A note here in regard to the sense of form in Sorabjit: Mr. Lebrecht tells us that "his music has to be heard many times before any sense can be made of structure or intent." This is in fact encouraging, since it implies that there IS structure to be found in it by one who is willing to persevere.
Mr Lebrecht's
FT (I think) preview of John Ogdon's 1987 performance of
Opus Clavicembalisticum in London's QEH gave anyone unfortunate enough to read it a fairly accurate idea of how much its author knew about Sorabji's music; we don't in any case need his "guidance" in order to ascertain for ourselves what forms there are.
And a question - an obvious one really which I should have asked Mr. H. earlier - the name "Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji," what language is it? And what do the three words - presumably chosen by the composer himself - signify?
All I know is that a "Parsee" - which according to the Grove Dictionary is what Sorabji père was - is one of the descendants of those Persians who fled to India in the seventh and eighth centuries to escape Muslim persecution, and who still retain their religion (Zoroastrianism); in other words a "Guebre."
Although answers to some of this have already been provided, here are some more pointers:
The Sorabji Resource site, launched only recently, gives a detailed history of Sorabji's name metamorphoses as traced through early correspondence:
http://www.mus.ulaval.ca/roberge/srs/01-forms.htmUntil its founder and webmaster Prof. Marc-André Roberge's forthcoming biographical study is published (hopefully very soon), the best source volume for information about Sorabji is
Sorabji: A Critical Celebration, ed. Prof. Paul Rapoport (Scolar Press [now Ashgate Publishing], Aldershot, UK; 1992, repr. 1994); some information on Sorabji's name, background and religious beliefs is given on its pp.68-70 and the book remains available today.
The best résumé of Sorabji's names and their significance is, however, to be found towards the beginning of Ronald Stevenson's essay
A Zoroastrian Musician in Dorset (1961, rev. 1988), which is reprinted near the front of the booklet accompanying John Ogdon's historic recording of
Opus Clavicembalisticum (Altarus, AIR-CD-9075); the composer did not "choose" his surname which was, of course, his father's, his middle name (which was indeed "chosen" at some point, although we cannot yet be certain as to who did so or when) was his father's forename and either he or someone certainly chose for him the first forename Cyrus, the Anglicised version of Kaikhosru, before he adopted "Kaikhosru" itself.
The existence of the above resources, incidentally, is surely far less suggestive of a "prematurely forgotten composer" than of one who was arguably not "remembered" soon enough?...
Sorabji was indeed born into the Zoroastrian faith on his father's side; his mother, always known not to be a Zoroastrian, has recently been discovered to have been English. The composer was not a practising Zoroastrian, however and, although some of his correspondence and other writings indicate a relatively early interest in Buddhism and a later one in Roman Catholicism (he published, for example, quite a number of "letters-to-the-editor" in the British publication
Catholic Herald), it is probably fair to say that he never subscribed to a single faith as we understand them.
I hope that this helps!
