Prompted by Lionel, I have added an MP3 of this broadcast to BIMA:
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor
Four Novelletten, Op.51 (1903)
BBC NOW/ Ryan Bancroft (br. 26/11/2020)
Thank you, John.
I greatly admire these pieces; while on the surface they appear to be cut from similar cloth to the
Petite Suite de Concert of 1911, they seem to me to have, in parts, considerable profundity. There are certainly hints of Tchaikovsky in the first movement but, more significantly I think, there's an Elgarian wistfulness about the opening of the third movement
Valse which later rises to a really impassioned climax. In the 'What are you currently listening to?' thread, Albion describes the string orchestra genre as 'difficult' and so it is but SC-T, as a violinist and as a conductor of string ensembles knew exactly how to write for the medium to maximum effect. As Albion also wrote, "Parry's writing for strings is second to none, neither Dvorak nor Tchaikovsky". I'd put SC-T's writing for strings in the same class. But then I would, wouldn't I? ;)
