British Music

[oldman]

Once again, a thousand thanks for the wonerful music.


BTW - since you seem to be making this threa the stanard stopping point for british music downloads, would it not be a good  idea to consoliate .(with the owners permission of course) the Broadcast of ebenezer Prout's 3rd and 4th Symphony into this list?

[albion]

would it not be a good  idea to consoliate .(with the owners permission of course) the Broadcast of ebenezer Prout's 3rd and 4th Symphony into this list?

If Mark is agreeable, I'd like to move the Prout broadcasts across to the main listing to prevent them from getting 'lost' in the body of the thread.

[Mark Thomas]

Of course.

[jerfilm]

Wow!  Lovely work for a combination that has all too few titles......
Thanik you, thank you
Jerry

[albion]

Wow!  Lovely work for a combination that has all too few titles......
Thanik you, thank you
Jerry

Whitlock's Symphony is splendid and certainly deserves a wide audience. With Mark's approval, I've now moved the Ebenezer Prout files to Folder 1 and Cipriani Potter's 1837 Quartet to Folder 5.

[Mark Thomas]

And I should have added my renewed thanks, Albion, for this cornucopia. The Whitlock, Bowen and O'Neill works are downloading as I type.

[Pengelli]

Whitlock is one of those composers that enthusiasts rave about. Imagine this being given a professional state of the art recording by Chandos or Telarc? I remember being excited by the Chandos recordings of Guilmaunt and thinking why don't we get this,now and again,instead of the,admittedly,wonderful Saint-Saens,over and over again. (Don't get me wrong,I like Saint-Saens,and allot of his music is neglected) Listening to this gave me the same feeling. What's wrong with Whitlock? Is it the name? Or because he's un-exotically British? (Oh,and born in Kent,like my mother!)
This could be popular!

[Pengelli]

After this I just had to buy a cd of the Whitlock Organ Sonata.

[calico]

Just to say thank you, Albion, for all these wonderful recordings. This will keep me busy for ages!

[albion]

Just to say thank you, Albion, for all these wonderful recordings. This will keep me busy for ages!

Great! The whole intention of starting this thread was to showcase the wonderful depth of British music beyond the Elgar-Vaughan Williams-Holst-Walton-Britten canon - the view of Britain as the "poor man" of European musical culture is a travesty, the inanity of which is still not properly acknowledged.

Much has been, and is being recorded beyond this core repertoire (Chandos, Hyperion, Lyrita, Dutton, et al) but there is clearly so much more and quite often important broadcasts of wonderful music have come and gone without any wider dissemination! I'm really pleased that the willingness to share off-air recordings has been embraced by so many members and hope that this will continue. For example, Dylan had kindly sent another broadcast from the 1995 Britannia at the Opera series which I will transfer from tape and upload at the beginning of next week.

[albion]

As promised, I have transcribed, edited and uploaded the 1995 broadcast of excerpts from The Olympians (1948) by Arthur Bliss from the tape kindly sent by Dylan. These eight extracts can now be found in Folder 5. 

Here is some brief but useful information on this wonderful opera, including a synopsis: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Olympians

[albion]

Another very kind donation by hammyplay has given us a broadcast of the Fantasy for Piano and Orchestra by Reginald King (1904-1991). This can be found in Folder 5.

Primarily known as a composer of light music, this work (a revision of an earlier Piano Concerto) shows another side of King's considerable talent. Here is some background information on the composer and his career - http://www.bardic-music.com/king.htm. 

[jerfilm]

Lovely piece - thanks Hammyplay.....and Albion

Jerry

[Mark Thomas]

I'll second that, thanks. Very pleasant.

[thalbergmad]

What's wrong with Whitlock? Is it the name? Or because he's un-exotically British?

I wonder if it is possible to be put off a composer by his name. Being English and born in Kent, it seems strange to me that someone with the name of Percy could compose such great music. I would expect my butcher, milkman or favourite uncle to be called Percy, but not a composer. Whilst not sounding exotic to me, I wonder if the name sounds exotic to someone living in France or Germany?

I once suggested to my piano teacher that he would be far better known if he changed his name from Richard Meyrick to Ricardo Merikov. I don't think he has though.

Thal