John Blackwood McEwen: Solway Symphony (No. 5) in C♯ minor (1911) The London Philharmonic/ Mitchell ChandosThis arrived today! I have listened to this via homemade cdr's & it didn't,exactly,excite me! I'm wondering if having the shiny cd & nice booklet with all the trimmings,will make a difference. It often does!! (Not with Rufinatscha,it didn't! ;D). There are influences readiy audible in the orchestration here! Strauss & Wagner,some impressionism. It all makes for a heady concoction,with some,colourful,,stirring,late romantic style orchestration! The second movement (moonlight) really is gorgeous! Again,what a difference the hard,shiny disc & trimmings make! (Or,maybe it is just a question of birates & Ned Luddite is just c*** at making cdr's?!) Lovely! I will,certainly,look out for Chandos' cd of McEwen's Border Ballads,now! And looking at the list of composition's on McEwen's Wikipedia page,there's plenty more for an enterprising recording label to explore! Whether,it's all worth recording or the scores are extant,I don't know? But this'll do nicely,for now!😊
Hooray, another McEwen fan! Get all three Chandos discs of the major works including
Ode on the Morning of Christ's Nativity and have a listen to the early A minor Symphony which is in the archive (PM me if you don't have the link). McEwen has such a distinctive voice, albeit with the influences you mention (who can exist on a musical island?), that he strikes me as well worth a go -
Solway and
Grey Galloway are probably the best places to start, but there's much more to explore certainly. As with Potter, Sterndale Bennett, Parry, Mackenzie, etc. he got increasingly bogged-down with administrative duties to the detriment of his own creative time...
::)