Also Available: Lyrita - Celebrating Fifty Years Devoted To British Music - Set Two

In Set One strong choices are made time after time. Alwyn’s Magic Island is in fact Prospero’s island - from The Tempest. The English Dances beguile and enchant. They are drawn from an LP and then from an extended CD which found Lyrita orchestral recording standards at their utter peak. The Russian Scenes are well done although ultimately they are a collection of exotic postcards and dances. The Benjamin Overture is a playful piece in the manner of the lighter examples by Barber and Bax. It comes as no surprise to discover that it was used as the overture to Benjamin’s opera Prima Donna. Berkeley’s crisp Serenade for Strings is presumably authoritative with the composer at the helm. Bliss conducting a suite from his Adam Zero seems underwhelming as music and as a performance - Handley’s version is much better. The delightful Bridge Suite for Strings is lovingly done by Boult. Similarly sumptuous and achingly poignant is A Shropshire Lad. Finzi’s Eclogue, Howells’ Merry-Eye and Hadley’s One Morning in Spring speak for themselves. The Forgotten Rite by John Ireland is a subtle, poetic and completely convincing piece. It’s interesting that this first set has only one bleeding chunk from a larger piece and that is the second movement of Busch’s Cello Concerto. The Cello Concerto is a strong work and makes quite a discovery among the rich crop of new Lyritas in 2008. Although issued on CD in the early 1990s the Foulds Mantras - of which we here have the Mantra of Bliss - is amongst the most radical and impressive. Then again Foulds was an extraordinary composer whose significance is international. Light music is represented by shapely performances of Coates’ From Meadow to Mayfair, Gibbs’ Fancy Dress and the Coleridge Taylor Valse. Fredman’s reading of the famous Delius Walk is to be treasured. He would have made an estimable Song of the High Hills had the opportunity been offered. Lyrita are the only label to provide Holst’s tangy Japanese Suite and, audaciously enough, it’s here in this set. From the 19th century comes Sterndale Bennett’s Caprice and the remarkable Variations on a Hungarian Air by Hurlstone. Henry Wood’s orchestration of the Bach Toccata and Fugue in D Minor was originally presented under a pseudonym, Paul Klenovsky. Oh how those Russian names legitimise British talent! Gipps’ Horn Concerto is played by the very talented David Pyatt. Would that Lyrita had also recorded her other concertos. Don’t forget her works for Clarinet (1940); Viola (Jane Grey Fantasy, 1940), Oboe (1941), Violin (1943), Piano (1948), Violin and Viola (1957) and Contra-Bassoon (Leviathan) and the five symphonies (1942, 1945, 1965, 1972, 1982). Names much associated with Cheltenham are represented by the Yorick overture, the Jabez and The Devil and the only recently vinyl-liberated Hoddinott Welsh Dances (Set 2).

- Rob Barnett, MusicWeb International


Lyrita - Celebrating Fifty Years devoted to British Music - Set One

CD 1 [73:53]
William ALWYN Symphonic Prelude - The Magic Island - LPO/Alwyn [10:11]
Malcolm ARNOLD English Dances - Set 2 - LPO/Arnold [9:49]
Bach orch. Henry WOOD Toccata and Fugue in D Minor - LPO/Braithwaite [9:49]
Granville BANTOCK Russian Scenes - LPO/Wordsworth [14:13]
Arnold BAX Northern Ballad No.1 - LPO/Boult [10:09]
Arthur BENJAMIN Overture to an Italian Comedy - RPO/Fredman [6:17]
William Sterndale BENNETT Caprice in E - Malcolm Binns (piano) LPO/Braithwaite [13:17]

CD 2 [75:21]
Lennox BERKELEY Serenade for Strings - LPO/Berkeley [13:14]
Arthur BLISS Adam Zero - Suite - excerpt - LSO/Bliss [8:53]
Frank BRIDGE Suite for String Orchestra - LPO/Boult [20:50]
William BUSCH Cello Concerto (II) Raphael Wallfisch (cello) - RPO/Handley [6:51]
Geoffrey BUSH Overture - Yorick - NPO/Handley [8:30]
George BUTTERWORTH A Shropshire Lad Rhapsody - LPO/Boult [8:38]
Eric COATES From Meadow to Mayfair Suite (excerpt) - NPO/Boult [8:14]

CD 3 [74:28]
Samuel COLERIDGE-TAYLOR Valse de la Reine - LPO/Wordsworth [4:32]
Arnold COOKE Jabez and The Devil - Suite - LPO/Braithwaite [18:02]
Frederick DELIUS The Walk to the Paradise Garden - LPO/Fredman [10:53]
Gerald FINZI Eclogue Peter Katin (piano) - NPO/Handley [10:32]
John FOULDS Mantra of Bliss - LPO/Wordsworth [13:06]
Cecil Armstrong GIBBS Fancy Dress - Dance Suite - RPO/Joly [17:20]

CD 4 [67:58]
Ruth GIPPS Horn Concerto - David Pyatt (horn) LPO/Braithwaite [17:14]
Patrick HADLEY One Morning in Spring - LPO/Boult [3:56]
Alun HODDINOTT Welsh Dances Set 2 - NYOW/Davison [9:04]
Gustav HOLST Japanese Suite - LSO/Boult [11:01]
Herbert HOWELLS Merry-Eye - NPO/Boult [8:52]
William HURLSTONE Variations on a Hungarian Air - LPO/Braithwaite [10:36]
John IRELAND The Forgotten Rite - Prelude - LPO/Boult [7:05]

rec. 1966-2007. ADD/DDD
LYRITA SRCD.2337 [4 CDs: 73:53 + 75:21 + 74:28 + 67:58]

‘I just write what I have to write’. The artistic credo of George Lloyd (1913-1998) conveys the directness and emotional honesty of his music. He wrote in a traditional idiom enriched by a close study of selected models, Verdi and Berlioz chief among them. His music is not derivative, however. It is distinctive and written with integrity. There is a remarkable consistency to his output, most of which was created spontaneously and without the incentive of a commission. He was fortunate enough to discover his individual and versatile musical voice at an early age. The deceptively artless quality of his scores stems from a rigorous grounding in composition techniques. Lloyd had found a champion of his music in conductor Edward Downes (1924-2009). Downes conducted the first performance of Lloyd’s Eighth Symphony (1961, orchestrated 1965) with the BBC Northern Symphony Orchestra, broadcast on Radio 3 on 4 July 1977. Many listeners were stopped in their tracks by the work’s melodic strength and imaginative scoring. This turning point in the composer’s fortunes marked the beginning of the public’s demand for performances and recordings of his music. In the succeeding five years Downes tirelessly promoted and disseminated Lloyd’s works. Paul Conway

Includes work(s) by Walter Leigh. Ensembles: Philharmonia Orchestra, London, New Philharmonic Orchestra. Conductor: Nicholas Braithwaite. Soloist: Trevor Pinnock.

It was after hearing the premiere of Joubert’s First Symphony given by the Hull Philharmonic under Vilem Tausky in Hull City Hall on April 12, 1956 that Russian-born pianist Iso Elinson invited the composer to write him a Piano Concerto. Completed in the summer of 1958, the resulting score is dedicated to Elinson, who gave the first performance of the work with the Hallé Orchestra under George Weldon on January 11, 1959 in the Free Trade Hall, Manchester. In keeping with Joubert’s instinctively symphonic approach to large-scale forms, the concerto is more of a sinfonia concertante than a bravura vehicle for pianistic display. The idea for a musico-dramatic work based on Charlotte Brontë’s novel Jane Eyre originated in the early 1980s, when the composer took early retirement from the University of Birmingham. This was a labor of love which he embarked upon unprompted and without the security of a commission. Dedicated to the opera’s librettist Kenneth Birkin and his wife Inge, Symphony No.3 on themes from the opera “Jane Eyre”, Op.178 (2014-17), reworks the five orchestral interludes as five symphonic movements. Originally written for chamber orchestral forces, the material has been re-scored by the composer for a full symphony orchestra.

These works by composer Wilfred Josephs are available here for the first time on CD on this 2-disc set. The pieces included on this recording are Symphony No. 5 "Pastoral", Variations on a Theme of Beethoven, and Requiem, Op. 39. Regarded as one of the composer’s most influential works, Requiem, Op. 39 was composed in memory of the Jews who died during the Holocaust. It won the first International Composition Competition of La Scala and the City of Milan. This recording was made in the presence of the composer.

Daniel Jones (1912-1993) composed in a wide range of genres, yet the cornerstone of his prolific output is the Symphony, memorably described by him as ‘a dramatic structure with an emotive intention’. He tackled the form afresh with each of his 13 examples, of which the first 12 are based on a different note of the chromatic scale. Jones’s Second Symphony was written between March and July 1950 and first broadcast in the Welsh region by an augmented BBC Welsh Symphony Orchestra under the composer on 13 September 1951. The Second Symphony places great emphasis on intricate rhythms and combines both lyrical and dance elements. There is a focus on orchestral colour, epitomised by the prominent role given to the celesta in the first, third and fourth movements. Expansive, big-boned and at times uncharacteristically discursive, it is Jones’ last symphony conceived on a large canvas: from now on his symphonic works would be increasingly concise and cogent, rejecting any orchestral colour extraneous to the musical argument. Daniel Jones’s Eleventh Symphony in E flat was completed on 7 December 1983 and premiered by the BBC Welsh Symphony Orchestra under Sir Charles Groves on 20 October 1984 in the Brangwyn Hall, Swansea. Commissioned by the Swansea Festival, it is dedicated to the memory of George Froom Tyler, chairman of the festival committee, who had died in 1983 and was a friend of the composer. Though each of his thirteen symphonies is a unique and highly personal statement, the cycle as a whole maintains an unwavering consistency of quality and vision. Daniel Jones domonstrates a steadfast integrity throughout, never bowing to the latest trends. His priority is always to communicate directly with the listener.

Daniel Jones (1912-1993) composed in a wide range of genres, yet the cornerstone of his prolific output is the Symphony, memorably described by him as ‘a dramatic structure with an emotive intention’. He tackled the form afresh with each of his 13 examples, of which the first 12 are based on a different note of the chromatic scale. Though each of his thirteen symphonies is a unique and highly personal statement, the cycle as a whole maintains an unwavering consistency of quality and vision. Daniel Jones demonstrates a steadfast integrity throughout, never bowing to the latest trends. His priority is always to communicate directly with the listener.

JONES Symphonies: No. 4, “In memory of Dylan Thomas” ; No. 7; No. 8 1 • Charles Groves, cond; Bryden Thomson, cond; 1 Royal PO; BBC Welsh SO 1 • LYRITA 329 (78:05)


Welsh composer Daniel Jones (1912–1993) was born in Pembroke and raised in Swansea, where he forged a friendship with the poet Dylan Thomas. After study in Swansea, Jones moved to London’s Royal Academy of Music. His output included concertos for violin, oboe, and cello; choral music, including the Oratorio, St. Peter ; an opera, The Knife ; chamber music; and 13 symphonies. Jones’s musical language is essentially tonal. He originated a rhythmic method for heightened expression—a device that he called “complex meters” involving maintaining and often juxtaposing, complex and often-irregular time signatures over a long timespan. Musically, Jones was influenced by Purcell, Haydn, and Janá?ek, but his language is personal. His symphonies can be broadly divided into three groups: Symphonies Nos. 1–5 (1944–58), conceived within the late-Romantic symphonic tradition and scored for large forces; Symphonies Nos. 6–9 (1964–72) moving towards greater structural experimentation, unusual combinations of instruments, and shorter lengths; and Symphonies Nos. 10–13 (1976–92) concerned with concision and paring down germ ideas to the barest essentials.


Daniel Jones’s Fourth Symphony, considered to be one of the composer’s finest achievements, was composed in memory of the poet Dylan Thomas, who had died, tragically young, in New York on November 17, 1953. Their relationship had been close; they had shared a zest for life. It was Jones who had written the folk-like music for Under Milk Wood. The Symphony is, understandably, elegiac; the opening Maestoso movement speaks bleakly of tragedy and loss, with a sometimes funeral-march tread, but also of defiance. The central Allegro capriccioso scampers along; it is light-hearted and capricious. Its playfulness might suggest the larger-than-life characters from Under Milk Wood , and perhaps the real-life antics of composer and poet, while its slower, sadder, middle section is more reflective, sometimes darkly so; it has a vulnerability, a sadness—and regret? The final Adagio-moderato-adagio is turbulent and disturbing; the music’s violence seemingly released reluctantly in a brief coda that highlights a solo violin with pizzicato cellos and basses.


The Seventh Symphony is cast in five movements, although the fourth and fifth share the same track. Completed in 1972 and dedicated to Sir Charles Groves, it was written as a commission from the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. The work has an unsettling ambiguity, the music often lurking in dark corners and having many abrupt contradictions. The most immediately appealing material is in the quicksilver Scherzando that employs a xylophone to heighten its puckish, tipsy fun, but even here tragedy stalks. The Eighth Symphony has five movements too. The music is enigmatic and ferocious, lyrical and searching, and not without a sardonic wit. Its extraordinary, arresting opening chords are sounded on marimba. Imaginative orchestrations abound: the often-spectral third movement has some amazing interchanges between piano and vibraphone; the elegiac fourth movement includes harmonic passages for kettledrums under heartfelt music for strings, muted trumpets, and softly played trombones; and the high-spirited finale sounds triumphant trumpets and tubular bells.


Strong performances of some quite original music. A rewarding disc for the adventurous.


FANFARE: Ian Lace

Classical Music

Another marvellous disc of two fascinating symphonic firsts and a fitting reminder of the stature of two great British conductors.

This is an absolutely marvellous disc which is going to put a lot of collectors in a bit of a dilemma. If like me, you snapped up this version of the Joubert Symphony No.1 when it first appeared as that rare fish, a Classical CD ‘single’, you will be wondering whether the performance of the Matthias will justify the duplication – I would say wholeheartedly it does. If by happy chance you missed the disc in its first incarnation hesitate no longer and grab it while you can. As well as the quality of the music performed here it serves as a powerful testament to the work of two of the best yet relatively under-appreciated British conductors of their respective generations; Sir Charles Groves and Vernon Handley - was ever a knighthood more deserved for service to the Arts in Britain?
 
John Joubert’s music is gradually receiving the recognition (in the recorded catalogue at least) that it richly deserves. The performance of the symphony here was released as part of his 80 ^th birthday celebrations in 2007 and proves it to be both instantly accessible yet also profoundly rewarding on deeper acquaintance. Joubert contributes his own fascinating liner note and although he rather self-deprecatingly calls it ‘very much a youthful work’ he also acknowledges that it ‘represents my coming of age as a composer’. Coming back to the work I am struck all over again by the compact power and economy of Joubert’s writing. Not that this is dry in any sense but it has control of its material and avoids the verbosity that afflicts many early efforts at extended composition. Joubert states that it is scored for a classical orchestra but the presence of heavy brass, piano and percussion assures that the sound world it occupies is very recognisably post-War British. The disparaging phrase ‘Cheltenham Symphony’ that was coined to intellectually bin any work giving even a passing nod to tonality from the 1950s through to the late 1970s would certainly apply here but I feel that is a badge it should wear with pride. As one would expect in an early work some of the composer’s influences and enthusiasms have not yet been totally assimilated into a unique compositional voice but again I would say so what. I enjoy hugely the Sibelian granitic climaxes such as track 1 5:10. I wonder if this control of form had anything to do with the fact that Joubert conducted some of the rehearsals of the – mainly amateur – orchestra in preparation for the first performance in 1955 and so was able to edit the work in the light of that experience. I can imagine it must have been both exciting and daunting for the Hull Philharmonic Orchestra; this is far from simple music to bring off. Clearly Joubert wrote what he had in his mind with no concession for the performers involved. The very opening of the 2 ^nd movement – Lento ma non troppo - is a case in point. Funereal almost ritualistic outbursts accompanied by scurrying string figures give way to a sombre string elegy over grimly dissonant wind and brass chords. To sustain the tragic atmosphere here must have tested the Hull players to their limit. Again the stalking brass suggests Sibelius – but even here Joubert’s voice is distinctly his own and Handley’s pacing of the movement is perfection; the slow underlying tread not allowing the music to be becalmed. The transition into the 3rd movement Presto is so quick the movement is on us before we have time to catch breath. I would put money on the fact this was the movement to give most trouble to the Hull players! Every section of the orchestra has tricky anxious figurations that need to be knitted together in the complex whole. Credit again to the excellent LPO tossing off what by definition must have been totally unfamiliar to them. Glorious brass writing ensures the movement rattles along with the sustained energy of youth – perhaps something of Walton’s Symphony No.1 and the cross-rhythms Walton delights in creeps in here but again the tight control of the material belies Joubert’s – at the time – relative inexperience. I was interested to read that the powerful slow introduction to the last movement was an afterthought written between first performance and publication. Again, a steady but powerful underlying pulse gives the music an implacable march-like quality – an impression reinforced by flamboyant tattoos on the timps and quietly insistent pedal notes from the piano. There is a cumulative build in the tension which is suddenly – and somewhat unexpectedly - released by the arrival of the movement’s allegro. Again, interesting to read that Joubert acknowledges in his note that the disparity in mood between the music from here to the end of the symphony and how it ‘caused some unease in the critic from The Times who covered its first performance’. Am I alone in suddenly hearing some Nielsen here? It has the flavour of that composer’s Sinfonia Espansiva and it is at odds to the music that has come before. Perhaps it is the sudden juxtaposition rather than the sense of a long-fought fight for release that jars. But it is a minor quibble, what a pleasure to hear such an impressive work performed so well – I can only imagine that it was one of Joubert’s best birthday presents! What a shame that Lyrita were not able to get Handley to record the 2 ^nd Symphony too before his untimely death in 2008.
 
It is clear the pleasure is not mine alone – throughout this symphony the LPO play with superb virtuosity and audible pleasure in the writing. Also, Handley proves yet again what a marvellous and committed interpreter he was of British music. A word too for engineering and production – it is in the finest Lyrita traditions – to my ear still the source of some of the best sound let alone performance on any recording of British music – the ideal mix of richly detailed sound without ever becoming synthetic or overblown. One little curiosity though; the Lyrita website for the CD ‘single’ version (SRCD322) lists the recording date as 2 March 1994 and the engineer as Simon Rhodes, the booklet for the current release has the same producer – Andrew Keener – but now it is from March 1995 with Tryggvi Tryggvason watching the meters! In either case it is superb – interesting how this recording team have been able to utilise/control the very resonant acoustic of Watford Town Hall to produce an ideal recording. I must admit I find some recent recordings there to be overly resonant thereby bloating the orchestral sound.
 
Given that the well of ‘original’ Lyrita recordings is now all but dry in re-release terms I am so glad to see them mining the back catalogue of other labels for recordings and performances worthy of resurrection. And Sir Charles Groves’ performance of the Mathias Symphony No.1 is certainly worthy. My sense is that Groves’ stature as a conductor is often overlooked or underestimated. Aside from his promotion of British music in recordings and in the concert hall it is worth remembering that he was the first British conductor to direct a complete cycle of the Mahler Symphonies and indeed the Liverpool Phil were the first orchestra to programme a cycle of the complete Shostakovich Symphonies (he did not conduct the complete cycle) during his directorship. In the field of British music his promotion of new music was astonishing and to this day recordings of his including Arnold, Bridge and Bliss have not been bettered. The recording here dates from just three years after the symphony’s first performance in 1966. Another textual quirk here – the note says the work was commissioned by the 1968 Llandaff Festival but premiered there in 1966…! The liner for the competing version of the symphony on Nimbus also quotes 1965/6 for composition and 1 ^st performance so I assume that 1968 is a typo. No recording information is given for this work in the liner other than its original release on the Pye Virtuoso label. But it sounds very well – the close immediate, slightly unsubtle sound, suiting the bravura of the writing. As with the Joubert all credit to the orchestra and conductor for their uninhibited reading of the score. While not the technical equal of the Joubert recording – there is a touch of harshness at the biggest climaxes, and the internal orchestral balances are occasionally subject to highlighting – the performance conveys a great deal of the excitement and energy contained in the work. I do not remember Pye as a label ever sounding anything like as good as this on vinyl so credit to the Lyrita re-mastering engineers for the job they have done. This work is dominated by dancing figurations in the way that the Joubert was concerned with predominantly more dramatic issues. So while the passing dissonance level in this work is much the same as in the Joubert the prevailing mood is lighter and more exuberant. Try track 6 1:45 – I love the way the violas dig away with the accompanying motif, while the percussion and timps riff away and the violins play a flamboyant unison melody. There is a devil-may-care brilliance here that is exciting and arresting. This is in direct contrast to the Molto Adagio 3 ^rd movement which has a sense of stasis where the previous two movements emphasised motion. A flurry of bird-like motion in the woodwind (pointed up with a rather heavy-handed glockenspiel – percussion often finding out the limitations of older recordings) disturbs the stillness or perhaps awakens the orchestra to strive for a briefly achieved climax. The range of moods here is wider than Joubert is trying to express, this is the most consciously ‘atmospheric’ music written on this disc. The brass led climax decorated with arpeggiating strings, piano, glockenspiel and harp. It has an almost heraldic quality but soon sinks back into the nature-music of the opening. But this heraldic quality re-emerges in the opening to the symphony’s finale. The RPO brass clearly relishing the ringing writing – again stirringly caught by the recording. But this brief largamente introduction is soon overwhelmed by the allegro con brio and energy of overlapping dancing rhythms is re-established. Mathias is particularly adept at blurring the bar-lines – without access to a score I have no idea how or where they occur in this work instead there is a strong feeling for smaller rhythmic units which break down conventional pulse and allow the music to become a riot of interlocking cells and polyrhythms. Try 6:40 into the final track 8 – there’s a touch of Hindemith’s Mathis der Maler with a brass chorale overlying running string and woodwind figurations which builds to a powerful if slightly abrupt climax.
 
Both works deserve to be heard live in concert but in the meantime this CD does them both honour. The Joubert is unchallenged but the Mathias has considerable opposition in the composer’s own recording on Nimbus with the (then) BBC Welsh SO. Although movement timings are reasonably similar the feeling of the Nimbus performance – aided in part but the recording – is far mellower. Also, the 1970 RPO - the strings in particular - is a more virtuosic ensemble than the 1990 Welsh. Groves seems able to maintain the driving dancing momentum better than Mathias and the less subtle recording helps that impression too. Conversely the third movement benefits from the mellower sound on Nimbus. Ultimately they are two very different takes on the same work and if I prefer the Groves it is because I have a penchant for the up-front vigour and vim it captures – this is a young man’s music and the spirit of that is well caught by Groves. Mathias’s own recording was made just two years before his own tragically early death and that spirit is not nearly so present.
 
Another marvellous disc of two fascinating Symphonic firsts and a fitting reminder of the stature of two great British conductors.
 
-- Nick Barnard, MusicWeb International

At the heart of this CD is the cellist Raphael Wallfisch. He not only performs these pieces with the utmost musicianship but they were also all written for him. Since the BBC NOW play with their customary skill under William Boughton, about as well established an expert on his native British music as one could wish to have, this CD is home and dry. The Hoddinott Hall is one of the best acoustics in the country and Lyrita's engineers have, as usual, produced a splendid sound. I did wonder about the slight left-placement of the cello but that is where soloists usually sit so it may simply reflect reality.

Joubert's work is, as the title states, in two movements. Each lasts a little over 11 minutes. Considering it is scored for only double woodwind, horns and strings, it displays a wide range of instrumental colours and is not only impressively coherent but also makes a very pleasurable sound. There is plenty of energy in the work. This is not a pastoral idyll one can allow to just wash over you. Joubert keeps one firmly engaged throughout and reminded me that I have neglected my sole Joubert CD prior to this, the First Symphony, also on Lyrita.

The late Robert Simpson was a very important symphonist and composer of string quartets. His musical structures require close attention from his listeners. This concerto, one of a mere handful, is typical of his later style. It was in fact his last orchestral piece. It consists of a theme and eleven variations played without a break and lasting very nearly half an hour. It is by turns lyrical and dramatic, ending quietly. Though the orchestra is large the textures are always clear and I found myself gripped by his typically involved musical argument right up to the 'calm resignation' of the coda, described thus in the excellent notes by Paul Conway.

Finally Christopher Wright has come to my attention only recently, having heard an extract from his lovely Violin Concerto of 2010 (Dutton CDLX 7286), so I was not surprised to discover that his Cello Concerto is also a fascinatingly individual creation full of lovely sounds but also of much energy and momentum.

We do not hear many different cello concertos in the concert hall. Those by Elgar, Dvorak, Schumann and Shostakovich are deservedly the most frequently performed. The three recorded on this CD are of a quality and approachability to match such as Saint-Saëns, Hindemith, Martinu and Walton. They should most certainly not be allowed to lapse into obscurity.

- Dave Billinge, MusicWeb International

Another plus on the Lyrita list: Jacob’s symphonies merit immediate attention

Gordon Jacob’s First Symphony (1929) employs sizeable forces (including triple woodwind and two harps) and has five movements: two feisty and purposeful Allegros frame the whole edifice, while its dashing central Scherzo is flanked by two slow movements, the first of which in particular possesses an elegiac demeanour that accords with the work’s inscription to the memory of the composer’s favourite brother, Anstey (a victim of the Great War – Jacob, too, served in the trenches). It would make a terrific “Guess who?” item: on a first encounter I jotted down the names of Vaughan Williams, Holst, Elgar, Walton, Bliss, Poulenc and Stravinsky. The more you return to it, however, the more individual the voice that emerges. Barry Wordsworth lends this powerful, criminally neglected discovery clear-headed, fervent advocacy, and the LPO are on their toes throughout. Completed in 1945, the Second Symphony was premiered under Boult in a May 1946 broadcast; Rudolph Schwarz gave the first public performance two years later. Cast in the traditional four movements and described by Jacob as “a meditation on war, suffering and victory”, it’s tautly argued, full of healthy contrapuntal vigour (I was at times reminded of Nielsen) and concludes with a cleverly crafted passacaglia or “Ground” – perhaps subconsciously influenced by, and yet fascinatingly different from, the finale of Vaughan Williams’s roughly contemporaneous Fifth Symphony. Comparison with Bostock’s rival account finds these newcomers generating the greater tonal heft and intensity (especially in the plangent slow movement); otherwise, both teams serve this bracing music admirably.

With its agreeably tangible and airy sonics in the best Lyrita tradition, this stimulating pairing of two impressive home-grown symphonies merits immediate investigation.

-- Andrew Achenbach, Gramophone [9/2007]

Includes work(s) for piano by John Ireland. Soloist: Eric Parkin.

Another splendid trawl through the treasurable Lyrita back-catalogue. Here's an uncommonly wide-ranging and generous selection of Holstian delights, encompassing music as stylistically diverse as the folk-song bumptiousness of the early Two songs without words (a VW dedication from 1906) to the ''tender austerity'' (to use the composer's own phrase) of the Lyric Movement for viola and chamber orchestra—a most haunting creation from his penultimate year. Elsewhere, we are offered such rarities as the colourful Golden Goose ballet music and Capriccio (both expertly reworked by Holst's daughter, Imogen), the gritty Double Concerto of 1929, as well as the composer's own string orchestra transcription of the tender ''Nocturne'' from A Moorside Suite—a marvellous work, scored originally for brass band (I do wish Decca would restore their superb Grimethorpe Colliery Band version to currency). The enchanting Brook Green Suite is here, too, but the outstanding account of the popular St Paul's Suite which came with it on that 1967 LP anthology will have to wait a little longer for its silver-disc debut.

Performances throughout possess unfailing insight, and the present remasterings are superb. An essential companion disc to Lyrita's classic Holst/Boult compilation from last year (7/92).

-- Andrew Achenbach, Gramophone [4/1993]

Classical Music