Bax was asked to write the music for David Lean’s Oliver Twist. One of the most memorable themes from that score was that for Mr Brownlow. Here it is treated with that extra passion and deeper conviction appropriate to Pearse and those who died in the reprisals following the ill-fated Easter uprising in Dublin in 1916. In Memoriam commemorates Pearse and how splendid it sounds in this spine-tingling performance by Vernon Handley and the BBC Philharmonic. Bax was clearly greatly moved when writing this music it conveys all the anguish he felt at learning about all the suffering in his beloved. Ireland. In Memoriam is part-elegy, part-funeral march, and partly a furious remonstration against a cruelly suppressed bid for Irish independence. Marching rhythms with insistent side drum and bugle calls contrast with music that suggests Irish Elysian Fields fit for heroes. A wonderful musical experience. This would have been ideal source music for Michael Collins - or for any drama dealing with The Troubles. Bax’s music is vivid and colourful and highly romantic and dramatic, ideal as screenplay source material.

The Concertante for Piano (Left Hand) and Orchestra written for Harriet Cohen who had injured her right hand is an undemanding work with first movement theme that could have been used in a Western! The Bard of the Dimbovitza clearly shows the influence of the Russian composers, that so impressed Bax in his earlier years, as well as the French impressionists. It is a colourful song cycle for soprano and orchestra from Romanian Folk Verses. They vary in mood from the eerie and ghostly to the romantic and the sardonic. A fuller review of this excellent release can be found on our associated Classical Music on the Web site

Reviewer

Ian Lace

Reviewer

Ian Lace