Related Links

Recommended Links

Give the Composers Timeline Poster



Site News

What's New for
Winter 2018/2019?

Site Search

Follow us on
Facebook    Twitter

Affiliates

In association with
Amazon
Amazon UKAmazon GermanyAmazon CanadaAmazon FranceAmazon Japan

ArkivMusic
CD Universe

JPC

ArkivMusic

Sheet Music Plus Featured Sale

The Classical Explorer

   Symphonic Poems: April 2008 Archives

English Music from Lyrita

|
Lyrita 269

Granville Bantock
(1868-1946)
Overture to a Greek Tragedy 1

Joseph Holbrooke
(1878-1958)
The Birds of Rhiannon 2

Cyril Rootham
(1875-1938)
Symphony #1 2

1 Philharmonia Orchestra/Nicholas Braithwaite
2 London Philharmonic Orchestra/Vernon Handley
Lyrita SRCD269 62:30

A concert comprising Bantock's moody overture, Holbrooke's fairly gentle tone poem, and Rootham's engaging symphony. There are echoes of such composers as Ralph Vaughan Williams, Arnold Bax, a touch of Edward Elgar, even Ernst Moeran. The heart of the half-hour symphony is its beautiful slow movement with similarities to Vaughan Williams' Pastoral Symphony and occasionally William Walton's 1st.

[ Available on CD: Amazon - UK - Germany - Canada - France - Japan - ArkivMusic - CD Universe ]

Polish 19th-Century Symphonic Works

|
Accord 11369

Karol Kurpinski (1785-1857): Two Huts
Ignacy Feliks Dobrzynski (1807-67): Monbar
Stanislaw Moniuszko (1819-72): The Fairy Tale
Zygmunt Noskowski (1844-1909): The Steppes
Wladyslaw Zelenski (1837-1921): In the Tatra Mountains

Sinfonia Varsovia/Grzegorz Nowak
Accord 011369-2 66:31

This is an enjoyable collection of orchestral music by mostly little-known 19th-century Polish composers. The standout is the Noskowski, a 20-minute symphonic poem with memorable themes and sweeping momentum. The mystery is the inclusion in the Zelenski of a theme familiar from Antonín Dvořák's Cello Concerto, which was written 25 years later.

[ Available on CD: Amazon - UK - Germany - Canada - France - Japan ]

Little-Known Sibelius

|
BIS 815

Jean Sibelius
(1865-1957)

The Wood Nymph, Op. 15 - Ballade
A Lonely Ski-Trail (1925)
Swanwhite, Op. 54
The Wood Nymph, Op. 15 - Melodrama

Timo Keinonen, cello
Lasse Pöysti, narrator
Sakari Tepponen, violin
Pauli Pietiläinen, organ
Harri Karri, piano
Lahti Symphony Orchestra/Osmo Vänskä
BIS BIS-CD815 62:08

The Wood Nymph is early Sibelius but is a powerful orchestral work that had to wait until this 1996 CD for its first recording. Swanwhite is a delicate suite of incidental music with most movements lasting little more than a minute. If you dislike music with narration, the other two pieces are minor short works and it's these that include the narrator.

[ Available on CD: Amazon - UK - Germany - Canada - France - Japan - ArkivMusic - CD Universe ]
Trumpet