. Pristine Classical is delighted to have this opportunity to offer it as a download - the first time a major orchestral and vocal recording of this nature has been premièred on the Internet.
About the composer, James Stevens (b. 1923):
Studied initially with Benjamin Frankel in his exclusive class at the Guildhall School of Music in London. There he won several prestigious awards including the Royal Philharmonic Prize for his First Symphony; the Wainwright Scholarship for 'composer of the year'; and a French Government Bursary which took him across the Channel to study with Darius Milhaud at the Paris Conservatoire. There he met Nadia Boulanger who made him one of her star pupils who received Saturday evening tuition free of charge. He also enjoyed an open invitation to Arthur Honegger's classes. He later won the coveted Lili Boulanger Memorial Prize in Boston, USA, for 'composers of exceptional talent and integrity' awarded by a panel of judges which included Stravinsky, Copland and Villa-Lobos. Another award was the Mendelssohn Scholarship which even Benjamin Britten failed to achieve, despite several attempts! As a result of this he spent some time in Berlin at the Hochschule für Musik. He also won the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths' Award while his most recent honour was the BDK International Award in Tokyo for his Buddhist requiem Celebration for the Dead played by the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra. Stevens commenced his extensive film career while still a student and was acclaimed at the Ealing Studios where he constantly devised new film music techniques which are now standard practice. Unusually, Stevens has never confined himself to one particular musical genre and has taken every opportunity to take part in pop music, jazz, films, television scores, and musicals; his musical Mamízelle Nitouche being revived in London's West End in the autumn of 2001. Although also concerned with serious avant-garde works, his music is melodic rather than atonal. In one year he was the only British composer to be selected for the annual International Society for Contemporary Music (with Etymon) while having a disc at number one in the Melody Maker charts (with Exploding Galaxy). In 1990 he was nominated for the BAFTA music award for his contribution to Chelworth - eight one-hour episodes. In 1995 he was invited to give a 'James Stevens Day' in Cincinnati, shortly after which he was invited by the Musicians Union of Japan to represent English artists at the Hiroshima and Nagasaki 50th anniversary memorial ceremonies. In 1998 the Cleveland Orchestra Piano Trio gave the world premiere of Concertante a Tre and in 1999 Stevens was commissioned to write David's Round for a 9-year-old prodigy violinist, also in Cleveland, USA. The following year he was commissioned by members of the Cleveland Orchestra to write a work for cello and piano called Duo Per Umanita. Also in 2000 Stevens completed his magnum opus The Reluctant Masquerade, dealing with the human psyche and nature of time. In 2001 he wrote the incidental music for American writer Daniel de Cournoyer's epic one-man theatre show Bells to Hell and also a Processional for a wedding in Australia. (Taken from MusicWeb International)
Programme Note by the composer: The Japanese have a concept of the outside and the inside of human personality, that which is shown to the world as opposed to the real inside person. This is known as tatamae and honne, or disparagingly aware (the Japanese always know how to have your cake whilst eating it) omote and ura. The person who demonstrates this dichotomy in extremis was the great post-war writer/actor Yukio Mishima. To all intents and purposes he was a successful public figure with a beautiful wife and a happy family, but at heart he was a homosexual who deplored the state of contemporary Japan and begged for the restoration of earlier ideals. At the same time he suddenly realised his homosexuality when he saw the night-soil man emptying the buckets, his biceps vividly in view. From then on he had to live two lives. Hence the title of this work. He ran his own private little army to "bring back the glory of the Emperor". In his last tetralogy, "The Sea of Fertility", he demonstrates all his contradictions. He adopted the Buddhist ethic with its acceptance of reincarnation as a basis for the ongoing narrative, which brings into consideration the nature of time. He planned a final show-down at the Eastern Army Headquarters on November 25th, 1970. This work opens at the point where, having delivered the last pages of his tetralogy to his publisher, he has the general tied up to a chair with the crowd bellowing outside. It goes on to suggest the Buddha shedding tears for the state of the world and finally the problem of the central character in his last work (Satoko, reformed prostitute, now Mother Superior) confronted with the problem who she is really in love with, the characters in the book or the author, which brings up the question of the nature of time.
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