Delius: Irmelin Prelude

Introduction

Based on themes from Delius' 1892 opera, Irmelin, this prelude is actually a freestanding orchestral piece, not an introduction to the stage work. Delius dictated it in 1931 to his amanuensis, Eric Fenby, and it was first performed when Sir Thomas Beecham used it as an interlude in a 1935 production of another early Delius opera, Koanga.

The prelude begins with a small, rising motif with a little fall at the end, whispered by individual woodwinds and passed to the strings. (The woodwinds, indeed, play a central role through this piece.) The themes are wispy and fragmentary; the second and third main sections contain pastoral melodies that seem more extended, but they merely rely on gently repeated small gestures. The opening theme returns in a string duet, seeming especially nostalgic and nocturnal, and the prelude ends with the clarinet crooning the melody on a soft bed of strings.