Elgar/Walker: Piano Concerto & Other Orchestral Works

Advantages: One of the most Romantic concertos around, full of beautiful melodies and passion
Disadvantages: over-recorded

...INTRODUCTION Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninov was one of the most promising composers emerging from Russia after Tchaikovsky. His early works included the youthfully energetic Piano Concerto in F sharp minor, Op.1, an orchestral fantasia The Rock, the opera Aleko, several songs, piano pieces (including the famous Prelude in C sharp minor, a work that would plague Rachmaninov with its popularity throughout his life) and the First Symphony in D minor, Op.13. Rachmaninov had high hopes for the latter; it was his magnum opus up until that time. However the symphony proved to be the biggest disappointment of his career, causing a tremendous crisis in his creative life. All the critics jumped on the work, most notably César Cui who compared it with the Seven Plagues of Egypt and condemned the work as modernist trash. The effect... Read review

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Advantages: Good tuba muisc
Disadvantages: None

...with a fanfare like opening to the first movement and then launches into the main material. It has two contrasting themes in the first movement, a rhythmic one and a much more lyrical one. The first movement makes a great opening to the concerto, with a good bright tempo, a great melodic line (especially in the middle with a lovely, high, lyrical melody) and great orchestral accompaniment. The second, middle, movement is much slower and has a main string chorale (hymn like tune) which is heard at the start and end of the movement. The middle has the tuba solo which is very chromatic and leads to a climactic point. This movement isn't as good in my opinion, but as contrast is a very important part in many concerti, this is achieved, and achieved quite well. The final movement is faster again, with a rondo structure and bright dance like melody... Read review

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Advantages: It is simply one of the finest pieces of music ever written
Disadvantages: How dare you ask of any disadvantges!?!

...of the work in existence, neither are there any sketches left, but there were numerous mentions of the work in letters and diaries, such as the note from Alice when the conductor Landon Ronald came to visit on Elgar's sixty-second birthday on June 2, that Elgar played large chunks of the concerto on piano and three days later the cellist Felix Salmond came to try the work out on his cello and was apparently "delighted and enthusiastic." Elgar was enthusiatic as well and often was seen waking up at early morning, adding passages and orchestrating the work, and by late July he told Sidney Colvin he had "nearly completed a Concerto for Violoncello: a real large work and I think good and alive." He dedicated the concerto for Colvin and his wife Frances, and after a couple of additions that Salmond came out to try at Brinkwells, the score was ready by... Read review

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