Percy Hilder Miles

[MikePurton]

Just to let you know that our wonderful Percy Hilder Miles CD is now on general release and is available at all the usual dealers. Or you can buy directly from my website at www.mikepurtonrecording.com

Great reviews so far including 'Very strongly recommended – my disc of the year' (Kevin Maundry BMS Journal December 2021). More on the way!

[eschiss1]

Just the sort of thing I've been hoping for since I first heard of this composer. Thanks!

[matesic]

Percy's most promising orchestral work was probably his short cello concerto (more accurately "concertino") that nearly got performed at the 1908 Henry Wood Promenade Concerts. From his correspondence in April of that year we learn that piano rehearsals with cellist Bertie Withers were going swimmingly, until at short notice Percy received an offer to tour Australia as an examiner for the Associated Board of London music colleges. It appears his time on the liner and the far side of the globe was so fully occupied that he never got around to finishing the orchestration. Withers then seems to have returned the score addressed to "My Friend Herbert Withers", perhaps with justifiably strong words because Percy then struck out the dedication in his Catalog of works.

My attempts to adapt the piece for viola or violin are too grotesque so for the time being this is the closest we can get to how it may have sounded in rehearsals. If it been a hit with Timber and his promenaders Percy's career may have taken a completely different course.

https://imslp.org/wiki/Category:Miles,_Percy_Hilder

It seems UC doesn't like the specific link to the concerto but you can find it yourself from there!

[matesic]

It was good that Mike's CD of Percy's chamber music played by Ensemble Kopernikus got an airing followed by complimentary and perceptive words on last Saturday's Radio 3 Record Review.

[Alan Howe]

Agreed. An excellent showcase.