This is the fourth and final volume in the Chandos-Scott series
each instalment of which has paired a symphony and a concerto.
This one reveals
a fledgling green symphony by a young, and accomplished yet
impressionable Scott. The Symphony No. 1 is not a harmonically
complex work unlike the symphonies 3 and 4 and its mate on
this disc. Scott at twenty plays a magnificently light hand
and the music flows like cheering mercurial amber. The first
movement has a flowing grace which recalls the feather hand
of Binge’s much later Elizabethan Serenade and mixes
in the jauntiness of Grainger. The Andante is almost
Delian, warmly sighing and winsome. The Allegretto is
gently playful. The bipartite finale starts with a theme and
ten variations and is followed by a finale-proper. The Tema
con variazioni smacks of Vaughan Williams and the neo-classical
aspect of Moeran - those coarsely blown fanfares and confiding
rhythmic ostinatos. Add to the mix a touch of Rimskian-Moussorgskian
splendour. The same influence can be felt in the Bantock Russian
Suite. I kept expecting to pick up the religious and symbolist
influence of the poet Stefan George with whom the symphony
is associated but it is not that kind of work. It was, at
the time, perhaps the best of Scott and the composer dedicated
his then best to the object of his admiration.
The Cello Concerto is a mature
sombre work given eloquent expression by Paul Watkins. From
almost forty years later than the First Symphony it is confident
and totally accomplished. It seems likely that it was written
for Beatrice Harrison to match the symmetry of the as yet
unrecorded Double Concerto he had written for the Harrison
sisters. His Violin Concerto (recorded earlier in the series)
was a work championed by May Harrison. The Cello Concerto
is in three movements in which a rich tapestry of swooping
long passionate-lined melodies arc their way through a warmly
musing Delian canvas. The orchestration is lavish but sensitively
used with piano included. The work erupts in eloquent and
completely characteristic clouds as at 3:48, 6:31 and 12:30
in the long first movement. There is a short meditative intermezzo
pastorale which again makes tense play of the orchestral
piano and woodwind. This leads into a sanguine pattering Rondo
giocoso with pensive, melancholic Delian asides ending
in some positively Moeran-like celebratory flourishes. It
has something of the reflective and undemonstrative understatement
of the Moeran and Bax cello concertos. Watkins, who I last
heard in concert in Brighton in the Schumann concerto, manages
magnificently in this domain of the restless, the soulful
and the swirling. His adroitly hooded tone is spot-on for
Scott.
There is an earlier Cello Concerto from
1902. Perhaps we will hear it one day.
The liner notes are by Lewis Foreman.
They are typically informative - full of facts, nexus and
insight.
Two long unheard Scott works - one wonderfully
light of heart and celebrating a life-long admiration; the other
fully mature in his richest and most intriguing vein.
Rob Barnett
Cyril Scott on Chandos:
Symphony No. 2/Violin Concerto CHAN10407
Symphony No.
3/Piano Concerto 2 CHAN10211
Symphony No. 4/Piano Concerto 1 CHAN10376
