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Tuesday, December 31, 2019

Ralph Vaughan Williams; John Blackwood McEwen - Works for Viola (Lawrence Power)


Information

Composer: Ralph Vaughan Williams; John Blackwood McEwen
  • (01) Vaughan Williams - Suite for viola and small orchestra
  • (09) McEwen - Viola Concerto
  • (12) Vaughan Williams - Flos Campi

Lawrence Power, viola
BBC National Chorus & Orchestra of Wales
Martyn Brabbins, conductor

Date: 2011
Label: Hyperion
https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA67839

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Review

Power and Brabbins unite for British viola gems

As Lewis Foreman explains in his very informative notes, this disc is effectively a tribute to the work and vision of the viola player Lionel Tertis, who commissioned all three works featured here. It is good to hear McEwen’s Viola Concerto of 1901 given a performance of such conviction. A pioneering work that predates the substantial British Romantic chamber works for viola by Bowen and Dale, the Concerto gave Tertis the opportunity to project his instrument across a large-scale, ambitious three-movement structure, its rhetoric common to many late‑19th-century concertos, yet the register and tone of the viola generate a different sound world in which McEwen’s rich orchestration gently yet sumptuously supports the solo instrument. Lawrence Power’s playing is wonderfully varied, at times delicate and poetical, at others broad, passionate and generous.

This is especially so in the case of the two works by Vaughan Williams. Though I admit to a special fondness for Willcocks’s 1964 recording of Flos campi, with the radiant, numinous sound of King’s College Choir, Power’s intonation, tone and interpretative insight have the edge over that of Cecil Aronowitz, especially in the lyrically expansive paragraphs. But Power (and Brabbins, who exercises his usual imaginative flair and masterly orchestral control in this repertoire) is at his best in the Suite of 1934. Here the very sound of the viola seems to articulate that quintessential voice of the composer: the generous paraphrase of Bach in the Prelude, the simple melody of the ‘Carol’, the heavenly aura of the ‘Ballad’, the mercurial élan of the ‘Moto perpetuo’ and the deeply innocent ‘Musette’. This is a ‘must have’ for all lovers of Vaughan Williams and British music in general!

-- Jeremy Dibble, Gramophone

More reviews:
ClassicsToday  ARTISTIC QUALITY: 9 / SOUND QUALITY: 9
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2015/Mar/VW_flos_CDA67839.htm
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2011/nov/13/lawrence-power-vaughan-mcewen-review
https://www.allmusic.com/album/vaughan-williams-flos-campi-suite-for-viola-mcewen-viola-concerto-mw0002243548
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vaughan-Williams-Campi-McEwen-Concerto/dp/B005OCES5M

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Ralph Vaughan Williams (12 October 1872 – 26 August 1958) was an English composer of symphonies, chamber music, opera, choral music, and film scores. Strongly influenced by Tudor music and English folk-song, his output marked a decisive break in British music from its German-dominated style of the 19th century. Vaughan Williams is among the best-known British symphonists, noted for his very wide range of moods, from stormy and impassioned to tranquil, from mysterious to exuberant. His works have continued to be a staple of the British concert repertoire, with all his major compositions have been recorded.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Vaughan_Williams

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John Blackwood McEwen (13 April 1868 – 14 June 1948) was a Scottish classical composer and educator. McEwen was born in Hawick and studied at the Glasgow University and the Royal Academy of Music. He was professor of harmony and composition at the Royal Academy of Music, London, from 1898 to 1924, and principal from 1924 to 1936. Among his students were William Alwyn, Dorothy Howell and Priaulx Rainier. McEwen's music achieved little public recognition, partly because he rarely sought it. Despite that, he nevertheless did much to further the cause of other British composers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Blackwood_McEwen

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Lawrence Power (born 1977) is a British violist. Power studied with Mark Knight at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, and with Karen Tuttle at the Juilliard School. He won 1st prize at the Primrose Competition in 1999. Since his London solo debut with The Philharmonia, he has performed in the UK and abroad, appearing as soloist with many leading orchestras. Power also has a prominent career as a chamber musician, as violist in the Nash Ensemble and the Leopold String Trio. He plays an instrument by Antonio Brensi of Bologna from c.1610. Most of his recordings are published by Hyperion Records.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Power

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