L Berkeley, M Berkeley: Piano Concerto, Op. 29; Four Poems of St Teresa of Ávila, Op. 27; Tristessa; Gethsemani Fragment

COMPOSERS: L Berkeley,M Berkeley
LABELS: Chandos
WORKS: Piano Concerto, Op. 29; Four Poems of St Teresa of Ávila, Op. 27; Tristessa; Gethsemani Fragment
PERFORMER: Catherine Wyn-Rogers (contralto), Howard Shelley (piano), Celia Craig (cor anglais), Steven Burnard (viola); BBC National Orchestra of Wales/ Richard Hickox
CATALOGUE NO: CHAN 10265

Vol. 5 of Chandos’s series devoted to Berkeley father and son pairs two works from the 1940s by Lennox with two from 1990 and 2003 by Michael. Lennox Berkeley’s Piano Concerto of 1947 is a real find (though it has been recorded before, if long out of the catalogue), lyrical and spiky by turns and played here with feeling and lucidity by that ever-resourceful saviour of forgotten concertos, Howard Shelley. Lennox Berkeley’s Four Poems of St Teresa of Ávila, originally written for Kathleen Ferrier, is a short cycle shot through with religious intensity, and Catherine Wyn-Rogers proves herself an honourable successor to Ferrier in the concentration of her tone colour and her text-awareness. The first of Michael Berkeley’s works here is also religiously inspired, but the general sense of Gethsemani Fragment for string orchestra is an abstract expression of grief, while Tristessa, named after a character in an Angela Carter novel, has its roots in the world of Dowlandesque lacrimation. This later work, shortlisted for the British Composers Awards being announced on 17 December, is a highly effective tone poem – not at all as gloomy as it sounds – with solo roles for those most plangent of instruments, cor anglais and viola. Played with fervour and authority by the forces for whom it was written, this performance caps a welcome addition to the Berkeleys’ discography. Matthew Rye