Royal Ballet Orchestra - Elite Syncopations - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Philip Lane has long been a stalwart of British Light Music and this recording provides an excellent survey of his concert works. London Salute marked the 60th anniversary of BBC, while the lyrical and frivolous Diversions on a Theme of Paganini was originally written for brass quintet. Partly inspired by childhood memories, the Cotswold Dances reflect the composer's own part of the country, Gloucestershire and the Cotswolds. Composed for clarinet soloist Verity Butler, the Divertissement quotes liberally from Lane's earlier works, the most popular of which is the Sleighbell Serenade, a piece that has been performed all over the world.

RTE Sinfonietta - Ballet Music - Les Sirenes [COMPACT DISCS] date 03/11/2022

The English composer and conductor Gregory Rose (b. 1948) here presents a programme of some of his recent orchestral compositions, prefaced by a 90th-birthday tribute to Aaron Copland. Many of these pieces show the influence of Stravinsky in their angular melodies, brittle harmony, hieratic gestures and fondness for dance. Rose's Violin Concerto, a single span of nine interlocking episodes, has a similar sense of implicit drama it casts the soloist as the central character whom the instruments of the orchestra engage in dialogue as the work progresses.