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Disc Details


Title: Complete works for solo piano
Soloist(s): Martin Jones, piano
Label Name: Metronome
Catalogue Number: METCD1068/1069

Contents

Work Title Composer
Excursions Richard Rodney Bennett
Impromptu on a theme of Henri Dutilleux Richard Rodney Bennett
Impromptu on the Name of Haydn Richard Rodney Bennett
Memento Richard Rodney Bennett
Noctuary Richard Rodney Bennett
Partridge Pie Richard Rodney Bennett
Scena I Richard Rodney Bennett
Taking a Line for a Walk Richard Rodney Bennett
Tango after Syrinx Richard Rodney Bennett
Three Romantic Pieces Richard Rodney Bennett

Reviews

  • The range of musical masks Bennett can wear comfortably is breathtaking. One minute he's coaxing extraordinary riches of expression and delicacy from the Schoenbergian 12-note system in Fantasy; the next he's transforming Debussy's solo-flute favourite Syrinx into an insidiously seductive Tango. He can sustain a compelling musical argument for nearly 25 minutes in the ballet-based Noctuary or deftly spin a sequence of winsome miniatures like the seven Diversions.
    One common element, though - which does mark these pieces out from most of the piano music written particularly in the 1960s and 1970s - is Bennett's obvious respect for and understanding of the instrument, its historical attributes (witness Three Romantic Pieces) as much as its modern potential. That's as evident in the four-hand pieces as in the solo works, though here Bennett the suave charmer and barbed wit takes the spotlight (apart from the refreshingly spiky Capriccio). Good to have recordings so well attuned to the whole kaleidoscope of colours and textures. Recommended.

    Stephen Johnson, BBC Music Magazine, 01 January 2005
  • The stylistic range of these solo works is about as wide as it could possibly be: from the jolly teaching pieces collected in Seven Days a Week, A Week of Birthdays and the like, to the very early, and overtly Bartokian, Sonata, the serialist Fantasy and the confident adaptation of Messiaen in Five Studies, and to jazz syntheses such as Excursions and Noctuary, for which he is well known. The latter, at 24 minutes his longest piano piece, was written for a MacMillan ballet and deliciously draws out Scott Joplin rags. Martin Jones plays with great vigour.
    , Sunday Times

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