The Pierrot of the Minute

• The overture, The Pierrot of the Minute, was written and premiered in 1908. The piece was presumably created for the Worcester Three Choirs Festival that same year and has become one of the composer’s most popular works.
• In the score, the full title of the piece is “The Pierrot of the Minute: a comedy overture to a dramatic phantasy of Ernest Dowson.” Bantock dedicated the work to Otto Kling, London manager of the work’s publisher, Breitkopf & Härtel.
• In his score, Bantock offers the following program:

Pierrot enters a glade in the park of the Petit Trianon at twilight, led thither in obedience to a mysterious message, which bids him come to sleep one night within these precincts if he would encounter Love. Half whimsical, half fearful, he wonders why he, so careless, thoughtless, and gay, should now be filled with wistful longing; and in the fast-falling darkness he lies down on a couch of fern, and falls asleep. A Moon-maiden descends the steps of the Temple of Love, and, bending over the sleeper, kisses him. He awakes and throws himself at her feet in rapt devotion, though she warns him that the kisses of the Moon are of a fatal sweetness, and that

“Whoso seeks her she gathers like a flower
He gives a life, and only gains an hour.”

But Pierrot, reckless, demands the pure and perfect bliss, though life be the price to pay. With gay laughter and sprightly jest they learn together the lore of Love; but daybreak approaches, the birds awaken, and the Moon-maiden must leave him. Together they gaze at the coming dawn; then Pierrot, sinking back on his couch, falls softly asleep once more, and the Moon-maiden vanishes.

The Prelude ends with the awakening of Pierrot, his love-dream being but the illusion of a minute.¹

1. Lewis Foreman, Notes in accompanying booklet, Bantock: The Song of Songs performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Vernon Handley, Hyperion 67395, 2003, compact disc.