Joe Stollery

Reverdie is a four-movement piece for orchestra which in the most part describes in poetic terms the destruction of nature through various stages. The title, which relates to a form of poem celebrating the coming of spring (‘re-greening’), is used in bitter irony, where the truth of nature is gradually replaced by a false, artificially green landscape ‘for all to enjoy’.

The genesis of this work, as well as the titles of its four movements, comes from a close-hand experience with the development of a golf course on sand dunes north of Balmedie beach, near Aberdeen. The course in question was conceived and developed by property tycoon Donald Trump, through which an aggravated assault on the local environment had subsequently been carried out, alongside a cocktail of political bribery, smearing of reasoned opposition, and ultimately warping the truth in the local media, all so to favour his agenda. The very fact that this tycoon had since that time achieved the Presidency of the United States and transferred his matters onto a global platform, meant this story has now become more relevant than ever, the treatment of nature here even suggesting a poetic commentary on the President’s curated concepts of ‘alternative truth’ and ‘fake news’ and their prominence in contemporary social media. In short, the assault on nature can be seen as synonymous with the assault on truth.

Reverdie is in essence a programme symphony, following a traditional order of fast-scherzo-slow-fast. It features leitmotifs representing abstract concepts such as ‘Nature’, ‘Scotland’, and ‘Man’ (a generic symbol for Trump), that frequently appear in each movement whenever the events dictate. Each movement is subtitled with a poetic description of a certain event associated with the golf course development. My aim was not to be specifically programmatic, but rather to use universal concepts that can be easily identified and interpreted on these planes. The various leitmotifs that crop up are also disparate from each other and were developed from a variety of composing techniques – some on common-practice lines, others on more serialist processes. Some are even based on analysing the melodic contours of certain political statements. Overall, Reverdie has a tonal language that mostly reflects the dramatic, cinematic orchestral music of the early 20th century, including the film music of the time, taking from both Romanticist and Expressionist harmonic disciplines, and the large orchestral forces required for the piece similarly follow this line. I also decided to give a separate voice to represent Trump’s character in the orchestra – choosing the slightly more unique sound of a solo euphonium to match his high, weedy timbres. This instrument generally plays a concertante role throughout the piece, often playing against the rest of the orchestra. Other instruments and sections play minor roles on occasion, reflecting the situation as appropriate.

The main leitmotifs to look out for in the piece are:

•          ‘Nature’ – two sets of two brass chords in a slightly pungent tonality.

•          ‘Man’ – the presence of the adversary is mainly identifiable whenever the euphonium makes an appearance, but their part features mostly sinewy chromatic lines that twist around in melodic blocks.

•          ‘The Thistle’ – representing the pure allegory of Scotland, in its base form this is a gentle pibroch-like melody that makes use of the 9 notes of the Highland Bagpipe scale, over a deep drone.

•          ‘Agnus Dei’ – mostly prominent in the third movement, but appearing at brief points before then, this is a keening set of suspended notes that generally descend, mostly paraphrasing the eponymous Latin prayer.

•          ‘MAGA’ – a direct contour transcription of Trump’s infamous campaign slogan, sometimes with pitches close to the non-tonal original, and other times fully harmonised and fitting to the major scale.

•          ‘Cameron’s Ditty’ – a twirling set of four tonal notes that were reportedly muttered by former British Prime Minister David Cameron as he announced his resignation from his post following the ill-judged result of the 2016 EU Referendum – this little melody sums up for me the current state of politics here, and I find it fits well in with the other motifs well.

•          ‘America First’ – another of Trump’s slogans interpreted musically, first properly appearing in the finale mostly in conjunction with ‘MAGA’, but also appearing in its own right.