James Macmillan

Ninian James Macmillan

(Boosey & Hawkes Scores/Books). This clarinet concerto was premiered in 1997 as part of the celebrations of the Year of Ninian, one of the founding fathers of Christianity in Scotland. St Ninian, the first bishop of Whithorn, was believed to have arrived in Galloway in the south-west of the country in 397, nearly two centuries before St Columba landed on Iona. The three movements are based on three of the so-called Miracles of Ninian, strange and evocative tales about the saint and his followers, documented in a Latin poem written a few centuries after his death. As well as being a concerto, the work is therefore also a collection of tone-paintings which give an impression of these ancient tales.