World première recordings made in the presence of the composer
This year 2010 British Composer Award winner Rory Boyle celebrates his 60th birthday. Young virtuoso pianist James Willshire’s debut recording explores the full gamut of Boyle’s compositional personality – from the cragginess of his finely wrought Sonata to the intensely human lyricism of Tatty’s Dancing (itself a 60th birthday present for Boyle's wife).
“Willshire shaped and characterised every moment with freshness and lucidity.” The Herald, September 2007
“While Boyle’s scottish roots are never far away, his music has a strong, mainstream European, Stravinsky-based rigour, with its own brand of virile, challenging, but always comprehensible counterpoint, dissonance which is hardfought yet never gratuitous, an unsentimental lyricism and unerring sense of architecture.” Nicholas Cleobury
23rd April 2011
“Boyle (born 1951) has built a compact oeuvre of predominantly tonal pieces that showcase a gift for natural melody. Too traditional for today’s taste? Judging by this CD he deserves to be better known...In all, Boyle shows a distinctive voice and fluent imagination”
The Arts Desk
Graham Rickson
28th May 2011
“Boyle’s compact, pungent Sonata makes for compelling listening, especially the central Recitatives and Dreams with its bell-like sonorities...the myth of Phaethon driving the sun chariot allows Boyle to compose a compact sequence of five bleak, pithy dances. It’s not a comfortable listening experience, but it’s so, so exciting.”
February 2012
“a composer of considerable range and depth...This is challenging, yet accessible music.”
