Holst - At the Boar's Head (320kbps .mp3) torrent

Holst - At the Boar's Head (320kbps .mp3)

Penny Gore presents today's Thursday Opera Matinee: At the Boar's Head by Gustav Holst - his one-act opera combining folk tunes with scenes from Shakespeare's Henry IV.

While convalescing from an illness, Holst had been reading both Henry IV, Part I, and an edition of John Playford's The English Dancing Master. He noticed similarities between the metre of Shakespeare's lines and the rhythms of tunes in the Playford collection and he decided to incorporate the two into an opera.

Holst: At the Boar's Head, Op.42

Prince Hal ..... Philip Langridge (tenor)
Falstaff ..... John Tomlinson (bass)
Hostess (Mistress Quickly) ..... Elise Ross (soprano)
Doll Tearsheet ..... Felicity Palmer (mezzo-soprano)
Pistol ..... David Wilson-Johnson (baritone)
Peto ..... Peter Hall (tenor)
Bardolph ..... Richard Suart (baritone)
Ponis ..... Michael George (bass)
Men's Voices of the Liverpool Philharmonic Choir
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra
Conductor: David Atherton