An old Punch cartoon showed a suited gentleman before a stage curtain addressing a conference hall: “In a moment, the corporation’s Annual General Meeting. But first, Mahler Eight”. That puncturing of pretension by hyperbole stayed with me, but I never expected to encounter a similar proposal live. But here was Mahler’s mighty Symphony no. 7 "introducing" a 20-minute piece of a cappella singing. But the circumstances were unusual and partly political.
The BBC Singers, a world-class professional chorus, had recently been threatened with extinction, then reprieved, one episode in the beleaguered British arts scene of recent times. To celebrate the choir and illustrate the calibre of work under threat, the London Symphony Orchestra added a second half to what was initially intended to be a concert devoted to one symphony. The chosen addition was created in wartime Paris, Poulenc’s Figure humaine, based on poems Paul Ėluard had written during his time in La Résistance.
The 1945 world premiere was given in London, in English – and by the BBC Singers. The work’s reputation stands high, for both quality and difficulty – written for double chorus involving 12 or more parts at times. It can rarely have been sung as accurately, and as expressively, as it was here. The final cry of “Liberté ”, capped with a startling high E, a scream for freedom, provoked a rapturous reception owing something to solidarity as well as to musical appreciation. Sir Simon Rattle, who directed the chorus, made a speech to open this second part, lamenting the threat faced by British musical culture. Alongside familiar points he acknowledged the cost challenges, adding “we could help, if we were ever asked or consulted”.