Evening Songs
Delius and Ireland Songs
arranged for cello and piano
Julian Lloyd Webber, cello
Jiaxin Cheng, cello
John Lenehan, piano

Frederick Delius’s beautiful songs show his extraordinary gift for melody. John Ireland admired Delius enormously and his songs are inspired by a wide variety of literature, including his hugely popular setting of John Masefield’s Sea Fever. Renowned cellist Julian Lloyd Webber celebrates both composers’ remarkable melodic gifts in these sensitive arrangements, and pianist John Lenehan has received great acclaim for his Naxos recordings of Ireland’s complete piano music.

George GERSHWIN (1898-1937)
Concerto in F • Rhapsody No 2
I Got Rhythm Variations
Orion Weiss, piano
Buffalo Philharmonic • JoAnn Falletta

George Gershwin’s Concerto in F was a response to demands for a ‘proper concerto’ after the success of Rhapsody in Blue, avoiding programmatic content while providing a feast of tunes both uplifting and nostalgic. Originally intended as music for a film, his up-beat Rhapsody No. 2 describes the bustling Manhattan cityscape while under construction. Sourced from his hit musical Girl Crazy, I Got Rhythm Variations was Gershwin’s last full score. Pianist Orion Weiss is one of the most sought-after soloists and collaborators of his generation of young American musicians. Also Available on Blu-ray Audio

Claude DEBUSSY (1862-1918)
Complete Orchestral Works
[9 CDs boxed set]
Orchestre National de Lyon • Jun Märkl

This collection contains all Debussy’s works for orchestra as well as many orchestral arrangements of his piano music. Together these display a rich panorama of Debussian sound and a remarkable insight into the composer. Established arrangements by Debussy’s contemporaries, including Ravel and Caplet, are complemented by more recent arrangements from composers such as Colin Matthews and Robin Holloway. The conductor Jun Märkl believes that Debussy ‘set up a model of orchestration for the rest of the twentieth century’ and it is with this conviction that he draws from the Orchestre National de Lyon such ‘world-class playing’ (American Record Guide).

Krzysztof PENDERECKI (b 1933)
Sinfoniettas • Oboe Capriccio
Artur Pachlewski, clarinet
Jean-Louis Capezzali, oboe
Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra
Antoni Wit

Composed over a period of some thirty years, the six string works in this programme cover the full stylistic range of Penderecki’s towering compositional career. The Sinfoniettas are transcriptions of two chamber works, impassioned in texture, courting elegy and terse gesture alike. With the Three Pieces in Old Style we are in the world of Baroque pastiche, whereas introspective intensity runs through the Serenade of 1997. Radicalism informs the Intermezzo whilst the Capriccio, written a decade earlier, reveals Penderecki’s lighter, more piquant side in scintillating fashion. ‘Antoni Wit’s Penderecki series for Naxos has been uniformly excellent… Top recommendation’. (ClassicsToday.com on 8.572032)

Edvard GRIEG (1843-1907) (arr Alf Årdal)
String Quartet in G minor Op 27
String Quartet in F major
Arne NORDHEIM (1931-2010)
Rendezvous
Oslo Camerata • Stephan Barratt-Due

Grieg’s String Quartet in G minor has long established itself as one of the finest such works of the second half of the nineteenth century. The distinction of its thematic material, and its use in cyclical form, is reinforced by an ultimately victorious motto theme. The F major Quartet was written later, but remained unfinished, but it too is a fertile creation with a strong dance profile. Both works are heard in Alf Årdal’s imaginative arrangements for string orchestra. Arne Nordheim, Norway’s leading living composer, wrote Rendezvous as a quartet but expanded it in 1986. It is an intense, moving, and beautifully crafted work.