Polka (Walton: Facade)

*Contemporary Piece*

Whilst a young graduate, Walton lodged with the Sitwell family. this was the 1920's, a time of literary experimentation. Edith Sitwell was writing poems concerned with word-play, rhythms and onomatopoeia. Originally the poems were simply technical exercises attempting to obtain purely through the written word, the rhythm of the waltz, polka and fox-trot. When Edith was told that this was very clever-but just a facade, the name stuck, and Walton undertook the task of setting the poems to music. Initially performed in 1922, Walton continued to add and revise for many years, and finally gathered a definitive collection in 1948 for publication. 

The music and words were to have an equal contribution. To attain this, and to eliminate the personalities of the speaker and instrumentalists, the original performance was screened from the audience by a curtain. A Sengerphone (a type of megaphone) was used, which jutted through the curtain and amplified the volume of the speaker to equal the musicians. Made of papier-mache, it removed the metallic rasp of a megaphone, preserving the tonal qualities of the voice (the orifice covered both mouth and nostrils, retaining the resonance of the nasal cavities.)

A successful rendering of Facade depends almost entirely on the reciters, for their ability to articulate the often tongue-twisting lines of inconsequence, their avoidance of over-characterisation, and ability to let the pure sound/rhythm of the words speak for themselves. Jane Minns. September 2007

_Score 8pp. Parts 1-2pp._