Bax/Bridge/Britten/Stanford - Orchestral Works - Handley, Vernon
Here is a unique collection conducted by Vernon Handley including music by Britten’s teacher Frank Bridge and the Celtic composer Arnold Bax.
On its release this record became famous as an audiophile demonstration record.
It is now available for the first time at mid-price Britten’s Peter Grimes has been described as “the most successful of all modern English operas”. The opera is distinguished by a series of Interludes, linking the scenes in each of the three acts and thereby ensuring continuity of construction. Realising the popularity of the Interludes, Britten took the most compact four and placed them together as a single work piece in four sections. The result is Four Sea Interludes, rich and evocative pieces which encapsulate the spirit of the opera and the atmosphere of the Suffolk coast. The “Storm” interlude is much admired by hi-fi buffs for its incredible sound.
Frank Bridge’s The Sea is a richly atmospheric work, sumptuously orchestrated and full of ravishing melodies which proved a great influence on a young Benjamin Britten (his pupil) – in particular the haunting third movement “Moonlight”. Handley and the Ulster Orchestra perform the work with brilliance and heartfelt compassion.
Bax’s Prelude, On the Sea Shore makes a colourful and atmospheric companion to the masterly Bridge and Britten pieces on the disc. Completing this collection is Stanford’s The Fisherman of Loch Neagh and What He Saw, a distinctive, sharply contrasted, colourful and atmospheric work – especially picturesque, in part because of the Irish melodies woven into it. It was Stanford’s intense Irishness which in fact protected him from the Teutonic influences in British music during his earlier years.
Ulster Orchestra/Vernon Handley
Benjamin Britten
Four Sea Interludes, Op. 33a
from Peter Grimes, Op. 33
1 I Dawn
2 II Sunday Morning
3 III Moonlight
4 IV Storm
5 Passacaglia, Op. 33b
from Peter Grimes, Op. 33
Frank Bridge
The Sea
Suite
6 I Seascape
7 II Sea Foam
8 III Moonlight
9 IV Storm
Arnold Bax
10 On the Sea-Shore
Edited and orchestrated by Graham Parlett
Charles Villiers Stanford
11 Irish Rhapsody No. 4, Op. 141 'The Fisherman of Loch Neagh and What He Saw'