RCA Red Seal have reached into their back-catalogue
for Bridge and Delius works previously issued on Conifer Classics
to considerable critical acclaim. This double CD set is a French
release in the RCA Red Seal Artistes Répertoire Series
without English translations. With my schoolboy French I was still
able to spot several factual errors and spelling mistakes in the
annotation; which seems sloppy presentation. The gate-fold card
sleeve has a strange-looking cover design which looks like it
could be a page from an embroidery magazine merged curiously together
with a head and shoulders photograph of an unknown woman. It certainly
isn’t Tasmin Little! In spite of a cobbled-together impression
the release contains wonderful music excellently performed and
recorded.
The first disc contains the four Delius sonatas
for violin and piano. The chamber works of Delius are often ignored
in favour of his larger-scale orchestral tone-poems. However these
four sonatas are wonderful examples of Delius’s art. They
are moody, rhapsodic, containing rich tapestries of sensual and
subtle textures with touches of impressionism. Sometimes wistful
and sometimes ecstatic, I have heard these sonatas described as
being, “Delius at his most meltingly lyrical”, a mood
that Tasmin Little and Piers Lane so expertly convey to the listener.
Their expressive playing is of the highest quality giving a sense
of ‘time suspended‘. Little’s violin has a really
beautiful tone and Lane plays most sympathetically. It is hard
to imagine these works played better.
Described by eminent music writer Mark Morris
as, “…an innovative and introverted composer…”
the orchestral works of Frank Bridge are becoming increasingly
better known both in the concert hall and the recording studio.
A selection of Bridge’s lighter works and miniatures for
strings or small orchestra are contained on the second disc. They
are superbly performed by the Britten Sinfonia under Nicholas
Cleobury. Of the eight works the most substantial is the appealing
Suite for Strings that Bridge composed in 1909. There is a willow
grows aslant a brook from 1927 and the Incidental music from:
The Two Hunchbacks composed in 1910 are clearly significant and
important scores. The remaining five works: Threads, Rosemary,
Canzonetta, Berceuse and Serenade are vignettes, short in duration
yet extremely attractive. Nicholas Cleobury is a sensitive Bridge
interpreter conducting warm, tender and sensuous performances
from the Britten Sinfonia.
With warm and enticing interpretations this is
a release reminding me of ‘summer sunshine’. Splendid
performances excellently recorded makes this a most desirable
set.
Michael Cookson
Tasmin Little (violin) Piers Lane (violin) Recorded in 1997. No details
of recording venue provided. 