Duttons for May/June

[Paulp]

No.12 could stand a new recording that really does justice to this ferociously concentrated work: the Naxos doesn't quite do it for me - a little soft-centred, and that final gong stroke nowhere near powerful enough (a side note here: am I alone in thinking the strings-only slow section in that work sounds almost like Tippett in its lyrical efflorescence?). Given the work's brevity (only no.22 is shorter, I think), that would bring the CD's playing time to, say 57-58 mins., which would still leave room for something else if so desired. Either In Memoriam or For Valour would fit the bill. All in all, we've come a long way since the times when the only way you could hear most of the Brian symphonies was to hunt down those pirated Aries recordings - who'd have thought that now we'd have multiple recordings of the Gothic, never mind having The Tigers commercially available at last? Still some way to go, obviously - I would certainly want to see Agamemnon commercially recorded at some point - may I live long enough! But all the same...... :)

[Dundonnell]

I am a little concerned by the rumour that Lyrita intends to issue some of the BBC broadcasts of the Brian symphonies as part of the Itter Broadcast Collection.

Why ??? Well most of these are already in circulation, either on cd from Klassic Haus or on You Tube. No doubt Lyrita could improve the sound quality but there is then the old question about how many of these broadcasts continue to stand up today. Yes...some of them do and yet I cannot escape the feeling that issuing more Brian recordings made 40 years ago is not perhaps the best route to go down. I know that there are others who share this view. At best I think that Lyrita should be very selective if that is indeed something they are planning.