DELIUS: SONG OF SUMMER. 8

DELIUS: SONG OF SUMMER

Audio only.

Produced and directed by Ken Russell
Written by Ken Russell and Eric Fenby
Based on the book Delius as I Knew Him by Eric Fenby.

Cast:

Max Adrian .... Frederick Delius
Maureen Pryor .... Jelka Delius
Christopher Gable .... Eric Fenby
David Collings .... Percy Grainger
Geraldine Sherman .... Girl next door
Elizabeth Ercy .... Maid
Roger Worrod .... Bruder

Fenby on Russell and the Song of Summer...

"I little thought, when struggling to take down Delius's music, that one day I should see those scenes enacted on film. Ken Russell's film was disturbingly life-like. I saw it first at its public showing, being myself out of action when it was made. Even so, Christopher Gable, as me, had begged me to spare his feelings and keep away from the set. I was finally called to the studios, however, to record the music in the scene where Delius, propped up in bed, listens to Percy Grainger and myself playing Percy's two-piano arrangement of The Song of the High Hills in the music room. On my arrival I found Russell immersed in directing a 'retake' of my first meeting with Delius with which Max Adrian was still not satisfied. I was ushered into the studio to wait, and was just in time to hear that deliberate and unforgettable greeting, 'Come in, Fenby !'. I had mimicked Delius weeks before at Russell's suggestion as a guide to Adrian learning his lines and behaving exactly like Delius. But this was too much for me - the voice, the inflection, the image of Delius sitting there, a rug over his knees with a great screen about him, slowly extending his hand in welcome. I lived that momentous moment again, I am unashamed to say, and not without tears. Max Adrian told me later that of all the roles he had ever played he had never before had such difficulty in ridding himself of involvement".

Eric Fenby - from Author's Afterword to 1981 edition of 'Delius as I knew him'.

DVD:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Delius-Song-Summer-Max-Adrian/dp/B00005N9FK

Category:

Music

Tags:

• frederick
• delius
• eric
• fenby
• ken
• russell
• song
• of
• summer
• classical