This is a remarkable coupling of tuneful music. E. J. Moeran, who died in 1950, has a considerable following for his fine Symphony in G minor, and concertos for violin and cello. It has long been known that he left sketches for an unfinished Second Symphony, which have rivalled those of Elgar’s Third Symphony as a tantalising musical ‘might-have-been’ among British symphonic scores. Now in a remarkable parallel with Anthony Payne’s performing edition of the sketches of Elgar’s Third Symphony, conductor Martin Yates has realised and completed the sketches of Moeran’s Second Symphony to reveal a glorious work given wing by this idiomatic performing edition, brilliantly played by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra under Yates’s baton. This is an exciting discovery, which all lovers of British music, especially of the period of Bax and Vaughan Williams, will want to hear. The themes and orchestration are Moeran at his most persuasive, and thanks to Martin Yates’s efforts we now have a completed symphonic work of art to lay beside Moeran’s G minor Symphony. It is accompanied on this CD by Moeran’s Overture for a Festival, which survives only as an undated piano score. In a work thematically linked to the G minor Symphony, this idiomatic orchestration was made by Rodney Newton for its first performance at the 1994 Norfolk and Norwich Festival, and here receives its premiere recording. To mark the fiftieth anniversary of the death of John Ireland, The John Ireland Trust have commissioned Martin Yates to orchestrate the piano suite Sarnia: an island sequence (1940-41), which provides a charming companion to the Moeran works. In these three movements – Le Catioroc, In a May Morning and Song of the Springtides – we have, if not quite an English La Mer, certainly a distinctive and colourful score. “Ireland surely had the orchestra in mind when writing this evocative music,” remarked Martin Yates during the recording. In the finale those sparkling climaxes – at the brilliant cadenza-like culmination of the opening section and the thrilling closing bars – acquire a new dimension in their orchestral dress.

"Moeran's symphony, unfinished when he died in 1950, is one of British music's most tantalising might-have-beens. It has been lovingly restructured and orchestrated by Martin Yates, who obtains virtuoso playing from the RSNO. John Ireland's Sarnia is 20th-century romanticism at its most appealing."
Michael Kennedy, The Sunday Telegraph, 22 April 2012

The public response to Dutton Epoch’s exploration of the orchestral music of Stanley Bate has been very positive, and there will surely be new enthusiasts for this fourth volume, which features the Second Piano Concerto and the First Sinfonietta, coupled with another Dutton Epoch discovery, the music of Franz Reizenstein whose Second Piano Concerto is grippingly played by Victor Sangiorgio. Here Dutton Epoch celebrates the centenary of the birth of both composers: Bate born in Plymouth, Reizenstein in Nuremberg (and coming to the UK in 1934). Stanley Bate’s scores date from 1938 and 1940, and his Concerto is characterised by its relentless energy and onward drive. Bate was a man who readily absorbed what was new, and if we sense the occasional flavour of Hindemith and the Shostakovich First Piano Concerto (complete with obbligato trumpet in the finale) in the fast music, and the lyricism of Poulenc in the slow movement, we also quickly recognise the ebullient voice of Bate himself in two scores that just precede his celebrated Third Symphony. Franz Reizenstein was one of the many composers and musicians who were forced to leave Germany when the Nazis came to power. Reizenstein wrote in all forms, with much piano music and chamber music. The Second Piano Concerto, perhaps briefly his most popular orchestral work, was first performed by the composer at a BBC broadcast concert from Maida Vale on 7 June 1961. Published in 1962, it was seen as an approachable modern work, and indeed pianist Victor Sangiorgio brings a romantic sweep to his performance, which is surely what the composer intended.

The best yet! Dutton Epoch’s sixth volume of British Light Music Premieres presents nine composers in some 29 tuneful tracks, nominally 10 works. The disc opens with Anthony Hodges’s bustling evocation of market day at the Yorkshire town of Beverley and encompasses two Welsh composers (Hoddinott and Mansel Thomas) in folk-song mood, Philip Lane’s tuneful and varied dance movements, fast and slow, and a potpourri of show tunes by Richard Addinsell and Noel Gay from 1926. Carey Blyton’s Cinque Ports the composer described as ‘music for an opera’ in which he set five different scenes that might have taken place in a harbour town. His tango – El Tango Ultimo – distils the essence of South American dance into a few hypnotic minutes. David Morgan’s group of charming pieces – Music for Children – is crowned by John Fox’s unique musical evocation of Princess Diana – Portrait of Diana of 1997. Who said light music was dead?

John Foulds’s Cello Concerto at last! This is a beautiful, romantic programme. In his booklet notes, Malcolm MacDonald describes Foulds Cello Concerto as “a youthful essay in a melodious late-Romantic idiom ... a succession of memorable tunes in superb orchestration.” He goes on to find the coupling – the Cello Concerto by Lionel Sainsbury – as “unabashedly tonal and opulent melodic language, recalling the neo-romantic idiom of great 20th century composers such as William Walton and Samuel Barber.” Long requested by Foulds enthusiasts after Raphael Wallfisch had revived it in a broadcast over twenty years ago, Dutton Epoch is delighted to make it available following the success of their two-volume survey of Foulds’ shorter orchestral works. Raphael Wallfisch is now joined by Martin Yates and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra to make this world premiere recording. For Lionel Sainsbury’s equally delightful Concerto, the Dutton Epoch team journeyed to Glasgow where the Royal Scottish National Orchestra relished Sainsbury’s memorable invention, recorded in the presence of the composer.

The celebrated conductor John Wilson returns to Dutton Epoch with the BBC Concert Orchestra to conduct a third programme of orchestral music by Edward German, most of the material played being either world premiere recordings or first digital recordings. This is repertoire on the stylistic cusp between light music and symphonic fare, and all of it informed by German’s characteristic lyricism and orchestral flair. The programme is focused on theatre music – the music with which German came to fame – and includes extended suites from Shakespeare’s Much Ado and Henry VIII, and shorter extracts from The Tempter and Romeo and Juliet. The Marche Solennelle of 1890 and the 1911 Coronation March and Hymn complete the programme. Delightful stuff, and essential not only for the many collectors who bought Volumes 1 & 2 in this series, but also for those wanting to explore this composer’s engaging music. Here, John Wilson and the BBC Concert Orchestra are in their element.

This world premiere recording of Peter Horton’s new edition of Vaughan Williams’ Fifth Symphony edited from the manuscript is the first time a recording addresses all the textural problems left in the published score. Peter Horton writes: “The composer’s notoriously hard-to-read handwriting caused further problems, as the copyist assigned to make a fair copy of the score introduced a large number of mistakes, principally (but not exclusively) in the phrasing and articulation. To compound matters, these subsequently made their way into the orchestral parts and the published score. The most significant was the delay by one bar of a timpani entry in the Romanza.” The coupling is Christopher Wright’s deeply felt Violin Concerto sensitively played by Fenella Humphreys. Christopher Wright’s affecting Concerto was written in memory of his wife, and looks perhaps to Walton for its stylistic roots, especially in the scherzando elements of the middle movement. Composer Elis Pehkonen writes how, “Words cannot convey the beauty and emotional content of this music.”

Pianist Hiroaki Takenouchi (featured in the critically acclaimed television documentary The Prince and the Composer) has recorded his first programme for Dutton Epoch. He explores piano concertos by Georgy Catoire (1861-1926) and Percy Sherwood (1866-1939), two worthwhile but neglected contemporaries who came to musical maturity in the closing years of the nineteenth century. The Russian Catoire – who came into the circle of Tchaikovsky, Arensky and Lyadov – wrote in that glorious musical time in Russia before the dissolution of the Revolution, and it is remarkable that his heart-warming, lyrical Concerto of 1909 has been unrecorded until now. To all intents and purposes, the German-born Percy Sherwood was a late romantic composer, who made a significant career as both pianist and composer in Germany until 1914, but he died in London in June 1939. His output derives from the late-nineteenth century romantic tradition, a character particularly apparent in the gorgeous slow movement of his Second Piano Concerto (1932-33). These two delightful additions to the piano concerto repertoire are issued in Dutton Epoch’s International Series.

As a coupling for their new recording of Frederic Austin’s romantic overture Richard the Second with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, Dutton Epoch have reissued tracks from three different earlier recordings, all brilliantly remastered, to assemble a remarkable survey of orchestral music by the great English baritone, Frederic Austin, who was also a notable composer. Austin’s big-boned Symphony of 1913 almost certainly influenced his friend the young Arnold Bax, while the colourful orchestral tone painting in the overture The Sea Venturers adds yet another vibrant musical sea picture to the repertoire. Both are vividly played by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra under Douglas Bostock. The programme is completed with Austin’s delightful nature poem the Symphonic Rhapsody Spring, a success at the Proms in 1907. They make a cherishable sequence, which reveals yet another British composer who had been eclipsed, but proves very much to have had something to say. If you like Bax or early Frank Bridge, this is a terrific discovery.

Frédéric d’Erlanger’s romantic Piano Concerto, Concerto Symphonique, dates from 1921. Brilliantly played by Victor Sangiorgio – all flashing pianism and sumptuous orchestration – it will appeal to lovers of the romantic concerto. It is coupled with two delectable shorter works for cello and orchestra: the Ballade (1926) and the Andante Symphonique (1903). Beautifully projected by cellist Guy Johnston, one immediately wonders why we had not heard them before. Similarly romantic is d’Erlanger’s comparatively small output of orchestral music, which is well represented here by Sursum Corda! (1919) and the Prélude Romantique (1934). This is a gorgeous survey of a deserving romantic composer.