Gramophone – September 2019

gramophone.co.uk GRAMOPHONESEPTEMBER 201961

ItwasthecomposerAlanRawsthorne
who acted as Gerard Schurmann’s entrée
into film music, a tale deftly told in the
instructive booklet by Carolyn Nott.
Schurmann was Rawsthorne’s assistant,
orchestrating and sometimes composing
scenes, notably in The Cruel Sea (1953).
Aside from Rawsthorne’s work, his credits
include The Vikings (Nascimbine), Exodus
(Gold) and Lawrence of Arabia (Jarre),
all worldwide box office hits, a feat that
Schurmann as film composer, or rather the
films themselves, never quite achieved. In
this selection, The Long Arm alone enjoyed
a London premiere at the Gaumont
Haymarket in July 1956. Starring Jack
Hawkins, then a top UK draw at the box
office, it was a natural for the bright lights
of the West End. Other Schurmann titles
fared less well: Konga (1961), a cheap rip-
off of King Kong, was branded as an ‘inept,
silly and ludicrously enjoyable monster
movie’ in a backhanded compliment by
Time Out.
Dr Syn, alias The Scarecrow gets the CD
off to a brilliant start. Set on the coast of
south-east England, this schoolboy yarn
brings to the fore Schurmann’s keen
dramatic sense in a tale of derring-do,
featuring chases and a motley list of
characters of whom Dr Syn, the local
vicar and saviour of the downtrodden, has
a noble theme befitting his office, which

isreprisedindifferenthues.Thedemiseof

the monster in Konga follows Max Steiner’s

sympathetic portrayal in the earlier King

Kong movie from 1933. The quirky ‘Little

Ape at Play’, a brief humorous sketch,

catches its playful behaviour. Schurmann

composed a surprisingly engaging portrait

of Claretta, Mussolini’s mistress, in the

film of the same name from 1984. Her

own theme, a gentle string tune flecked

with harp colours, is a sweet thing. The

following romantic interlude, set in the

Palazzo Venezia, is exquisitely scored

and played. The world of la dolce vita

that Claretta and Mussolini breathed is

suggested in the waltz theme and heard

again in the finale, where the composer

unleashes ‘a ravishing flood of

romanticism’, to quote David Wishart,

the late authoritity on Schurmann.

The Ceremony (1963), set in Morocco,

begins with a figure redolent of Falla

before continuing along a shimmering,

Impressionistic path with an array of wind

instruments including Indian flute. The

drama is given its head in a terrific action

sequence, a speciality of the composer.

A late entry, The Gambler (1997) is

based on a story by Dostoevsky and is again

Impressionistic in part. A gambling wheel

is illustrated by subtle changes in the time

signature, and in ‘Carriage Ride and

Sunrise’ there’s a suggestion of the

gamelan,theinstrumentassociatedwith

Java,thebirthplaceofthecomposer.

Schurmann’strademarkangularstyle,

notsoremotefromHindemith,findsits

placeinthepunchyMainTitlefrom

AttackontheIronCoast(1967)aswellas

theferociouscuefor‘GruesomeMurders’

inHorrorsoftheBlackMuseum(1959).

Thisisahugelyenjoyablepresentation

inallrespects,onethatredressesthe

imbalanceofacomposerknownfor

toolongastheorchestratorofother

people’smusic.Inthesesharplyetched

performanceshecanbeappreciatedinhis

ownrightasakeyfigureinthelexiconof

filmcomposersalreadyrepresentedinthis

fineseries.AdrianEdwards

Weigl

SymphonyNo1, Op5.

BilderundGeschichten,Op 2

DeutscheStaatsphilharmonieRheinland-Pfalz/

JürgenBruns

CapriccioFC5365(61’• DDD)

Born in 1881,

Karl Weigl

received lessons

from Zemlinsky

as a teenager, studied alongside Webern

at the University of Vienna, was repetiteur

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