*THE SNOWMAN CONCERT VERSION (to be performed with optional projected film, or narration, or both), for boy soprano and orchestra op.323 (October 1983)

Published by: Chester Music Ltd to rent 'The Snowman' music or film for projection contact the hire librarian: Ada
Commissioned by: CBS Masterworks
Instrumentation: narrator, treble, 2flutes(=piccs),1 Oboe (=CA),2.Clarinets (2nd=B/cl),1 bassoon; 2 Horns,1 Trumpet,0.0. 2 perc. pno, celeste(or pno/cel), harp, strings
[Key to Abbreviations]
Note on Lyrics: Narration by Howard Blake by permission of Raymond Briggs; Lyrics of 'Walking in the air' by Howard Blake
Duration: 26 mins
First Performance: Commentary recorded by Bernard Cribbins Summer 1983

The first concert performance was given in December 1983 at The Barbican Concert Hall, London, with Bernard Cribbins as narrator, Peter Auty as treble soloist and The Sinfonia of London conducted by Howard Blake
Full score for sale
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Vocal score for hire
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Enquiries for sheet music, score and orchestral parts, media and grand rights licensing to Chester Music CH77176 www.chesternovello.com

This concert version may be performed either with narrator or with projection of the original animated film, available from www.thesnowman.co.uk or licensing@uk.penguingroup.com

The Snowman Piano Score is published by Chester CH7 6879

All sheet music for "The Snowman" and "Walking In The Air" since 2010 is published and available from Chester Music Ltd, part of The Music Sales Group, www.chesternovello.com It can be purchased online from MusicRoom.com, or from music retailers.

"Walking In The Air" is also available in a concert piano-only version arranged by the composer direct from Highbridge Music as part of the collection of piano pieces called "Lifecycle", available form Amazon or from Highbridge Music.

Howard Blake describes 25 years of The Snowman animated film and 10 years of The Snowman Stage Show at Sadler's Wells Peacock Theatre in London's West End and plays "Walking in the Air". View the recording here.

The classic original Columbia album conducted by Howard Blake with treble soloist Peter Auty and narration by Bernard Cribbins is available from Sony Music Entertainment CDX71116CD, Amazon and retailers.

The 2010 DVD film of The Snowman Live Stage Show narrated by Joanna Lumley is available from Sony Music Entertainment, CDR 81267; also from Amazon and retailers.

Movements

• 01/01: THE SNOWMAN STORY - Waking In A World Of Snow 1 minutes 56 seconds
  
• 01/02: Footprints In The Snow 44 seconds
  
• 01/03: Building The Snowman 56 seconds
  
• 01/04: Bedtime 1 minutes 05 seconds
  
• 01/05: The Snowman Comes To Life 3 minutes 19 seconds
  
• 01/06: Calypso 1 minutes 17 seconds
  
• 01/07: The Music Box Dance 1 minutes 31 seconds
  
• 01/08: Motorbike Galop 3 minutes 17 seconds
  
• 02: Walking In The Air 3 minutes 30 seconds
  
• 03/01: Dance Of The Snowmen 2 minutes 33 seconds
  
• 03/02: Flying Home 1 minutes 37 seconds
  
• 03/03: The Next Day 1 minutes 48 seconds
  
• 04/01: THE SNOWMAN SOUNDTRACK - Waking In A World Of Snow 1 minutes 56 seconds
  
• 04/02: Footprints In The Snow 44 seconds
  
• 04/03: Building The Snowman
  
• 04/04: Bedtime 1 minutes 05 seconds
  
• 04/05: The Snowman Comes To Life 3 minutes 19 seconds
  
• 04/06: Calypso 1 minutes 17 seconds
  
• 04/07: The Music Box Dance 1 minutes 31 seconds
  
• 04/08: Motorbike Galop 3 minutes 17 seconds
  
• 05: Walking In The Air 3 minutes 30 seconds
  
• 06.01: Dance Of The Snowmen 2 minutes 33 seconds
  
• 06/02: Flying Home 1 minutes 37 seconds
  
• 06/03: The Next Day 1 minutes 48 seconds
  

Notes

It may be performed either with narrator or with projection of the original animated film, available from www.thesnowman.co.uk

Lyrics

Lyrics of 'Walking in the Air' by Howard Blake

We're walking in the air,
We're floating in the moonlit sky,
The people far below are sleeping as we fly.

I'm holding very tight,
I'm riding in the midnight blue,
I'm finding I can fly so high above with you.

On across the world
The villages go by like dreams,
The rivers and the hills,
The forests and the streams.

Children gaze open mouthed,
Taken by surprise,
Nobody down below believes their eyes.

We're surfing in the air,
We're swimming in the frozen sky,
We're drifting over icy
Mountains floating by.

Suddenly swooping low on an ocean deep,
Rousing up a mighty monster from his sleep,

We're walking in the air,
We're floating in the midnight sky
And everyone who sees us greets us as we fly

Performances

19th December 2021	Harrogate Symphony Orchestra, Harrogate, Yorkshire
15th November 2021 - 25th December 2021	The BBC Singers and Narrator, First performance of this work tba Second performance of this work tba Howard Blake writes: 'On August 23rd. 2021, Jonathan Manners, director of The BBC Singers, contacted me to ask if I would give my approval to a new arrangement of the complete soundtrack that I originally composed for the 1982, 26-minute animated film 'The Snowman' (op. 310) and for the follow-up CBS-Masterworks album 'The Snowman' for boy soloist, orchestra and narrator (1983 op.323). Jonathan's wish was to turn the work into a 'vocalise'- that is to say a piece of music to be performed by singers only. I had made such an arrangement of the main theme 'Walking in the air' in 2019 and conducted a performance with the choir of St Albans Cathedral with tenor Peter Auty, who back in 1982 had been the original marvellous treble soloist on the world-famous recording of this song. This new 2019 a cappella arrangement of 'Walking in the air' had sounded wonderful and might well have suggested the notion of further development. Jonathan told me that he had also studied my later arrangement of 'The Snowman' for string quartet and narrator (opus 612, 2015) and thought that this scoring for four instruments might somehow be employed in the proposed work, which would be a huge a cappella (unaccompanied) 'vocalise' sung to la,la,la or hummed or even whistled! Whilst not wishing to embark on such an arrangement myself, I gave Jonathan permission to experiment with this idea but expressed the doubt that all the musical features of the score could be thus voiced and suspected Jonathan would have to employ other instruments along with the choir. This turned out to be true and it was then decided that the a cappella arrangement of 'Walking in the air' made for Peter Auty and as heard in  St. Albans Cathedral in 2019 should be used exactly as I had written it, whilst the remaining music would be used in the wordless (a cappella) arrangement just made by Jonathan Manners for the occasion. In this revised form, Chester Music (Wise Music) my publishers of 'The Snowman', have given permission for the completed work to be scheduled for broadcast performance or performances with a celebrity narrator at Christmas 2021 (times to be announced.)
9th November 2021	Colin Touchin - Guest Conductor, Crisel Consunji -Storyteller Narrated in English. Running time is 80 minutes with a 15-minute intermission., Sha Tin Town Hall, 1 Yuen Wo Road, Sha Tin Hong Kong The Snowman & The Bear Back by popular demand, The Snowman & The Bear combines two heart-warming tales by Howard Blake – The Snowman and The Bear – in one beautiful production. Appearing on the big screen with live orchestral accompaniment, singing, and on-stage narration, this is a Christmas celebration you can't afford to miss! When: December 23, (4.30pm & 7.30pm) Where: Sha Tin Town Hall, 1 Yuen Wo Road, Sha Tin Hong Kong
31st January 2020	Julian Trevelyan with the Ealing Symphony Orchestra conducted by John Gibbons in a seasonal programme including The Snowman, Assembly Hall Worthing
31st January 2020	Julian Trevelyan solo piano, John Gibbons conductor, Worthing Symphony Orchestra,'The Snowman' narrated by Howard Blake7.30pm, Assembly Hall, Worthing, Sussex See worthing theatres website: www.worthingtheatres.co.uk phone 01903 206 206 Julian will give his second performance of the Howard Blake Piano Concerto in a popular seasonal concert which will also feature the concert version of 'The Snowman', Tchaikovsky Swan Lake Waltz, Delius Sleigh Ride, Sibelius Karelia Suite, Rimsky Kosakov Dance of the tumblers, Leroy Anderson 'Sleigh Ride' and Waldteufel Skaters Waltz.
31st January 2020	Julian Trevelyan piano, John Gibbons conductor, Howard Blake narrator, Worthing Symphony Orchestra "Walking In The Air" concert at Assembly Hall, Friday 31 January 2020 (7.30pm) Worthing Symphony Orchestra “Walking In The Air” concert - review REVIEW BY Richard Amey By Phil Hewitt Thursday, 6th February 2020, 11:15 am Updated Thursday, 6th February 2020, 11:17 amWSO Conductor John Gibbons Worthing Symphony Orchestra “Walking In The Air” concert at Assembly Hall, Friday 31 January 2020 (7.30pm), composer Howard Blake (narrator), John Alley (piano), Victoria Ridgway (singer) John Gibbons BEM (conductor), Julian Trevelyan (concerto piano). Nik Rimsky-Korsakov, Dance of The Tumblers (from The Snow Maiden); Fred Delius, Sleigh Ride; Emil Waldteufel, Skaters Waltz; Howie Blake, The Snowman, concert version; Pete Tchaikovsky, Waltz (from Swan Lake); Leroy Anderson, Sleigh Ride; Johnny Sibelius, March (from Karelia Suite); Howie Blake (again), Piano Concerto Op142 (/650+). It was as though Sergei Prokofiev had been right there, narrating his own Peter And The Wolf with Worthing Symphony Orchestra. To audience surprise, Howard Blake was doing the same in The Snowman – a children’s composition of parallel universal success composed by he, an ex-Brighton & Hove Grammar School boy, and with some primary and secondary classmates in the audience. Unbilled except last-minute on social media, Blake told me he was narrating a Snowman concert performance for the first time in five years. He was standing in for also-unpublicised actor Bernard Cribbins OBE, whose wife was unwell. Wombles voice-over Cribbins reached 91 in December. A month earlier, Blake OBE made it to 81, although he scarcely moves or looks older than 70. That’s the therapy of music for you. Blake’s own ‘local lad makes good’ story happened 40 years ago when his idea of a TV cartoon outlawing dialogue struck gold. Instead, it’s musically with descriptive richness and synchronised with the precision of a Tchaikovsky-Petipa ballet, and delivering a hit song that seasonally sits alongside Irving Berlin’s White Christmas. The familiar I’m Walking In The Air – the only words heard in the cartoon film – is sung by the Boy when the Snowman he has built suddenly lifts him up into flight, out over Brighton and up to the North Pole for a knees-up at a snowmen’s party visited by Father Christmas. A thaw-surviving scarf from that is living proof it happened for real, trumping at Christmas the Nutcracker Doll that can only underline a dream. Now it was happening right here, without the images but with author Raymond Briggs’ dialogue pointed up by Blake’s music. A different and rewarding audience experience this way round. And a master class in light film music orchestration . . . Sleep? Harp or strings. Fun building a snowman? Fairy harp and chirpy flute. Snowman greets his young creator? Cheery piccolo. Atmosphere around the boy’s house? Sober, nostalgic oboe. Terrified fleeing cat? Screeching strings. Snowman curious about human life? Cheeky bassoon or avuncular horn. Perilous sources of heat? Cymbals! (Furtive footsteps? Xylophone) Music box? Glittery harp, piano, flute, piccolo. Motor-bike escapade? Tearing orchestra with xylophone saddled on top! The Celidh of the Father Christmases? Celtic pub dance tunes on flutes, piccolo, xylophone, muted trumpet. And binding much together, the piano – setting new scenes, initiating rhythm and texture, creating mystery, punctuating or decorating percussively, bringing sentiment and affection, opening the mood and flow of I’m Walking In The Air for vocalist Victoria Ridgway – from Crawley, invited from the West Sussex Youth Choir. The 17-year-old was singing it publicly for the first time and her nerves in the opening verse counted in her artistic favour. Initially frayed-edged in childlike wonder and fear (“What? My snowman’s really a bird?”), her voice gained in confidence (“He’s not going to drop me now – I’m flying too!”) arriving at a purity (“This is the best adventure I’ve EVER had”). Incidentally, the washes of cymbals evoked for me the Cornish beach hut where Blake, years before, first thought of this tune. Blake’s is an unfamiliar face to most. His narration was thus like listening to a story a nice granddad at a small (under-control) children’s birthday party up the road. Throughout The Snowman, I sensed the audience’s adults captured by their own fascination and progressively moved. The final ovation’s vocal element was heartfelt. Blake brought also his own Piano Concerto and soloist, the 21-year-old Paris-trained Briton, Julian Trevelyan. It’s rarely played, despite its distinctive, pleasing and constantly entertaining vigour and melodic content, easy form and good humour, since its commission for Princess Diana’s 30th birthday 29 years ago. Blake performed it for her at the Royal Festival Hall. Surely, her death is not the reason for its back seat in Blake’s output? “Yes, it is a portrait of her,” he replied. “There’s her warmth and sense of fun.” After a shyly radiant opening musical vision, it garrulously flecks in syncopations and cross-rhythms of popular musical styles – though less prominently than in for example Ravel’s two-handed Concerto. Imagine a lively garden party, getting going. But in the jubilant, cosmopolitan finale of theme and variations they shine brightly and integral to the effervescence which, at the end, unexpectedly but poetically leaves us with a bookending repeat of that halting opening camera shot. There are one or two royal sweeps of cinematic strings and French Horn grandeur, and the tenor trombone pair join in the contrapuntal fun. The middle movement, far less loquacious, paints its own intimate photo or character album. It began and ended with just piano plus the leaders of the three violin and viola section leaders, whom at rehearsal Blake persuaded Gibbons and the players themselves that they should stand to play. The effect in performance was of something original being done spontaneously as an apt focus on music speaking of loving homage and respect. A remarkable concert moment and result. Trevelyan was bristlingly alive, alert and responsive to the Concerto’s solo demands and range, and evidently attuned with a composer whose birthday precedes his by a day. It was Trevelyan’s second performance of a piece composed for Russian prodigy Evgeny Kissin – who reportedly backed out of the premier, finding it too demanding to prepare in apparently ample time. It took Blake three months to prepare in Kissin’s place because Blake had abandoned concert piano performing. But it took Trevelyan just a month before his December debut in it. “It’s challenging with its use of non-classical rhythms being put in a classical context,” he told me. “The trick is to let it sing, and to make an interpretation without destroying its simplicity.” This climaxed and closed the concert, and won another enthusiastic reception. Trevelyan brought Blake on stage for a hug and then won over the audience without him in Chopin’s Mazurka No 2 in D major of Opus 33 as an encore. What of the rest of the programme? Far from makeweights or fillers, they were Gibbons with reindeer bells setting a winter’s scene around a snowman. Rimsky’s bounding dance of the Russian street performers laid out cold any preference for a conventional overture. Delius’ Sleigh Ride and wander off on foot around snow-laden countryside may well have been a WSO first. A Skater’s Waltz by a Strasbourg-born composer could not escape the notice of politically-aware Gibbons on Brexit Day. Out on Anderson’s stateside Sleigh Ride, the WSO were fully on the ball with its finger-snapping wit, and the Karelia Suite finale marched in out of the tundra chill with a genuine glow. But seizing the biscuit was the one item which could have passed by unnoticed in a routine rendition – but instead launched the second half with hum-along anticipation. Gibbons and WSO gave us a Swan Lake Waltz with astute variation in dynamics and a sweeping conclusion of festive Russian theatricality lacking only Bolshoic vibrato in Tim Hawes’ important trumpet solo. Do take us the whole way to Moscow next time, Tim! Richard Amey In the morning, the fifth WSO Children’s Concert enthralled and invigorated an audience of nearly 800. Around 100 were from special education care, among the children from 13 schools, and more than 40 came from home-educating households. Final two WSO concerts this season (Assembly Hall, 2.45pm) – Sunday 23 February: Mozart, Paris Symphony (No 31); Mendelssohn, Violin Concerto (new rising Swedish soloist, Johan Dalene); Grieg, Morning (from Peer Gynt); Holst, St Paul’s Suite; Prokofiev, Classical Symphony. Sunday 5 April: Tchaikovsky, Pathetique Symphony (No 6); Grieg, In The Hall of the Mountain King; Harty, A Comedy Overture; Rachmaninov, Piano Concerto No 2 (soloist Dinara Klinton, Ukraine; 2015 Sussex International Piano Competition finalist and 2017 Interview Concerts subject). REVIEW BY Richard Amey Nik Rimsky-Korsakov, Dance of The Tumblers (from The Snow Maiden); Fred Delius, Sleigh Ride; Emil Waldteufel, Skaters Waltz; Howard Blake, The Snowman, concert version; Pete Tchaikovsky, Waltz (from Swan Lake); Leroy Anderson, Sleigh Ride; Johnny Sibelius, March (from Karelia Suite); Howard Blake, Piano Concerto Op412. It was as though Sergei Prokofiev had been right there, narrating his own Peter And The Wolf with Worthing Symphony Orchestra. To audience surprise, Howard Blake was doing the same in The Snowman – a children’s composition of parallel universal success composed by he, an ex-Brighton & Hove Grammar School boy, and with some primary and secondary classmates in the audience. Unbilled except last-minute on social media, Blake told me he was narrating a Snowman concert performance for the first time in five years. He was standing in for also-unpublicised actor Bernard Cribbins OBE, whose wife was unwell. Wombles voice-over Cribbins reached 91 in December. A month earlier, Blake OBE made it to 81, although he scarcely moves or looks older than 70. That’s the therapy of music for you. Blake’s own ‘local lad makes good’ story happened 40 years ago when his idea of a TV cartoon outlawing dialogue struck gold. Instead, it’s musically with descriptive richness and synchronised with the precision of a Tchaikovsky-Petipa ballet, and delivering a hit song that seasonally sits alongside Irving Berlin’s White Christmas. The familiar I’m Walking In The Air – the only words heard in the cartoon film – is sung by the Boy when the Snowman he has built suddenly lifts him up into flight, out over Brighton and up to the North Pole for a knees-up at a snowmen’s party visited by Father Christmas. A thaw-surviving scarf from that is living proof it happened for real, trumping at Christmas the Nutcracker Doll that can only underline a dream. Now it was happening right here, without the images but with author Raymond Briggs’ dialogue pointed up by Blake’s music. A different and rewarding audience experience this way round. And a master class in light film music orchestration . . . Sleep? Harp or strings. Fun building a snowman? Fairy harp and chirpy flute. Snowman greets his young creator? Cheery piccolo. Atmosphere around the boy’s house? Sober, nostalgic oboe. Terrified fleeing cat? Screeching strings. Snowman curious about human life? Cheeky bassoon or avuncular horn. Perilous sources of heat? Cymbals! (Furtive footsteps? Xylophone) Music box? Glittery harp, piano, flute, piccolo. Motor-bike escapade? Tearing orchestra with xylophone saddled on top! The Celidh of the Father Christmases? Celtic pub dance tunes on flutes, piccolo, xylophone, muted trumpet. And binding much together, the piano – setting new scenes, initiating rhythm and texture, creating mystery, punctuating or decorating percussively, bringing sentiment and affection, opening the mood and flow of I’m Walking In The Air for vocalist Victoria Ridgway – from Crawley, invited from the West Sussex Youth Choir. The 17-year-old was singing it publicly for the first time and her nerves in the opening verse counted in her artistic favour. Initially frayed-edged in childlike wonder and fear (“What? My snowman’s really a bird?”), her voice gained in confidence (“He’s not going to drop me now – I’m flying too!”) arriving at a purity (“This is the best adventure I’ve EVER had”). Incidentally, the washes of cymbals evoked for me the Cornish beach hut where Blake, years before, first thought of this tune. Blake’s is an unfamiliar face to most. His narration was thus like listening to a story a nice granddad at a small (under-control) children’s birthday party up the road. Throughout The Snowman, I sensed the audience’s adults captured by their own fascination and progressively moved. The final ovation’s vocal element was heartfelt. Blake brought also his own Piano Concerto and soloist, the 21-year-old Paris-trained Briton, Julian Trevelyan. It’s rarely played, despite its distinctive, pleasing and constantly entertaining vigour and melodic content, easy form and good humour, since its commission for Princess Diana’s 30th birthday 29 years ago. Blake performed it for her at the Royal Festival Hall. Surely, her death is not the reason for its back seat in Blake’s output? “Yes, it is a portrait of her,” he replied. “There’s her warmth and sense of fun.” After a shyly radiant opening musical vision, it garrulously flecks in syncopations and cross-rhythms of popular musical styles – though less prominently than in for example Ravel’s two-handed Concerto. Imagine a lively garden party, getting going. But in the jubilant, cosmopolitan finale of theme and variations they shine brightly and integral to the effervescence which, at the end, unexpectedly but poetically leaves us with a bookending repeat of that halting opening camera shot. There are one or two royal sweeps of cinematic strings and French Horn grandeur, and the tenor trombone pair join in the contrapuntal fun. The middle movement, far less loquacious, paints its own intimate photo or character album. It began and ended with just piano plus the leaders of the three violin and viola section leaders, whom at rehearsal Blake persuaded Gibbons and the players themselves that they should stand to play. The effect in performance was of something original being done spontaneously as an apt focus on music speaking of loving homage and respect. A remarkable concert moment and result. Trevelyan was bristlingly alive, alert and responsive to the Concerto’s solo demands and range, and evidently attuned with a composer whose birthday precedes his by a day. It was Trevelyan’s second performance of a piece composed for Russian prodigy Evgeny Kissin – who reportedly backed out of the premier, finding it too demanding to prepare in apparently ample time. It took Blake three months to prepare in Kissin’s place because Blake had abandoned concert piano performing. But it took Trevelyan just a month before his December debut in it. “It’s challenging with its use of non-classical rhythms being put in a classical context,” he told me. “The trick is to let it sing, and to make an interpretation without destroying its simplicity.” This climaxed and closed the concert, and won another enthusiastic reception. Trevelyan brought Blake on stage for a hug and then won over the audience without him in Chopin’s Mazurka No 2 in D major of Opus 33 as an encore. What of the rest of the programme? Far from makeweights or fillers, they were Gibbons with reindeer bells setting a winter’s scene around a snowman. Rimsky’s bounding dance of the Russian street performers laid out cold any preference for a conventional overture. Delius’ Sleigh Ride and wander off on foot around snow-laden countryside may well have been a WSO first. A Skater’s Waltz by a Strasbourg-born composer could not escape the notice of politically-aware Gibbons on Brexit Day. Out on Anderson’s stateside Sleigh Ride, the WSO were fully on the ball with its finger-snapping wit, and the Karelia Suite finale marched in out of the tundra chill with a genuine glow. But seizing the biscuit was the one item which could have passed by unnoticed in a routine rendition – but instead launched the second half with hum-along anticipation. Gibbons and WSO gave us a Swan Lake Waltz with astute variation in dynamics and a sweeping conclusion of festive Russian theatricality lacking only Bolshoic vibrato in Tim Hawes’ important trumpet solo. Do take us the whole way to Moscow next time, Tim! Richard Amey
24th December 2019	ALED JONES NARRATES 'THE SNOWMAN' ON CLASSIC FM WITH THE SINFONIA OF LONDON CONDUCTED BY THE COMPOSER AND LYRIC-WRITER HOWARD BLAKE. 5.30PM,
24th December 2019	Aled narrates and sings the words and music of Howard Blake OBE, who conducts The Sinfonia of London, CLASSIC FM 5.30PM This complete 26-minute version of 'The Snowman' was originally recorded for the Channel 4 animated film in 1983 with Howard conducting his orchestra The Sinfonia of London, narrator Bernard Cribbens and treble Peter Auty, and in this form it went platinum for CBS Masterworks. In 1985 Aled made a memorable cover version which went to number 3 in the charts and he appeared on TOTP singing 'Walking in the air' the theme ffrom the film, which launched his highly-succesful career.
21st December 2019	The Golden State Pops Orchestra conducted by Steven Allen Fox, perform the concert version of 'The Snowman' with 'the voice of Disney', Bill Rogers, as narrator. 21st December 2019 at 8.00pm, Great Warner Theatre, San Pedro, Los Angeles, USA
8th December 2019	Jonathan Willcocks,conductor,The Mid-Sussex Sinfonia and Sussex Children's Choir, The Dolphin Hall, Haywards Heath This is a programme of music by Howard Blake, OBE.FRAM, who will be attending the concert to talk about 'All God's Creatures', 'The Snowman', 'Sussex Prelude' and other works he wrote at the time when he lived and worked in Highbridge Mill, Cuckfield, Sussex.
23rd December 2018	Ben Parry, childen's choir and orchestra,
20th December 2018	Royal Albert Hall, three performances on 20th December
17th December 2018	Liverpool Philharmonic Music Room lunchtime concert including Question and Answer session with the audience 1-2.00pm
16th December 2018	Performed with orchestra wirh projected film, Alistair Malloy (compere), ROYAL PHILHARMONIC HALL LIVERPOOL
22nd December 2017	Jason Thornton conducted brilliant performances with The Bath Philharmonia: 'The Snowman' and 'The Bear' both with film, singers and orchestra. A presenter introduced players and instruments to fill up an entire programme of Howard's music., The Forum Bath
17th December 2017	Snape Maltings 4.00pm A Christmas Classic and a beloved bear Herbert Chappell Paddington Bear’s First Concert Howard Blake The Snowman Zeb Soanes narrator The Suffolk Ensemble Ben Parry conductor The Snowman has been essential seasonal TV viewing for nearly four decades. But experiencing it on Snape Maltings’ big screen to the accompaniment of live orchestra adds an extra special magic that appeals to the excitable child in all of us. Before the film, a musical meeting with the ever-popular Paddington, and the narrated tale – with orchestra – of his first concert experience and the predictable mayhem that follows. Main image © Snowman Enterprises Ltd
17th December 2017	The Orchestra of Opera North Hugh Brunt - conductor John Savournin - presenter, Sun 17 December 2017 Victoria Hall. Leeds Prokofiev - Suite: Cinderella Howard Blake - The Snowman Arguably the most cherished soundtrack to the Christmas season is the score to Raymond Briggs’ The Snowman. This December the Orchestra of Opera North performs the music live in all its heart-melting splendour to a screening of the animation. Sure to captivate the imaginations of young and old  alike, this is not only the perfect way to spend time with loved ones, but a wonderful introduction to the thrills, chills and power of a symphony orchestra performing live. Before the screening, narrator John Savournin delights with the classic rags-to-riches tale of Cinderella with sensational music and illustrations to accompany the story.
6th January 2017 - 8th January 2017	"The Snowman" with Jaume Comas (narrator), Ana Puche(soprano),The Liverpool String Quartet(Jim Clark,Sarah Hill,Daniel Sanxis,Alex Holladay.) Cesar Franck Piano Quintet with Martin Roscoe (piano) Martin Roscoe (piano), Ana Puche (soprano), Jaume Comas (narrator) and Liverpool String Quartet, Saint Vincent, Castellvell del Camp,Tarragona,Spain, January 6th, 8.00pm (other venues 7,8 tbc) Day: 6th Jannuary, 2017 Hour: 7:30 pm Venue: Església de Santa Maria Assumpta Town: Maspujols Day: 7h Jannuary, 2017 Hour: 20:30 pm Venue: Esjlésia de Sant Vicenç Màrtir Town: Castellvell del Camp Repertoire: - Howard Blake (OBE): A MONTH IN THE COUNTRY (FOR STRING QUARTET) (opus 611) THE SNOWMAN CONCERT VERSION for narrator (or film), boy soprano and orchestra (opus 323) - Cesar Frank: Quintet for Piano and Strings - Music from films and traditional Christmas songs.
23rd December 2016	The Snowman with the Pops December 23, 2016 John Morris Russell, conductor The heart-warming animated Christmas film The Snowman has been a beloved staple of family holiday entertainment for over 30 years. Your Cincinnati Pops perform Howard Blake’s beautiful score live as the movie plays in high definition over the stage.
20th December 2016 - 21st December 2016	The Snowman (screening with live music) The Hallé The Snowman (screening with live music) Jonathon Heyward conductor | Tom Redmond narrator | TBC boy soprano Herbert Chappell Paddington Bear’s First Concert | Howard Blake The Snowman Tuesday 20 December 2016 1:30 PM The Bridgewater Hall
18th December 2016	The girls of The National Children's Choir and the Suffolk Ensemble, directed by Ben Parry, Snape Maltings Concert Hall, Aldeburgh, Suffolk, performances at 2.00pm and 4.00pm The first two public live performance of Howard's new animated film 'The Land of Counterpane' (2016), projected on screen with live children's choir and orchestra took place on Sunday 18th December at 2pm and 4 pm to capacity audiences in the Snape Maltings concert hall in a Howard Blake double-bill along with the original film of 'The Snowman'  film (1982). Great performances by the National Youth Children's Girls Choir and The Suffolk Ensemble Orchestra led by Cleo Gould and conducted by Ben Parry. The concert was the brain-child of Proms director Roger Wright moved to Suffolk to preside over the music of Aldeburgh. THE LAND OF COUNTERPANE - an animated song-cycle (26-minute film) (DVD) Recorded: 2016 Artists: The Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Mary Erskine Choir, David Rintoul (narrator), Mark Reeve (graphic artist), Emmett Elvin (animator), Howard Blake (director) Categories: [Film & TV Scores] Released by: HOWARD BLAKE ENTERPRISES 'THE LAND OF COUNTERPANE' An animated song-cycle for children's choir, narrator and orchestra The poet and novelist Robert Louis Stevenson was a sickly child confined to his bed, the covering of which was a vivid patchwork quilt known as a 'counterpane'. The pictures on it led him to flights of imagination, which he later recalled in his collection of poems "A Child's Garden of Verses". Twelve of these poems are set to music by Howard Blake and his spellbinding animated film has already excited rapt audiences in Edinburgh, the Daily Mail stating that it is 'the film that's poised to be the new Snowman'. It has been scheduled for a world premiere in Aldeburgh on December 18th 2016 in a fabulous double-bill with 'The Snowman' after which date it will be available for your own choir and orchestra to perform. (Film, score and parts available, contact: anna@annamenzies.com) Related Opuses op.0664 THE LAND OF COUNTERPANE - AN ANIMATED FILM OF THE SONG-CYCLE (September 2014)
17th December 2016	Graham Norton - celebrity interviewer, BBC Terry Wogan House (Broadcasting House LondoN) Saturday, December 17TH 2016 The release of the new duet version of 'Walking in the Air' on Aled Jones's 'One Voice at Christmas' album caused a flurry of publicity over Christmas 2016. Howard was invited to take part in the top celebrity chat show on BBC Radio, the Graham Norton show, to talk about his long-lived musical career and was asked questions about his role in 'The Italian Job' with Quincy Jones, his beginnings in a pub in the Edgware Road called The Lord Chancellor, his role as pianist at Abbey Road at the time of the Beatles and how he came to write the soundtrack of the worlsd-famous animated film 'The Snowman'.
December 2016 - January 2017	Fabio Mastrangelo (conductor) 2016/2017 St.Petersburg Academic Symphony Orchestra, Maestro Yury Temirkanov Grand Philharmonic Hall, Arts Square, St. Petersburg Children's Christmas Music by Tchaikovsky, Howard Blake, Korngold and Rebikov. 
December 2016	The newly named Classical KING FM Family Concerts presents four hour-long symphonic programs for children ages 6 to 11 and their families on Saturdays at 11 a.m. in the S. Mark Taper Foundation Auditorium.   Formerly called the Discover Music series, each concert is preceded by special performances and activities in the Samuel & Althea Stroum Grand Lobby one hour before the performance. The series will open on Halloween with Magic Circle Mime performing "Phantoms of the Orchestra," a musical adventure that includes Dukas' The Sorcerer's Apprentice, made famous by Disney's Fantasia. The series continues in December as the Symphony performs live from Howard Blake's award-winning soundtrack along with a screening of the cherished animated film, The Snowman. The Seattle Opera Youth Chorus will join the orchestra for the popular song from the film, "Walking in the Air." In March, ensemble Really Inventive Stuff will take part in a vaudeville-inspired production of Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf. The series closes in May as the ARC Dance Youth Company joins the Symphony on stage for an enchanting performance along with Carnival of the Animals by Saint-Saëns.
25th November 2016 - 26th November 2016	The Orchestra of the Swiss Commercial Association Zurich, Friday, 25.11.2016, 20.00 hrs Zurich (City Centre), St. Peter's Church Saturday, 26.11.2016, 19.00 hrs Thalwil (8m. from Zurich City Centre), Protestant Church In addition to The Snowman, music by Vivaldi, Piazzolla, Tchaikovsky and Guilmant wil be performed.
22nd December 2015 - 23rd December 2015	Stephen Bell cond, Tom Redmond presenter, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester 22nd Dec 1.30pm and 4.00pm 23rd Dec 1.30pm and 4.00pm
29th November 2015	Tonhalle Orchester Zurich,
24th November 2015 - 28th November 2015	Swedish Chamber Orchestra directed by Katerina Andreassen, Orebro,Sweden
31st January 2015	Jersey Orchestra cond. by Howard Blake, St.Helier Excerpts from Star Wars, The Good,bad and the ugly, Lord of the Rings etc live orchestra with screening
31st January 2015	Howard Blake conducts the augmented Jersey Chamber Orchestra and St Michael's children's choir and soloists, Opera House, St. Helier, Jersey 8.00pm Howard Blake conducts screened versions of 'The Snowman' and his new film 'The Land of Counterpane'. The programme will include music from Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, The Good the Bad and the Ugly, Schindler's List, James Bond  and other famous film scores.
23rd December 2014	Halle Orchestra, Stephen Bell cond., Bridgewater Hall Manchester
22nd December 2014	Mozart Orchestra, Cadogan Hall with projected film Wth orchestra and projected film
22nd December 2014 - 24th December 2014	Royal Northern Sinfonia, Alan Fearon cond., perfs 22,23,24 December 2014
22nd December 2014	The Mozart Orchestra, Cadogan Hall, London
21st December 2014	St Petersburg Symphony Orchestra,, Muisc Festival 'Arts Square' 1 December Sunday 15:00 afternoon Maestro Yury Temirkanov Grand Philharmonic Hall (established 1802) from £ 325 All prices Hall Plan International classical music festival "Arts Square 2014" Children`s project. Christmas music (Tchaikovsky, Rebikov, Korngold). Howard Blake. Fabio Mastrangelo (conductor) Orchestra: The St.Petersburg Symphony Orchestra Composer: Peter Tchaikovsky Conductor: Fabio Mastrangelo
21st December 2014	Orchestra of Opera North, Town Hall, Leeds
18th December 2014	Conductor Christopher Bell, narrator Julie Nimmo, with chorus and film projection, Aberdeen
17th December 2014	Kuopion kaupunginorkesten Atso Almila cond., Kuopio Finland
14th December 2014	Kyoto Symphony Orchestra cond. by Hiroshi Sekiya, Kaihanna Plaza main hall, Kyoto, Japan
13th December 2014	Orchestra of St Paul's cond. Ben Palmer, QEH
12th December 2014	London Philharmonic Orchestra, Heathrow Airport
11th December 2014	Orchestra of Opera North,
11th December 2014	Royal Philharmonic Orchestra cond. John Rutter,
23rd November 2014	Carlisle Pennsylvania, Carlisle Theatre 3.00pm
9th October 2014	City Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong, cond. Colin Touchin, host Tania Martin, Sha Tin Town Hall Auditorium 28 December 2014 Hong Kong(China)The Snowman, The Bear, City Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong conducted by Colin Touchin - Sha Tin Town Hall Auditorium, City Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong, Colin Touchin, guest conductor Tania Martin,Music by Howard Blake Original stories by Raymond Briggs Spice up your winter holidays with Howard Blake's The Snowman & The Bear! These two animated films, both heartwarming and magical, are based on picture-books by Raymond Briggs. Experience them on the big screen to the sounds of live orchestral accompaniment and singing. The perfect holiday treat for all the family.
8th December 2013	Kinder-Konzert mit der Jenaer Philharmonie, Werke von Leopold Mozart und Howard Blake Volkshaus, Carl-Zeiss-Platz, Jena Dirigent: Sergi Roca Moderation: Patrick Rohbeck ab 6 Jahre / ca. 60 Minuten Veranstaltungsort: Volkshaus Carl-Zeiss-Platz 15 07743 Jena Kreisfreie Stadt Jena Carl-Zeiss-Platz 15, Leopold Mozart   Die musikalische Schlittenfahrt Howard Blake  Der Schneemann  Für Sprecher, Knabensopran und Orchester
8th December 2013	The Concord Orchestra, Richard Pittman, conductor The Concord Orchestra has invited five members of the Fenn School Treble Chorus to sing the song for this performance. They are sixth-graders Charlie Clark and Henry Patton of Concord; Oliver Neale of Sudbury; fifth-graders William Skelly of Carlisle and Andre Vlahakis of Lowell. The Fenn School in Concord is an independent school for boys in grades 4 through 9. The 35-member Treble Chorus is an auditioned choir for boys and is under the direction of Michael Salvatore. Over the years, the boys have sung at the Boston Athenaeum, York Minster Cathedral, Castle Howard, The Boston Garden, and Fenway Park. Joyce Kulhawik is well known to Boston audiences as the Emmy award- winning arts and entertainment critic for WBZ-TV from1981 to 2008. Joyce Kulhawik (narrator) has covered local and national events from Boston and Broadway to Hollywood, reporting live from the Oscars, the Emmys, and the Grammys., Performing Arts Center, Concord, Mass. USA
7th December 2013	Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Ken Lam, conductor Rheda Becker, narrator (NB this is one of many orchestral performances scheduled in USA around Christmas.),
25th December 2012	Brandenburgische Staatsorchester Frankfurt(am Oder) Richard Wolf, Knabensopran Thorsten Spohr, Sprecher Dirigent: Joseph Bousso (Projected film, text in German), Nikolaisaal Potsdam,Berlin 17.00 Leopold Mozart "Musikalische Schlittenfahrt" Howard Blake Der Schneemann
27th October 2012	Howard Blake - composer/lyricist/conductor/producer, Peter Auty (boy soprano), The Sinfonia of London, The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research. The Commander of the International Space Station recently 'had a vision that Howard Blake's “Walking in the Air” song from “The Snowman” animated film would be great to have in the background of one of the spectacular time lapse aurora videos he’s working to capture' and Howard agreed with USA government authorities to proceed with this project. The amazing results of this collaboration can now be seen on You Tube. Dan Cook the mastermind of the project writes: 'We have completed the ISS imagery time-lapse project with “Walking in the Air” and wanted to share the feature with you.  The imagery is absolutely stunning and coupled with the music, it becomes even more of a captivating experience.'  Walking on Air (on NASA’s “ReelNASA” YouTube Channel) http://youtu.be/hWz5ltE_I4c  And, I’m sure you all may have seen “The Snowman” animated short film but for ease of reference, here’s the clip where the magical snowman takes the young boy on a night-time flying adventure where they experience many bird’s-eye views, including the ever-so-phenomenal dancing aurora. The video is also currently featured on the NASA home page @ http://www.nasa.gov within the “NASA Multimedia” videos section located near the center of the page.
10th December 2011	The City of Hong Kong Chamber Orchestra will be giving 3 all-Howard Blake concerts before Christmas conducted by Colin Touchin with narrators Jacqueline Gourley and Henry Coombs. Programme will be The Snowman and The Bear, both with projected film 2.30 and 5.00 on 10.12.11 at Hong Kong City Hall Concert Hall 2.30 on 11.12.11 at Tsuen Wan Town Hall Auditorium
1st June 2008	Macao Orchestra, Yan Chan, Macao International Festival, Macao S.A.R. The concert also features a performance of THE BEAR for girl sopano, tenor, bass, narrator and orchestra
1st June 2008	01/06/08 Snowman, The Macao Orchestra/Francis Kan, Macao Cultural Centre (Grand Auditorium) / Macao Macau International Festival (with film)
December 2007	Norwich Pops Orchestra, Geoff Davidson (with film), Norwich Playhouse, Norfolk, UK
26th December 2007	Mecklenburgisches Staats-theater, Martin Schelhaas, Mecklenburgisches Staats-theater Schwerin, Germany
26th December 2007	The Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra/Piecaitis, Vilnius Congress Concert Hall Lithuania
23rd December 2007 - 24th December 2007	Northern Sinfonia, Alan Fearon, The Sage, Gateshead (with film)
22nd December 2007	Royal Scottish Natonal Orchestra, Christopher Bell, Royal Concert Hall Glasgow (with film)
22nd December 2007	Walking in the Air, Royal Liverpool PO/Ian McMillan, Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool UK
21st December 2007	BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra/Peter Cynfryn Jones BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra/Peter Cynfryn Jones, Music Hall, Aberdeen UK
20th December 2007	BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra/Peter Cynfryn Jones, Town Hall, Ayr UK
20th December 2007	Nordeutscherundfunk, Hannover, Howard Griffiths, Norddeutscher Rundfunk, Hannover, Germany
19th December 2007	RSNO, Music Hall Aberdeen
18th December 2007	RSNO Christopher Bell, Caird Hall Dundee
18th December 2007	, Suhl und Gothe Germany
17th December 2007	Orchestra of St John's/John Lubbock, Cadogan Hall, London (with film) UK
16th December 2007	Northern Chamber Orchestra, Tatton Park, Knutsford, Cheshire (x 2) UK
16th December 2007	Walking in the Air, Huntington SO/Kimo Furumoto, Joan C Edwards Performing Arts Center, Marshall University, Huntington, WV, USA
16th December 2007	Walking in the Air Gloucestershire Youth Orchestra/Glyn Oxley, Town Hall, Cheltenham UK
15th December 2007	The Cantori Vocal Ensemble/Michael Crombie, United Free Church, Woodford Green UK
15th December 2007	Worcester Symphony Orchestra//Adrian Lucas, Worcester Cathedral UK
15th December 2007	Northampton County Youth 'Oldies' Orchestra/Paul Truman, Northampton High School UK
15th December 2007	15/12/2007 Walking in the Air,Huntington SO/Kimo Furumoto, Joan C Edwards Performing Arts Center, Marshall University, USA
14th December 2007	London Mozart Players, Walking in the Air, Croydon Parish Church
8th December 2007	Ulster orchestra, Christopher Bell, Waterfront Hall, Belfast (2 perf with film)
8th December 2007	cond. Markus L Frank, Anhaltisches Theater, Dessau (3 perfs) Germany
8th December 2007	Northampton Concert Orchestra/David Chambers, United Reformed Church, Northampton UK
6th December 2007	, Suhl und Gothe Germany
1st December 2007	National YO of Ireland, Gearoid Grant, The Helix, Dublin
25th November 2007	Bath Philharmonia, Jason Thornton, Howard Blake (pre-concert talk), Theatre Royal Bath (2 perfs)
11th November 2007	Funharmonics, Chris Jarvis/David Angus, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Festival Hall
1st August 2007	Taipei Chinese Orchestra conducted by En Shao, Taipei, Taiwan (tbc)
7th January 2007	Bernard Cribbins (narrator),Benedict Williams,(treble from King's College Cambridge, director Stephen Cleobury), Cambridge Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by the composer, Corn Exchange,Cambridge
5th January 2007	Orchestra of the National Concert Hall,David Brophy, Craig Doyle (with film x2), National Concert Hall,Dublin, Eire
4th January 2007	Orquesta Sinfonica de Navarra, Carl Davis, Auditorio Baluarte, Pamplona, Spain (with film)
2nd January 2007	Northern Sinfonia, Alan Fearon (with film), The Sage, Gateshead
28th December 2006 - 29th December 2006	Northern Sinfonia conducted by Alan Fearon, with film, Middlesborough Town Hall The Sage, Gateshead
23rd December 2006	Toronto Symphony Orchestra, with film, Toronto, Canada
23rd December 2006	Orchestra of St John's Smith Square, conducted by Johm Lubbock, Cadogan Hall,London (with film) To include 'Cradle Song' for boy & girl trebles and 'The Bear' with projected film and soloists (tbc)
23rd December 2006	RSNO, Christopher Bell (with film), Usher Hall, Edinburgh
23rd December 2006	Orchestra Sinfonica Verdi, Fabrizio Dorsi, Milan, Italy
23rd December 2006	Hutton & Shenfield Choral Society, Aurelian SO, Tim Hooper, Brentwood Centre, UK
21st December 2006	RSNO Christopher Bell (with film), Caird Hall, Dundee
20th December 2006	Royal Scottish National Orchestra and Junior Chorus, Christopher Bell, Music hall, Aberdeen
17th December 2006	Royal Scottish National Orchestra, conducted by Christopher Bell, with film, Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, Scotland
17th December 2006 - 18th December 2006	Orchestra of the National Concert Hall, David Brophy, Craig Doyle, National Concert hall, Dublin
16th December 2006	Folkestone orchestra, Saga Pavilion, Folkestone
14th December 2006	Latymer Students, Latymer School, London
14th December 2006	Student orchestra, Geoff Lavery, Bedford Modern School
13th December 2006	Dacorum Symphony Orchestra, Thomas Loten, Berkhampstead Collegiate School
12th December 2006	BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Grant Llewellyn, St David's Hall, Cardiff
11th December 2006 - 12th December 2006	Ayrshire Symphony Orchestra, St Margaret's Church Ayr
10th December 2006	City of Hong Kong Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Richard Honnor, with film ( 2 performances), Hong Kong City Concert Hall, China Also featuring a performance of 'The Bear'
10th December 2006	Gloucestershire Youth Orchestra, Cheltenham Town Hall
9th December 2006	Ulster Orchestra conducted by Christopher Bell, with film (2x), Waterfront Hall, Belfast. Northern Ireland
8th December 2006 - 9th December 2006	National Chiang Kai Shek Symphony Orchestra, with film. Carl Davis, National Chiang Kai Shek Auditorium, Taipei, Taiwan
5th December 2006	Caerphilly Music & Arts services (x2), Cardiff
3rd December 2006	Gottingen SO, Christoph Muller, Gottingen, Germany
1st December 2006 - 3rd December 2006	Landesjugendorkester Bremen (Leer), Bremen Germany
25th November 2006	Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, 'Symphony for Kids', Edmonton, Canada (with film projection)
19th November 2006	Duna Szimfonikus Zenekar, Duna palata, Budapest, Hungary
6th May 2006	London Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by David Parry, solo treble Sam Oliver, Abbey Road Studios (in a recording for the LPO's own record label)
25th February 1996	Cambridge Philharmonic Society, Matthew Rowe, Corn Exchange Cambridge Walking in the air

Reviews

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Worthing Symphony Orchestra “Walking In The Air” concert at Assembly Hall, Friday 31 January 2020 (7.30pm), composer Howard Blake (narrator), John Alley (piano), Victoria Ridgway (singer) John Gibbons BEM (conductor), Julian Trevelyan (concerto piano).

Nik Rimsky-Korsakov, Dance of The Tumblers (from The Snow Maiden); Fred Delius, Sleigh Ride; Emil Waldteufel, Skaters Waltz; Howard Blake, The Snowman, concert version; Pete Tchaikovsky, Waltz (from Swan Lake); Leroy Anderson, Sleigh Ride; Johnny Sibelius, March (from Karelia Suite); Howard Blake, Piano Concerto Opus 412.

It was as though Sergei Prokofiev had been right there, narrating his own Peter And The Wolf with Worthing Symphony Orchestra. To audience surprise, Howard Blake was doing the same in The Snowman – a children’s composition of parallel universal success composed by he, an ex-Brighton & Hove Grammar School boy, and with some primary and secondary classmates in the audience.

Unbilled except last-minute on social media, Blake told me he was narrating a Snowman concert performance for the first time in five years. He was standing in for also-unpublicised actor Bernard Cribbins OBE, whose wife was unwell. Wombles voice-over Cribbins reached 91 in December. A month earlier, Blake OBE made it to 81, although he scarcely moves or looks older than 70. That’s the therapy of music for you.

Blake’s own ‘local lad makes good’ story happened 40 years ago when his idea of a TV cartoon outlawing dialogue struck gold. Instead, it’s musically with descriptive richness and synchronised with the precision of a Tchaikovsky-Petipa ballet, and delivering a hit song that seasonally sits alongside Irving Berlin’s White Christmas.

The familiar I’m Walking In The Air – the only words heard in the cartoon film – is sung by the Boy when the Snowman he has built suddenly lifts him up into flight, out over Brighton and up to the North Pole for a knees-up at a snowmen’s party visited by Father Christmas. A thaw-surviving scarf from that is living proof it happened for real, trumping at Christmas the Nutcracker Doll that can only underline a dream.

Now it was happening right here, without the images but with author Raymond Briggs’ dialogue pointed up by Blake’s music. A different and rewarding audience experience this way round. And a master class in light film music orchestration . . .

Sleep? Harp or strings. Fun building a snowman? Fairy harp and chirpy flute. Snowman greets his young creator? Cheery piccolo. Atmosphere around the boy’s house? Sober, nostalgic oboe. Terrified fleeing cat? Screeching strings. Snowman curious about human life? Cheeky bassoon or avuncular horn.

Perilous sources of heat? Cymbals! (Furtive footsteps? Xylophone) Music box? Glittery harp, piano, flute, piccolo. Motor-bike escapade? Tearing orchestra with xylophone saddled on top! The Celidh of the Father Christmases? Celtic pub dance tunes on flutes, piccolo, xylophone, muted trumpet.

And binding much together, the piano – setting new scenes, initiating rhythm and texture, creating mystery, punctuating or decorating percussively, bringing sentiment and affection, opening the mood and flow of I’m Walking In The Air for vocalist Victoria Ridgway – from Crawley, invited from the West Sussex Youth Choir.

The 17-year-old was singing it publicly for the first time and her nerves in the opening verse counted in her artistic favour. Initially frayed-edged in childlike wonder and fear (“What? My snowman’s really a bird?”), her voice gained in confidence (“He’s not going to drop me now – I’m flying too!”) arriving at a purity (“This is the best adventure I’ve EVER had”).

Incidentally, the washes of cymbals evoked for me the Cornish beach hut where Blake, years before, first thought of this tune. Blake’s is an unfamiliar face to most. His narration was thus like listening to a story a nice granddad at a small (under-control) children’s birthday party up the road. Throughout The Snowman, I sensed the audience’s adults captured by their own fascination and progressively moved. The final ovation’s vocal element was heartfelt.

Blake brought also his own Piano Concerto and soloist, the 21-year-old Paris-trained Briton, Julian Trevelyan. It’s rarely played, despite its distinctive, pleasing and constantly entertaining vigour and melodic content, easy form and good humour, since its commission for Princess Diana’s 30th birthday 29 years ago. Blake performed it for her at the Royal Festival Hall. Surely, her death is not the reason for its back seat in Blake’s output? “Yes, it is a portrait of her,” he replied. “There’s her warmth and sense of fun.”

After a shyly radiant opening musical vision, it garrulously flecks in syncopations and cross-rhythms of popular musical styles – though less prominently than in for example Ravel’s two-handed Concerto. Imagine a lively garden party, getting going. But in the jubilant, cosmopolitan finale of theme and variations they shine brightly and integral to the effervescence which, at the end, unexpectedly but poetically leaves us with a bookending repeat of that halting opening camera shot.

There are one or two royal sweeps of cinematic strings and French Horn grandeur, and the tenor trombone pair join in the contrapuntal fun.

The middle movement, far less loquacious, paints its own intimate photo or character album.

It began and ended with just piano plus the leaders of the three violin and viola section leaders, whom at rehearsal Blake persuaded Gibbons and the players themselves that they should stand to play. The effect in performance was of something original being done spontaneously as an apt focus on music speaking of loving homage and respect. A remarkable concert moment and result.

Trevelyan was bristlingly alive, alert and responsive to the Concerto’s solo demands and range, and evidently attuned with a composer whose birthday precedes his by a day. It was Trevelyan’s second performance of a piece composed for Russian prodigy Evgeny Kissin – who reportedly backed out of the premier, finding it too demanding to prepare in apparently ample time. It took Blake three months to prepare in Kissin’s place because Blake had abandoned concert piano performing.

But it took Trevelyan just a month before his December debut in it. “It’s challenging with its use of non-classical rhythms being put in a classical context,” he told me. “The trick is to let it sing, and to make an interpretation without destroying its simplicity.”

This climaxed and closed the concert, and won another enthusiastic reception. Trevelyan brought Blake on stage for a hug and then won over the audience without him in Chopin’s Mazurka No 2 in D major of Opus 33 as an encore.

What of the rest of the programme? Far from makeweights or fillers, they were Gibbons with reindeer bells setting a winter’s scene around a snowman. Rimsky’s bounding dance of the Russian street performers laid out cold any preference for a conventional overture. Delius’ Sleigh Ride and wander off on foot around snow-laden countryside may well have been a WSO first.

A Skater’s Waltz by a Strasbourg-born composer could not escape the notice of politically-aware Gibbons on Brexit Day. Out on Anderson’s stateside Sleigh Ride, the WSO were fully on the ball with its finger-snapping wit, and the Karelia Suite finale marched in out of the tundra chill with a genuine glow.

But seizing the biscuit was the one item which could have passed by unnoticed in a routine rendition – but instead launched the second half with hum-along anticipation. Gibbons and WSO gave us a Swan Lake Waltz with astute variation in dynamics and a sweeping conclusion of festive Russian theatricality lacking only Bolshoic vibrato in Tim Hawes’ important trumpet solo. Do take us the whole way to Moscow next time, Tim!

Richard Amey

Richard Amey, Shoreham Herald, 6/2/2020

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The Snowman 1982

Now this brings back some memories. A bit before my time I will admit, but still an amazing holiday film. Based on author Raymond Briggs' children's book, the movie is wonderfully animated and extremely enjoyable. The story follows a young boy who builds a snowman, which later comes to life. It (it looks like a snowman, but who am I to judge?) and the boy have magical adventures through an amazingly animated winter wonderland.

While still a children's story, it is a great piece of film. In later versions of the movie, David Bowie was cast as the narrator. But what really sets this story apart in my mind at least is the music that goes along with it. It tugs at my heartstrings every time I hear it, and give me the goose bumps without fail. Walking in the Air is an amazing song that you have probably heard before, but don't know where from or its actual origin.

Singer Songwriter Howard Blake wrote the song for the movie, and it has been covered over and over again. Artists who have covered the song include Barry Manilow & Celine Dion in a duet, Kenny Loggins in his 1998 album December, Chloe Agnew and the Celtic Women and also operatic metal group Nightwish.

The song has also been covered this year by up and coming British rock band the Maccabees. The Maccabeess and Nightwish versions are currently my two favorites, but they are all amazing and I urge any music lover to check them out. The original version can be found here, with the accompanying video.

The Snowman is an amazingly heartwarming story of the innocence of youth and the magic of the season. It is a must-see for the coming Christmas time.

Jeff Sullivan, Christmas Movie Night - Mansfield Patch, 25/12/2011

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Review: The RSNO Christmas Concert, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Usher Hall, The Snowman

Although it was not advertised as a family event, it goes without saying that including Howard Blake’s The Snowman is guaranteed to bring out parents and their children – from toddlers to teenagers. A large screen had been set up in front of the organ pipes, the narration was very skillfully handled by Siobhan Redmond and there was an excellent boy soprano soloist. It caught and held the attention of one and all – from start to finish.

Sandy Scott, Edinburgh Evening News, 19/12/2011

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Raymond Briggs doesn't do Disney-style crowd-pleasers - so it seems to perplex him that the film of his book The Snowman has become a beloved festive staple and merchandise-monster over the last 25 years. Given the subject - a magical snowman and a night-time flight to meet Father Christmas - avoiding schmaltz must have been hard. But the speckled pencil drawings, the simple, silent storyline, Howard Blake's immortal music and that heart-breaking ending make for an achingly beautiful and wholly sugar-free masterpiece of old-school animation. A more sophisticated tale of friendship and loss than any wordy, plastic-looking CGI cartoon could muster nowadays, The Snowman is an inevitable Christmas classic - whether its creator likes it or not.
Holly Kyte
FIRST POSTED DECEMBER 19, 2007

Holly Kyte, First Post, 19/12/2007

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Original Review: An undisputed animated classic, The Snowman is a magical adaptation of Raymond Briggs' well-loved storybook, telling the tale of a young boy who builds a snowman one Christmas Eve, which comes to life that night and takes the boy on an unforgettable trip to the North Pole to meet Santa Claus. It's a simple story of childhood wish fulfilment, told with loving attention to detail and superbly stylised renderings, and since its initial release in 1982, the film has gone on to be heralded as one of the best animated short films ever made. Every year over the Christmas period, in the UK at least, the TV station Channel 4 screens the film, allowing families both young and old to enjoy this wonderful piece of seasonal tradition time and again.

As the story of The Snowman unfolds completely without dialogue, Howard Blake's masterful score takes on increased significance. In recent years, Blake has virtually disappeared from the film scoring scene, despite a healthy career during the 1960s and 70s when he wrote excellent music for films such as The Duellists and Riddle of the Sands, and had his scheduled slot to score the film Alien taken by some bloke called Jerry Goldsmith... But if Blake never writes another note of film music in his life, his reputation in the genre's history will undoubtedly be secured by his contribution to this film, especially the legendary song "Walking In The Air".

Written to accompany the scene in which the Snowman and the boy take flight and make their epic journey northwards to see Father Christmas, Blake employed the talents of St. Paul's Cathedral choirboy Peter Auty to lend voice to his exquisite melody and his poetic words. With opening chords that allude to John Williams E.T., a spine-tingling chorus and an instrumental bridge to die for, "Walking In The Air" went on to attain world-wide fame when it was subsequently released as a single by the famous boy soprano Aled Jones in 1985. The remainder of Blake's score is presented in two suites, running at 15 and 6 minutes respectively, either side of the song.

Although necessarily a touch cartoonish in nature, Blake convincingly and cleverly manages to convey the good humour and emotion and magic in the story with a series of wonderful interconnected cues, all of which are performed with life and spirit by the Sinfonia of London. Among the highlights include the mock Caribbean-rhythms for when the Snowman is "sunbathing" in front of the fridge, the lovely music-box theme for the Snowman's dance around the boy's bedroom, the wonderful woodwind and xylophone scherzo for the pair's chaotic motorbike ride round the garden, the magnificently vibrant source music for the Dance of the Snowmen, and the bittersweet rendition of the Walking In The Air theme as the pair reluctantly fly home.

Columbia's album, which is apparently extremely difficult to find outside the British Isles, is one of the most intelligently structured I have ever encountered. As the entire score only runs for just under 26 minutes, the music is presented twice - firstly with narration by character actor Bernard Cribbins reading extracts from the book, and secondly as an unbroken suite of narration-free music. Whoever took the decision to release the CD in this format should be unreservedly congratulated for their vision: not only does the two-half technique mean that you get a 50-minute CD, but you also get a choice of how to experience it. For those unfamiliar with the film, Cribbins' voice provides a welcome connection between the music and the on-screen action, while for those who wish to experience Blake's delicate touch and detailed orchestrations can simply skip forward to track 4 and indulge themselves.

Many people the world over have taken the film of The Snowman to their hearts, and a similar number have embraced Blake's score with equal enthusiasm. Even disregarding the near-legendary song, Howard Blake's lively music for this animated masterpiece will surely stand the test of time and go on to be part of Britain's Christmas traditions for many years to come. Though Blake has written classical pieces, other film scores, music for a number of theatre productions, and even a second Briggs animation (The Bear), the majority of people still consider this composition to be the seminal work of his career.

Track Listing: The Story of the Snowman (15:30)Walking In The Air (written by Howard Blake, performed by Peter Auty) (3:30)The Story of the Snowman continued (6:40)The Snowman Soundtrack (15:30)Walking In The Air (written by Howard Blake, performed by Peter Auty) (3:30)The Snowman Soundtrack continued (6:40) Running Time: 50 minutes 20 seconds

Jonathan Broxton, Movie Music UK, 1/1/2000

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