Following the success of Arthur Butterworth’s recording for Dutton Epoch (CDLX7212) of his Fourth Symphony and Viola Concerto with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, we are delighted to announce the composer’s gripping direction of the RSNO in his Fifth Symphony. This work is coupled with five of his shorter orchestral works – Three Nocturnes, Coruscations, The Quiet Tarn, The Green Wind and Gigues – music written over an almost fifty-year span. Butterworth is the musical poet of the north, and as the English Sibelius he occupies a special place in the repertoire. The shorter pieces are very varied in their sound-world. From the bleak grandeur of the Nocturnes to the coruscating Gigues and the warmth of The Green Wind, this is music in which the RSNO respond eloquently to the composer’s direction. World premiere recordings.
December 2010
“Throughout, Butterworth's confident orchestral touch never deserts him...the RSNO turns in an eminently respectable set of performances under the 86-year-old composer's sprightly baton. The extremely vivid engineering pulls no punches - and the balance, too, is very well judged.”
