Madeleine Mitchell on String Quartets by Charles Wood

Charles Wood is one of that era of British composers - like CV Stanford - who have often been known mostly for their big, hearty choral favourites, but whose other works are now enjoying a revival.

A welcome part of that revival, especially in this the year of the hundredth anniversary of his death, is a renewed interest in (and recordings of) his chamber works. Madeleine Mitchell and the London Chamber Ensemble Quartet dipped a toe into Wood's string quartet repertoire in 2024 with an album combining him with Howells; now they've recorded a further two of his quartets, the 'Harrogate' and the 'Highgate'. In them we hear the influence of Brahms - ever-present and always on the minds of British composers of that era - while also nodes to Wood's Anglo-Irish heritage in the incorporation of Irish folk idioms and melodic influences. 

I spoke to Madeleine to find out more about this often-overlooked corner of Wood's compositional output.

Can you tell us a bit about the kinds of musical and professional circles that Wood moved in throughout his career?

Charles Wood was born on June 15th 1866 in Armagh, and his musical education was begun under the organist Dr Thomas Marks at the cathedral where Wood’s father was a lay vicar. He was one of the inaugural scholars when the Royal College of Music opened in 1883, where he was a pupil of Sir Charles Villiers Stanford for 4 years. He later lived in Cambridge and was immersed in the musical environment there. He visited his elder brother, William Wood who was Master of Music at Highgate School in London until his death in 1895 – hence the title of the ‘Highgate’ Quartet. 

Wood having been a viola player himself, do you detect any extra-special love for the inner parts of the string quartet in his writing, or any favour shown to his own instrument?

Yes, some of his quartet movements are viola led – such as the reel in the 2nd movement of Quartet no.6 in D and the 3rd movement of the ‘Highgate’ Quartet - Adagio ma non troppo. Many composers were viola players – from Bach and Mozart to Hindemith and Rebecca Clarke. My theory is that they like being in the middle of the texture and harmony. Wood was a retiring personality so probably would have preferred playing viola to leading a quartet.                                                                                                       

Critics at the time sometimes saw Wood as slightly in the shadow of Brahms - do you think that’s fair?

Brahms, who died in 1897, was admired by Stanford who taught Wood, and certainly an influence on them both. You can hear this for example in the glorious variations over a ground bass in the slow 3rd movement of Wood’s ‘Highgate’ Quartet of 1893. Wood was also influenced by Beethoven, whom he revered, and made a profound study of his music. I think Wood’s string quartets come into their own through his original incorporation of Irish folk music combined with skilled counterpoint. 

How popular were string quartets (and chamber music generally) in Britain and Ireland during Wood’s time? Would there have been a healthy audience ready and waiting to appreciate new works?

With no radio (until 1922) or television, chamber concerts were certainly popular at the time. Though a small provincial city in the north of Ireland, Armagh nevertheless offered the young Wood an invigorating environment of music-making including soirées featuring chamber music as well as cathedral music. The composer Thomas Dunhill organised concerts in London designed to showcase new works by British composers and this is where some of Wood’s quartets were premiered. The composer Frank Bridge (1879-1941) was also a professional viola player and member of the English String Quartet who gave the UK premiere of the Ravel String Quartet at Bechstein (now Wigmore) Hall with Ravel in the audience. 

The Cambridge University Music Club, founded by R.R.Terry during Wood’s time, focused strongly on student musical activity, especially the cultivation of chamber music. It is likely that Wood’s ‘Highgate’ Quartet was performed at one of Ernest Fowle’s British Chamber Music Concerts during the winter season of 1895-6. The ‘Harrogate’ Quartet was given a first performance on 16 June 1914 at the second of Dunhill’s Eighth Series of chamber music concerts at Steinway Hall by the Grimson Quartet which included 2 of Wood’s former pupils. The Variations on an Irish Folk Tune were broadcast by the BBC in 1925 by the Music Society Quartet with a young John Barbirolli as cellist.

The six quartets and Variations weren’t published until three years after Wood’s death - do we know why this was? Did he not think them worthy of the public’s attention, or was it just bad luck?

The frontispiece of the Oxford University Press ‘Eight String Quartets by Charles Wood, Mus.Doc’ edition (now out of print) with an introduction by Edward J.Dent, Professor of Music in the University of Cambridge, states:

IN RECOGNITION of the services rendered by the late Dr Charles Wood to the Art of Music in the University of Cambridge, and more particularly his own College, this edition of his Quartets is published on behalf of the Master and Fellows of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, as a mark of their esteem and as a tribute to the eminence of their former colleague. 

The publication may have been intended as a retirement gift, but sadly Wood suffered ill health and died 12 July, 1926, age 60.

What sort of influence did he have on his pupils? There are a few moments on this album that sound like pre-echoes of Vaughan Williams - is that more of a coincidence than a real stylistic legacy?

Charles Wood had a great influence on his pupils, many of whom achieved fame as composers in addition to Vaughan Williams - Howells, Bliss and Tippett (who wrote five string quartets), to name a few. Vaughan Williams stated that for counterpoint ‘Wood was the man’. Wood continued to teach composition at both the Royal College of Music (having been appointed in 1888) and at Cambridge, where he was appointed the first Fellow in Music in 1894, until the end of his life. I think the influence of Irish folk music, incorporated by Wood in several of his string quartets, was echoed by Vaughan Williams in his wide collection and use of folk song.