Program Notes

Lincolnshire Posy

Percy Grainger, composer

Lincolnshire Posy is a masterpiece of the concert band repertoire. Grainger described it as a "bunch of musical wildflowers" based on folksongs he collected in Lincolnshire, England in 1905-06. Grainger was a picturesque nationalist who tried to retain something of the original flavor of British folk songs and their singers by strict observance of peculiarities of performance, such as varying the beat lengths and the use of "primitive" techniques like parallelism. The first movement, "Lisbon," is a sailor’s song in a brisk 6/8 meter with "plenty of lilt." In the second song, "Horkstow Grange," the accents shift constantly as the number of quarter notes per measure changes from four to five to three and back again. "Rufford Park Poachers" is the longest and most complex of the settings, followed by "The Brisk Young Sailor," a rather simple contrast. "Lord Melbourne" begins in free time, "heavy and fierce." The last song, "The Lost Lady Found," is the most conventional setting of all.

—Band Music Notes

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