Cantata Without Conclusions

Why cannot . . . the wheat be divided?

And the soldiers sent home? . . .

And the enemies forgiven?

It was the first performance of The War God, a cantata for orchestra and choir. Although they found it next to impossible to understand the words--from a poem by Briton Stephen Spender--most of the listeners in Manhattan's CBS studio were genuinely moved by the rich orchestration. After the performance, the cantata's composer, gaunt, chestnut-haired Richard Arnell, tall (6 ft.), 27-year-old Briton in a grey flannel suit, coolly explained: "It goes beyond simple pacifism by only presenting the facts and offering no moral conclusions."

Richard Arnell is the son of a British contractor who opposed his son's music career. In 1939, after studies at the Royal College of Music in London, the young composer decided to burn his early manuscripts and try his luck elsewhere. He picked the U.S. for his future. In New York he taught composition, served as a music consultant to BBC, and became a protege of Sir Thomas Beecham. In the past three years Sir Thomas has performed his young compatriot's Sinfonia and his First Symphony.

Last week, two nights after the cantata broadcast, Pianist Vivian Rivkin premiered Arnell's Twenty-two Variations on an Original Theme in Carnegie Hall. Composer Arnell admitted that it had been a successful week: "CBS paid for copying the cantata scores. I spent only $10 for postage and a recording of the cantata performance--and I got two seats to Carnegie Hall."

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