Delius: Brigg Fair (An English Rhapsody) - download (MP3 & FLAC)

“Delius's piano writing isn't that of a natural virtuoso, but here Shelley transforms it with some really sensitive phrasing and an ability to make the patterns of the figuration sound idiomatic...Davis proves himself an instinctive Delian in the way he delineates the shifting moods and colours of Paris and Brigg Fair: these must be among the best current accounts of both works.” BBC Music Magazine, Christmas 2012 *****

“Shelley and Sir Andrew Davis bring rather more in the way of epic ambition and romantic ardour to this likeable music [the Concerto] than do their Hyperion rivals, though at times greater rhythmic snap would not have gone amiss...As for the remainder, Davis makes a lovely job of the early Idylle de printemps.” Gramophone Magazine, November 2012

“I believe that Andrew Davis is possibly the greatest conductor of this music since Beecham. Davis is so in touch with the unique qualities of Delius's genius as to cause one to stop and reconsider the music...I cannot image any of the works on this eminently desirable disc being better performed than they are here” International Record Review, December 2012

“There always was a unique alchemy between the art of Sir Thomas Beecham and the music of Frederick Delius, and you can detect it in every bar. … It is, quite simply, a performance to cherish, its beaming dedication, wistful heartache and rapt wonder leaving the listener in no doubt Sir Thomas' boundless love for a work that served as his introduction to the composer. David Lennick's transfers have been admirably managed, Appalachia now sounding rather more open and full-bodied than on a rival Dutton compilation.” Gramophone

“There always was a unique alchemy between the art of Sir Thomas Beecham and the music of Frederick Delius, to be heard in every bar of this remarkable January 1938 recording of Appalachia.
It's a performance of beaming dedication, wistful heartache and rapt wonder leaves the listener in no doubt about Sir Thomas's boundless love for a work that served as his introduction to the composer. (He later recalled how the 1907 London premiere under Fritz Cassirer left him 'startled and electrified'.) By July 1938 Beecham and the LPO had committed to disc the three remaining items that eventually made up The Delius Society's lavishly presented third and final volume of the composer's music issued by Columbia Records; suffice it to say, La Calinda skips along entrancingly here, while no true Delian could fail to respond to Beecham's ineffably poignant way with both the closing scene from Hassan and the lovely Irmelin Prelude.
Naxos's curtain-raiser, Brigg Fair, was recorded towards the end of the previous decade. Some seven months separated the two days required to produce a reading of unforgettable tenderness and bewitching poetry (the results of an even earlier session in July 1928 having been rejected altogether), although some will still hold a slight preference for the second of Sir Thomas's three versions (a gloriously intuitive display with the newly formed RPO from November 1946).
David Lennick's transfers have been admirably managed, Appalachia now sounding rather more open and full bodied than on a rival Dutton compilation. Throw in a lively and informative booklet-essay from Lyndon Jenkins, not to mention the absurdly low price-tag, and it should be abundantly clear that this is a selfrecommending issue.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010