British Music Society CDs

Mewton-Wood plays Twentieth Century Piano Concertos

Arthur BLISS (1891-1975) Piano Concerto (1938-39)
Igor STRAVINSKY (1882-1971) Concerto for piano and wind instruments (1924)
Dmitri SHOSTAKOVICH (1906-1975) Concerto for piano, trumpet and strings Op. 35 (1933)

Noel Mewton-Wood (piano) Harry Sevenstern (trumpet) (Shostakovich) Utrecht Symphony Orchestra (Bliss); Residentie Orchestra, The Hague (Stravinsky); Concert Hall Symphony Orchestra Walter Goehr (conductor) rec. 1952 (Bliss, Stravinsky); 1953 (Shostakovich). mono. ADD Transferred by Bryan Crimp from LPs drawn from the collection of Robert Milnes Financial assistance from the Bliss Trust Originally issued as Concert Hall LPs: CHS1167 (Bliss); CHS1160 (Stravinsky); CHSH4 (Shostakovich)

BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY HISTORIC BMS101CDH

An interesting selection of CDs received in connection with the 70th birthday of the Society's President, John McCabe:

Mewton-Wood plays Bliss, Stravinsky and Shostakovich [BMS 101CDH]

This is a fine compilation of demading piano concertos, with a personal memir by John Amis, who played piano for him for the Busoni Concerto and talked with Noel for an hour and a half the night before he killed himself.

Best remembered is probably the Bliss war-horse, which I fear has ot made it into the repertoire. The Stravinsky concerto is recorded with Walter Goehr & the Residentie Orchestra wth "uncanny and faultless accuracy", but for me the best of this disc is his joie de vivre and panache in Shostakovich's No.1 (with trumpet); exhilarating and excellent mono-1953 in a traqnsfr which is "the first on CD to be made aat the correct pitch level" !

{revs of the others in the batch to follow}