Written by Michael Campion
“Seldom has there been such an outburst of critical rage and hysteria in an audience. Mr. Noel Coward was so shocked by it that he left in the middle. At the end my sister Edith was warned not to leave the shelter of her dressing room until the crowd had dispersed.”
As related by Osbert Sitwell, this was not a very encouraging start considering that Façade would turn out to be among the most famous and best-loved compositions to come from the pen of William Walton.
Edith Sitwell had been writing a series of poems that explored the craft and technique of poetry. She said, “They are abstract poems – that is, they are patterns in sound. They are, too virtuoso exercises in poetry of an extreme difficulty.”
At the time, Edith’s brother Osbert, who had befriended the 19 year-old William Walton at Oxford, suggested that the poems would be even more effective if they were set to music. Walton set to work with relish. It was decided that the words would be spoken in rhythm with a musical accompaniment in order to retain their effectiveness.
Unfortunately, this was a bit too much for the audience who heard the premier at the Aeolian Hall on June 12, 1923 with Edith Sitwell as speaker. But Walton refused to give in.
Several performances of Façade followed over the next several years, each time with different numbers and each time with varying success. But the work was gaining momentum. Walton, a notorious tinkerer anyway, continued to revise it, and by 1942, Façade was warmly received to the public bosom and has had a place there ever since.
In 1951, Walton (probably tired of messing with it) finally published the definitive version of Façade, but by this time, he cared very little for opinions. Now he was content to dwell comfortably in one of his five houses on the island of Ischia in Italy. He said, “One is inclined to dolce far niente, “how sweet to do nothing.” I know that’s supposed to be degenerate, but it’s quite nice, really.”
