| Reproduced from CLASSICALMUSIC, 18 JANUARY 2003 |
| Premiere of the fortnight |
| Even without Giles Swayne’s new Epitaph and Refrain Op. 89, Arpège’s flute-harp-horn-viola concert on 5 February [at York University] is mind-bogglingly wide-ranging, including as it does music by Wagner, Debussy, Ravel, Takemitsu, Koechlin, Bax, and Spanish Folksongs arranged by Marisa Robles. The world premiere introduces into the mix a story both heartbreaking and deeply personal. |
| Epitaph and Refrain is Giles Swayne’s farewell to Nii Sackey Codjoe, the Ghanaian brother of his ex-wife. Sackey died on 10 June 2002 at the age of 44. On leaving a London hospital after treatment for TB, he died suddenly from heart failure. His last years had been dogged by the potent mix of alcoholism and despair rooted in his failure, across the seemingly interminable length of a decade, to build a new life in Britain. ‘Sackey came here originally on a six-month visa,’ Swayne recounts, ‘then stayed on, working illegally before finally dropping out. His story is similar to those of many who arrive with no qualifications, thinking the streets of Britain are paved with gold. They then learn the truth, but are afraid to return home because of the loss of face involved. When Sackey was made redundant by a factory in 1995, I begged him to go back to Ghana with his savings.’ |
| Instead, though, Sackey frittered those savings away on drink and - in Swayne’s words - ‘went to pieces’. Contact was then almost completely lost, before Swayne’s doorbell rang at midnight six months ago and two Ghanaian women from a nearby church brought news of Sackey’s death. ‘He was using a pseudonym when he died, so in effect he was a body with no name.’ Swayne then formally confirmed the true identity. |
| Swayne describes Sackey ‘as one of the best and gentlest men I’ve ever known’. He was also a proud man, one tough and determined enough to have once walked across the Sahara to find work in Libya. Epitaph and Refrain is Swayne’s way of ‘offering simply what I know how to do in order to remember a man who had a raw deal from life. I’ve tried to express a feeling for the troubles he faced...the sadness and yet the serenity of the man.’ |
| The work uses a simple 25-bar refrain which is gradually modified by accidentals and register change, and becomes increasingly troubled before the clouds clear and death takes over. ‘I was able to use the tuning of the harp to transform the refrain in such a way that allowed me to introduce Rock of Ages, cleft for me - a favourite hymn of Sackey’s which he knew in Ghana to a tune which isn’t familiar here in the UK. But you could say the piece isn’t simply about Sackey - it represents the struggle faced by many others in his position.’ |
| Flautist Philippa Davies and Swayne have been championing each other’s work for many years. When she and harpist Christina Rhys founded Arpège as a novel combination of instruments they knew that they (along with violist Louise Williams and horn player Stephen Stirling) would have to commission new works if their concerts were not to end up being dominated by duets, trios and arrangements. ‘Giles came along to one of our concerts,’ says Davies, ‘after which the idea of this piece was born and brought to fruition with the aid of the RVW Trust and the Britten-Pears Foundation. He’s such a witty composer, but complex as well…in Epitaph and Refrain we can appreciate the elegiac, poignant side to his music. Yes, there’s this powerful, personal story behind the work, but it can equally be enjoyed as an abstract piece, as is the case with the Berg violin concerto.’ |
| Andrew Green |
| CLASSICALMUSIC 18 JANUARY 2003 |