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Product Description
Spitfire Prelude & Fugue; Sinfonia concertante; Variations on a Theme by Hindemith; March for 'A History of the English Speaking Peoples'.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Enjoyable, musical and very good value,
By Majkic (Leeds, U.K.) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Walton: Spitfire Prelude & Fugue, Sinfonia Concertante, Hindemith Variations (Audio CD)
The English Northern Philharmonia give a spirited and very musical rendition of some of Walton's concert hall standards in this budget Naxos release. I particularly enjoyed the "Spitfire" Prelude and Fugue. The disc is well recorded with a big and convincing sound space, but marred a little (at least to my ears) by the rather excessively "swimmy" or reverberant acoustic of Leeds Town Hall (somewhat improved in refurbishments since this recording was made). The background noise level in the hall, whilst not problematic, is not of the very best either, but these are minor technical criticisms of an otherwise very enjoyable and good value recording.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
4.6 out of 5 stars (7 customer reviews) 8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very good on its own terms,
By F. Behrens "Frank Behrens" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Walton: Spitfire Prelude & Fugue, Sinfonia Concertante, Hindemith Variations (Audio CD)
William Walton's music on 8.553869 does not depend on extra-musical elements. His Spitfire Prelude and Fugue, Sinfonia Concertante, Hindemith Variations, and March are played with style by pianist Peter Donohoe and the English Northern Philharmonia under Paul Daniel. I find the Variations the gem of this collection; but then again I am very fond of the variation-style of development. Be sure also to check into Walton's music for Olivier's "Hamlet," "Henry V" and "As You Like It," also on Naxos label.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A challenge and a delight for the ears,
By Mark Swinton - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Walton: Spitfire Prelude & Fugue, Sinfonia Concertante, Hindemith Variations (Audio CD)
William Walton was one of the most gifted composers of twentieth century Britain. He knew the musical consciousness of this country, particularly as it developed over the years, and his style was thus wide-ranging and all-accomodating, as in the Sinfonia Concertante which has all the elements of full-blooded nobility you would expect from him- with more than a few surprises along the way. Peter Donohoe plays with fire and finesse throughout, but especially in the Sinfonia, and Paul Daniel (conductor of the music at the Millennium Dome Opening Ceremony) guides the orchestral forces with equal aplomb.I say this is a challenge, and no doubt it will be for some ears- I find that whilst this disc is a taste of the best of British, it perhaps not so pleasant a taste as Vaughan-Williams or Elgar. Nevertheless, I was very taken with this recording when I first heard it and I hope you will be as well. 7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Walton in Several Guises,
By Thomas F. Bertonneau - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Walton: Spitfire Prelude & Fugue, Sinfonia Concertante, Hindemith Variations (Audio CD)
William Walton (1902-1983) came on strong in the 1920s with his "Façade," a cheeky Stravinskian suite to nonsense poems by Edith Sitwell. He soon developed into a rather slow-working master of large traditional forms such as concerto and symphony; he also worked in the motion picture industry in Great Britain and provided music for cinematic adaptations of Shakespeare. Naxos has committed to issuing the complete orchestral music and much has already come into the catalogue, including the two symphonies and the three string concertos. The present disc gathers smaller orchestral pieces. The Spitfire Prelude and Fugue derives from the score that Walton contributed to the film "The First of the Few" (1942), about R. J. Mitchell, the aeronautical engineer who designed the famous Supermarine fighter-interceptor. The Fugue cleverly suggests a host of aerial combatants mixing it up in a dogfight; but the denouement is heavenly rather than martial, related perhaps to the fact that Mitchell died soon after the prototype of the Spitfire flew - but his spirit lives on angelically, as it were. (No wonder the producers of the 1968 film "The Battle of Britain" wanted Walton to do the full score, but Walton was tired; Ron Goodwin wrote most of the music while Walton contributed only the balletic "Battle in the Air," which was orchestrated, not by the composer himself, but by Malcolm Arnold.) The Sinfonia Concertante comes from 1927 and constitutes Walton's first large-scale work for the concert-hall. The jazziness of "Façade" is still present, but submerged into a more serious context. Both a symphony and a concerto, the Sinfonia telegraphs the two main channels of Walton's development over the next decade. The Variations on a Theme by Hindemith (1963) represent late Walton, who, in this score, ingeniously develops a theme from Hindemith's Cello Concerto, along with the B-A-C-H theme, and throws in quotations from the opera "Mathis der Maler" as well. This is one of those works, like Bliss' Discourse for Orchestra or Rawsthorne's Symphonic Variations, that takes seemingly inauspicious material and works it out in such a way that the procedures themselves become fascinating. But the score is by no means dry or academic. Indeed, Walton pays homage to Hindemith's keen sense of orchestral color. A brief March, written to serve a BBC documentary on "The History of the English Speaking Peoples," fills out the program. Unusual repertory in cracking good performances. I especially like the Variations.
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