Richard Hickox's performances of these two symphonies for Chandos are very good; indeed, his take on the first movement of the Sixth Symphony, so redolent of Sibelius' Third, is a touch more lively than that on offer here. But there's no denying the general superiority of the orchestral playing under Norman Del Mar, or Lyrita's richer sonics (Handley and the LSO only appear in the Soliloquy, very well played by Rohan de Saram). Yes, there are moments in the quicker sections of both symphonies where the textures get a bit clogged, but that's really the fault of the composer. Rubbra fought the orchestra. While he clearly was a symphonist of substance, getting his message across seemed to cause him no end of trouble. In these middle symphonies, however, the problems have largely been solved, and along with Nos. 5 and 7 they constitute the essential core of his output. Symphony No. 8, subtitled "Hommage to Teilhard de Chardin", gives free rein to the spiritual impulse that underlies so much of Rubbra's art, and although the Hickox cycle is complete, if you just want to sample this elusive (but very serious and ultimately worthwhile) composer, then this is the place to start. [11/16/2006]--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

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This lovely recording includes works for strings by Aurthur Benjamin (1893-1960), Bernard Stevens (1916-1983), Andrzej Panufnik (1914-1991), Arnold Bax (1883-1953), and Lennox Berkeley (1903-1989). The recordngs by Benjamin, Stevens, Panufnik, and Bax were broadcast originally on the BBC on January 31, 1961, and the Berkeley was broadcast on March 20, 1961. The recordings are performed by the Boyd Neel Orchestra, and the London Chamber Orchestra.

All three of these works were written at times of war. John Ireland's sonata was composed during World War One (1917) and was the work that established Ireland as a composer of note in the UK. The Franz Reizenstein and Geoffrey Bush sontatas come later, composed in 1945, and are far less well known. While all three works maintain a sense of melody and tonality, each composer finds room push boundaries. Bush's sonata receives it's premiere recording in this release

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Following demobilization from the army in 1919, Bliss wrote four exploratory essays in sonority and textures, including Madam Noy and Rout. They accorded him a short-lived reputation as an enfant terrible, but they can also be said to have paved the way for his first large-scale orchestral work, the Color Symphony. The "witchery song" Madam Noy (1918) is a bizarre variation on the old nursery rhyme "Old Mother Hubbard." Rout is used in the old sense of popular revelry, and is a vibrant score evoking the snatches of song that might be caught by someone watching a carnival. For the rarely encountered scena for contralto and orchestra, The Enchantress, the text was supplied by Bliss's poet friend Henry Reed. And finally, Bliss was Master of the Queen's Musick when he was commissioned to write The Beatitudes for the Festival of 1962 to mark the opening of the new Coventry Cathedral.

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These recordings of orchestral works by William Wordsworth (1908-1988) are all performed by the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra conducted by James Loughran or Stewart Robertson. These three works are original broadcast recordings from the BBC which aired between 1968 and 1979. These outstanding pieces are indicative of Wordsworth’s unique compositional style. He once wrote of his compositions, “I am quite convinced that I have something to say, and an individual way of saying it which the ordinary music-lover is capable is responding to if he is given sufficient opportunities.”

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