“We don’t break down barriers in music–we don’t see any!”–Errollyn Wallen proudly announced in 1990 at the inaugural concert of the London-based Ensemble X, which she had co-founded. Not that Wallen, born in Belize (then still British Honduras) and brought to London at the age of two, did not have some major barriers to confront at the beginning of her career. She definitely encountered a great deal of prejudice based on her gender and skin color. Yet she refused to be intimidated or discouraged, and today, she is one of Britain’s most prominent composers. Last year, she was appointed by King Charles III as Master of the King’s Music, a prestigious honorary post established by Charles I in 1626.
Composer, pianist, singer, poet, dancer and one-time TV personality, Wallen has worked in jazz, soul, pop, rock and heavy metal in addition to classical music. She is the author of a large and varied catalog of works including operas, ballets, orchestral and chamber music, often inspired by social and political issues. Mighty River was written in 2007 to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Slave Trade Act, which forbade slave trade throughout the British Empire. Commenting on the composition, the composer has written:
Composing for the orchestra is my favourite challenge and this commission from the Rector and PCC of Holy Trinity Clapham Common and John Wates[1], to mark the bicentenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade, is an especially important one for me.
It is an innate human instinct to be free just as it is for the river to rush headlong to the sea. That is the concept for this work.
The work makes reference to the hymn Amazing Grace and the spirituals Deep River and Go Down Moses. It is as if the perpetual motion of the music, like water, like time, through its sheer momentum, comes across the cries and echoes of human hearts and voices, singing out of suffering, repentance, humility and hope.
Each new piece I write is like an adventure and in composing Mighty River I reaffirmed my belief that history is a living thing of which we are all part. It has been a joy to have got to know John and Carol Wates (Carol is a distant relative of William Wilberforce[2]) and to have discussed with them the creation and intentions of this work. I feel honoured to have been chosen to commemorate this very special day.
Mighty River is in a single movement and I dedicate it to my great-great-great-great-great-great grandmother. I will never know her but I praise her for her courage and toughness. Because of her I thrive.
The piece begins with a rendition of Amazing Grace in its original form, played by a solo horn–the instrument John Wates plays. (In 1980, Wates founded the British Horn Society!) When the rest of the players join in, melodic fragments, familiar and less familiar, weave in and out of the orchestral texture against a steady rhythmic pulse, as the river becomes wider and wider on its way to the sea. Finally, the solo horn returns to usher in the reflective conclusion.
“I have written music to cast spells, to charm, to woo, to plead, to curse, to frighten, to call, to summon, to retaliate, to keep intact, to transform, to remember, to keep harm away.”
From Errollyn Wallen’s memoir, Becoming a Composer (2023)
[1] John Wates (b. 1943), magistrate, music administrator, Anglican minister and philanthropist, is an Officer of the British Empire. He attended Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech in 1963. – PL
[2] William Wilberforce (1759-1833), Member of Parliament, was a driving force behind the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade. – PL
~ Notes by Peter Laki, copyright 2025