The Times 25th June 1976
Lloyd Webber / Seow
Purcell Room. Hitherto, cellists have had four works by Delius at their disposal, although a fifth, early work was known about. That is the Romance (1896), which has just been published. It received its first British performance, two days after its premiere at the Helsinki festival, by Julian Lloyd Webber and Yitkin Seow last night. In Mr Lloyd Webber, for the first time since Jacqueline du Pre took the Concerto and Sonata into her repertory, Delius has an eloquent exponent able to draw out the long-spanned sequential writing and make emotional rhetoric out of a style which can easily sound merely prolix. The new work proved to be a modest recital piece, after the manner of the Caprice and Elegy. One could not fail to admire Delius’s sure handling of the tenor register of the instrument. Lloyd Webber revealed a firm, well focused tone which spoke evenly throughout all the registers, with certain intonation and, above all, a cool, levelheaded way with the music which never overstated its case.
Keith Horner
