JAVS Spring 2023

E, a gesture common in A minor. The only time this melody returns (in the movement’s coda, mm. 245–251), it is fully harmonized in A minor. These melodies point to Bliss’s comfort and agility in writing for the viola, something on full display in the viola sonata. II. Bliss’s Inspirations While no artist produces art entirely in a vacuum devoid of outside influence, Bliss particularly embraced extra musical influence to spur his creativity. He readily acknowledged its importance: I like the stimulus of words, or a theatrical setting, a colourful occasion, or the collaboration of a great player. There is only a little of the spider about me, spinning his own web from his inner being. I am more of a magpie type. I need what Henry James termed a “trouvaille” or a “donnée.” This inspiration came from both practical circumstances, including commissions, incidental and occasional music, and dedications to virtuoso performers as well as influences from other art forms, including literature, visual art, and films. Writing for performers provided Bliss with the greatest amount of external inspiration. This began with his earliest compositions for himself and his brothers and stretched through the end of his career with his Concerto for Violoncello and Orchestra (1970) for Mstislav Rostropovich. Other performers he wrote for included Leopold Stokowski ( Introduction and Allegro, 1926), Léon Goossens (Quintet for Oboe and Strings, 1927), Solomon Cutner (Piano Concerto, 1939), and Alfredo Campoli (Violin Concerto, 1954). Bliss’s proximity and sensitivity toward these performers produced indelible marks on the compositions themselves. When writing the Piano Concerto (1938–39), Bliss shared a “close and stimulating collaboration” with Solomon, who had premiered the Viola Sonata with Tertis. Bliss shaped the work around Solomon’s personality: “Besides being a master pianist Solomon has the temperament I admire—capable of great feeling, held steady in check, I try to do the same by casting my work into as formal a pattern as I can.” Bliss engaged in a similar collaboration with violinist Alfredo Campoli, recounting that he was “swayed by the style of playing of my chosen soloist” who had been “tireless in discussing the work—almost bar by bar—in suggesting how difficult and awkward passages can be made more amenable.” While Bliss’s collaborations

with Solomon and Campoli were detailed and productive, he found his closest collaboration with a performer while writing the Viola Sonata.

Tertis, Bliss, and Walton’s F-sharp Lionel Tertis (1876–1975) was no stranger to

collaborations with composers. As one of the major proponents of the viola as a solo instrument, Tertis commissioned or was the dedicatee of at least 63 works featuring the viola, and he transcribed or arranged many more. These works form a substantial body of repertoire that furthered Tertis’s pioneering quest of highlighting the soloistic capabilities of the viola. While the exact origin of their relationship is unknown, Tertis and Bliss were at least aware of each other by 1915, when Tertis played viola in the first performance of Bliss’s piano quartet. Bliss expressed early admiration of Tertis’s playing in a 1921 lecture, commenting on “the perfection of ensemble achieved by Messrs. Albert Sammons, Lionel Tertis, Felix Salmond, and William Murdoch of the Chamber Music Players.” By 1923, their relationship had grown closer, as Tertis arranged Bliss’s Two Nursery Rhymes (1920) for soprano, viola, and piano, substituting the viola for the original’s clarinet. Letters between Bliss and Tertis in March 1923 indicate Bliss’s excited approval of the arrangement. Before exploring the background of Bliss’s Sonata as it relates to Tertis, it is worthwhile to note several fascinating connections between Bliss, Tertis, and the younger composer, William Walton (1902–1983). In addition to Sir Thomas Beecham’s oft-cited suggestion that Walton compose a concerto for Tertis, violist Bernard Shore alternately suggested that the genesis of the concerto came from the composer hearing Tertis perform Bach’s Chaconne in recital in 1929. Coincidently, Bliss’s first impression of Tertis also came from hearing him perform the Chaconne. Bliss writes, “I went specially to hear his own arrangement of the Bach Chaconne, and of course his tone was absolutely personal, like Goossens’ tone on the oboe is personal to him. [. . .] It was a really thrilling sound.” A second intersection between Tertis, Bliss, and Walton occurred during the private premiere of Bliss’s Viola Sonata at Bliss’s house in Hampstead Heath, London. For the performance on May 9, 1933, in front of “a very distinguished gathering of musicians,” Tertis and

Journal of the American Viola Society / Vol. 39, No. 1, Spring 2023

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