Brian Wright : In Memoriam Kenneth Allsop : Bergmann

Brian Wright

Bergmann Edition: 12 pages

Kenneth Allsop of course was a famous broadcaster, and television presenter, and he died 52 years ago. The Preface is written by his son Tristan, and he goes into considerable detail about the man.

The piece itself has a Lento that is riflessivamente , dolce e lamentoso introduction in two, and sometimes three voices and it is very emotive and slow moving in its musical vocabulary.After a considerable time, what is now called the Theme enters a little faster than the opening but is still very sad and not really very different in its feel from the intro. Moreover there are a few tricky places when you attempt to play the parts smoothly, as it no doubt requires. The three voices are not where you might expect them, and as a result some of this is harder than you might think. About halfway through the intro (Lento) momentarily returns in a mixture of time signatures before the theme returns one more time, and leads to the coda where everything gradually stops and the final chord of Am with a bottom E closes the piece.

I must be honest and say that the piece didn’t really grab me. It was very sad, quite difficult, and the music itself was not very memorable, but you might think quite differently.

Chris Dumigan