The Planets, Op. 32, is a seven-movement orchestral suite by the English composer Gustav Holst, written between 1914 and 1917. In the last movement the orchestra is joined by a wordless female chorus. Each movement of the suite is named after a planet of the Solar System and reflects its astrological significance.
The premiere of The Planets was at the Queen's Hall, London, on 29 September 1918, conducted by Holst's friend Adrian Boult before an invited audience of about 250 people. Three concerts at which movements from the suite were played were given in 1919 and early 1920. The first complete performance at a public concert was given at the Queen's Hall on 15 November 1920 by the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Albert Coates.
The innovative nature of Holst's music caused some initial hostility among a minority of critics, but the suite quickly became and has remained popular, influential and widely performed. The composer conducted two recordings of the work, and it has been recorded at least 80 times subsequently by conductors, choirs and orchestras from the UK and internationally.
Background and composition
thumb|alt=Bespectacled white man of middle age, clean-shaven, leaning on his right hand and looking at camera|Holst 1921
The Planets was composed over nearly three years, between 1914 and 1917. The work had its origins in March and April 1913, when Gustav Holst and his friend and benefactor H. Balfour Gardiner holidayed in Spain with the composer Arnold Bax and his brother, the author Clifford Bax. A discussion about astrology piqued Holst's interest in the subject. Clifford Bax later commented that Holst became "a remarkably skilled interpreter of horoscopes". Shortly after the holiday Holst wrote to a friend: "I only study things that suggest music to me. That's why I worried at Sanskrit. Then recently the character of each planet suggested lots to me, and I have been studying astrology fairly closely". He told Clifford Bax in 1926 that The Planets:
Imogen Holst, the composer's daughter, wrote that her father had difficulty with large-scale orchestral structures such as symphonies, and the idea of a suite with a separate character for each movement was an inspiration to him. Holst's biographer Michael Short and the musicologist Richard Greene both think it likely that another inspiration for the composer to write a suite for large orchestra was the example of Schoenberg's Five Pieces for Orchestra.
The Sunday Times, too, quickly changed its line. In 1920 its new music critic, Ernest Newman, said that Holst could do "easily, without a fuss" what some other composers could only do "with an effort and a smirk", and that in The Planets he showed "one of the subtlest and most original minds of our time. It begins working at a musical problem where most other minds would leave off". Newman compared Holst's harmonic innovations to those of Stravinsky, to the latter's disadvantage, and expressed none of the reservations that qualified his admiration of Schoenberg's Five Pieces for Orchestra. Holst conducted the London Symphony Orchestra in the first two recorded performances: the first was an acoustic recording made in sessions between September 1922 and November 1923; the second was made in 1926 using the new electrical recording process.
thumb|Holst conducting The Planets in 1922–23
Holst's tempi are in general faster than those of most of his successors on record. This may have been due to the need to fit the music on 78 rpm discs, although later 78 versions are slower. Holst's later recording is quicker than the acoustic version, possibly because the electrical process required wider grooves, reducing the available playing time. Other, slower, recordings from the 78 era include those conducted by Leopold Stokowski (1943) and Sir Adrian Boult (1945).
Recordings from the LP age are also typically longer than the composer's, but from the digital era a 2010 recording by the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Vladimir Jurowski is quicker than Holst's acoustic version and comes close to matching his 1926 speeds, and in two movements (Venus and Uranus) surpasses them. There were no commercial recordings of the work in the 1930s; timings are given below of a recording representing each subsequent decade up to the 2020s:
{| class="wikitable plainrowheaders" style="text-align: left; margin-right: 0;"
|-
! scope="col" |Conductor:
! scope="col" |Holst
! scope="col" |Holst
! scope="col" |Stokowski
! scope="col" |Boult
! scope="col" |Sargent
! scope="col" |Karajan
! scope="col" |Steinberg
! scope="col" |Mackerras
! scope="col" |Gardiner
! scope="col" |Rattle
! scope="col" |Jurowski
! scope="col" |Harding
|-
| Orchestra:
| LSO
|LSO
| NBCSO
| BBCSO
| BBCSO
| VPO
| BSO
| RLPO
| PO
| BPO
| LPO
|BRSO
|-
| Year:
| 1922–23
| 1926
| 1943
| 1945
| 1957
| 1961
| 1971
| 1988
| 1997
| 2006
| 2010
|2023
|-
| Mars:
| 06:13
| 06:12
| 06:52
| 06:58
| 06:56
| 07:02
| 06:37
| 07:01
| 08:03
| 07:25
| 06:31
| 08:22
|-
| Venus:
| 08:04
| 07:19
| 08:45
| 07:52
| 09:11
| 08:21
| 07:25
| 08:05
| 07:37
| 08:59
| 06:52
| 08:48
|-
| Mercury:
| 03:36
| 03:33
| 03:36
| 03:40
| 03:33
| 03:59
| 03:59
| 03:56
| 03:51
| 04:02
| 03:46
| 04:14
|-
| Jupiter:
| 07:04
| 07:02
| 07:05
| 07:50
| 07:45
| 07:38
| 08:01
| 07:36
| 07:17
| 08:02
| 07:06
| 08:23
|-
| Saturn:
| 07:00
| 06:58
| 09:05
| 08:09
| 09:35
| 08:33
| 07:45
| 09:20
| 09:13
| 09:35
| 07:24
| 10:57
|-
| Uranus:
| 06:06
| 05:57
| 05:41
| 05:41
| 06:01
| 05:47
| 05:24
| 06:10
| 05:34
| 06:04
| 05:38
| 06:12
|-
| Neptune:
| 05:31
| 05:35
| 09:50
| 06:23
| 07:12
| 07:38
| 06:47
| 06:59
| 08:11
| 07:02
| 05:49
| 09:49
|-
| Total time:
| 43:34
| 42:36
| 52:34
| 46:33
| 50:11
| 48:58
| 45:58
| 49:07
| 49:46
| 51:09
| 43:04
| 56:48
|}
:Source: Naxos Music Library.
Additions, adaptations and influences
There have been many adaptations of the suite, and several attempts to add an eighth planet – Pluto – in the time between its discovery in 1930 and its reclassification by the IAU to dwarf planet in 2006. The most prominent of these was Matthews's 2000 composition, "Pluto, the Renewer", commissioned by the Hallé Orchestra. Dedicated posthumously to Imogen Holst, it was first performed in Manchester on 11 May 2000, with Kent Nagano conducting. Matthews changed the ending of Neptune slightly so that the movement would segue into Pluto. Matthews's Pluto has been recorded, coupled with Holst's suite, on at least four occasions. Others who have produced versions of Pluto for The Planets include Leonard Bernstein. Jun Nagao has produced a version of the Earth.
The suite has been adapted for numerous instruments and instrumental combinations, including organ, synthesiser, brass band, and jazz orchestra. Holst used the melody of the central section of "Jupiter" for a setting ("Thaxted") of the hymn "I Vow to Thee, My Country" in 1921.
The Planets has been taken as an influence by various rock bands, and for film scores such as those for the Star Wars series. There have been numerous references to the suite in popular culture, from films to television and computer games.
Notes, references and sources
Notes
References
Sources
External links
- Links to public domain scores of The Planets:
- The Planets: Suite for Large Orchestra (Score in the Public Domain)