The final work heard in Royal Northern Sinfonia’s concert at The Glasshouse was immediately recognisable as English string music. Yet the man behind St Paul’s Suite possessed a musical and intellectual imagination reaching far beyond England. Gustav Holst was composer, professional musician and, crucially, teacher. He was also a man whose religious curiosity led him beyond the Christianity of his upbringing towards the sacred literature and philosophy of India. Understanding that wider life makes the apparent simplicity and generosity of St Paul’s Suite all the more interesting.

From Cheltenham to the Royal College of Music

Holst was born in Cheltenham in 1874 into a musical family. He studied composition at the Royal College of Music, where one of the most important relationships of his life began: his friendship with Ralph Vaughan Williams. The two men became important figures in twentieth-century British music, regularly exchanging ideas and criticising one another’s compositions. Holst’s path towards becoming an established composer was not straightforward. He worked as a church organist and choirmaster and later earned his living as a professional trombonist. That orchestral experience is worth remembering. Holst knew music not only from the composer’s desk but from inside the ensemble itself. He understood what it meant to be one of the musicians whose contribution was essential even when the audience’s attention was directed elsewhere.

Looking beyond Christianity

Holst’s intellectual curiosity extended considerably beyond the religious environment into which he had been born. He developed a deep interest in Hindu philosophy and Sanskrit literature. Rather than relying entirely upon translations prepared by others, he studied Sanskrit himself so that he could engage more directly with the texts that fascinated him. That engagement entered his music. Among the works emerging from this interest were the chamber opera Sāvitri and his Hymns from the Rig Veda. Yet Christian material did not disappear from his work. His later The Hymn of Jesus drew upon the early Christian Acts of St John. Holst therefore becomes particularly interesting when placed alongside Max Bruch. Bruch, a Protestant Christian, responded to the sacred melodies of Judaism. Holst looked towards the religious literature of India while continuing to engage with Christian sources.

Both demonstrate a willingness to look beyond the boundaries of one’s immediate inheritance.

.

St Paul’s — but not that St Paul

The title St Paul’s Suite might naturally suggest a religious connection. But there is none. The St Paul in the title refers not to the Apostle but to St Paul’s Girls’ School in Hammersmith, West London. Holst joined the school’s staff in 1905 and remained associated with the institution for the rest of his life. The school soon recognised that it had acquired an exceptional teacher and composer. When a new music wing was completed for him, Holst had an ideal reason to create something for the school’s string players. The result was St Paul’s Suite.

Music written to be played

The suite contains four movements. The opening Jig immediately establishes its energy and rhythmic vitality. The Ostinato that follows is built around persistent rhythmic movement, while the Intermezzo introduces a more lyrical and reflective world. Then comes the ingenious Finale. Here Holst uses the traditional English tune The Dargason and eventually combines it contrapuntally with another familiar melody. Here Holst uses the traditional English tune The Dargason and eventually combines it contrapuntally with another familiar melody. There is sophistication here, certainly. But there is also generosity. Holst was writing music intended to be played, not simply admired on a page.

Holst the teacher

The enormous popularity of The Planets can sometimes obscure this other Gustav Holst. Alongside the composer fascinated by Sanskrit literature, English folk music, early Christian texts and the possibilities of the orchestra stood a committed teacher. That part of his life matters. Every musical tradition depends upon transmission. A score sitting silently on a shelf does not make music. Someone must teach another person how to read it, interpret it and finally transform notation into sound. The young musicians for whom Holst wrote St Paul’s Suite belonged to that process more than a century ago. At The Glasshouse, Royal Northern Sinfonia became part of it again. Holst consequently contributed something different to this extraordinary concert. Holst consequently contributed something different to this extraordinary concert. He brought education and curiosity. His life reminds us that encountering another religious or cultural tradition need not erase one’s own inheritance. It can encourage us to look more closely, read more deeply and listen more carefully. His music crossed boundaries because his curiosity crossed boundaries. And yet St Paul’s Suite returns us to something wonderfully immediate: a teacher giving young musicians good music to play. Music survives because composers create it. It survives because performers such as Will Duerden and Royal Northern Sinfonia bring it back to life.

But it also survives because somewhere, in every generation, a teacher places music before a student and invites them to begin.