Penguin CD Guide 2001
English Idyll
English idyll (with ASMF, Neville Marriner): VAUGHAN WILLIAMS: Romanza. ELGAR: Romance in D min., Op. 62; Une idylle, Op. 4/1. Discs: 2 Pieces for cello and chamber orchestra. GRAINGER: Youthful rapture; Brigg Fair (arrangement). DYSON: Fantasy. IRELAND: The holy boy. WALFORD DAVIES: Solemn melody. Holst: Invocation, Op. 19/2. Cyril Scott: Pastoral and reel. The highlights of Julian Lloyd Webber’s programme of English concertante miniatures are the Holst Invocation, with its nocturnal mood sensitively caught, and George Dyson’s Fantasy. Grainger’s passionate Youthful rapture is given just the right degree of ardent espressivo, as are Delius’s warmly flowing Caprice and Elegy, written during the composer’s last Fenby period for Beatrice Harrison. The two transcriptions, Vaughan Williams’s Romanza and the Elgar Romance, were both arranged for the cello by their respective composers. Lloyd Webber gives the full romantic treatment to John Ireland’s simple tone-picture, The holy boy, and to Grainger’s arrangement of Brigg Fair. For the closing Cyril Scott Pastoral and reel he returns to a more direct style, with pleasing results. Sympathetic accompaniments and warm, atmospheric recording.
