Owen Orchestration

Tintagel (GP213) is the Bax's most enduring work. The perennial tone-poem describes a visit to the Cornish village of Tintagel, a place steeped in the myth and legend of King Arthur. However, Bax is more interested in the physical, not the metaphysical, and the brass chorales depict the rockfaced castle atop the sharp cliff, whilst the gentle violin melody that comes afterwards as the theme of the sea (though, as we will soon know, this is the love theme).

Bax, on his first visit to Tintagel, installed his mistress Harriet Cohen in a nearby hotel, and he snuck away from his young family to be with her. It is obvious that this piece is filled with love and triumph.

A more turbulent inner passage either depicts the waves crashing against the rocks on a “not windless” day, or it depicts a relationship that veered regularly between fraught angst and passionate affection. A quotation from Tristan und Isolde may have been coincidental or deliberate - but the symbolism of ‘wounded Tristan’ may be important to the interpretation of this section. 

Did you know that Tristan und Isolde, one of Wagner's most famous operas, is based on a folk-legend from Cornwall? Tristram (note the correct spelling) and Iseult were two people who fell in love when they shouldn't have: Iseult was on her way to marry King Mark of Cornwall (whose palace was the castle of Tintagel). Perhaps in this instance Iseult is Bax, and Tristram is Cohen, and King Mark is Bax's wife, Elsita - and Bax's musical work is simply a clue to the whole secret.

Tintagel's lasting popularity is likely from the long, flowing melodic lines that imbue this piece with a lyricism stronger than other works of the era, whilst the turbulence of the middle is worth the wait for the return of the love theme in its full form.