Walton: Sinfonia Concertante

“RCA's two-disc collection includes the premiere recording of the Cello Concerto with Piatigorsky – who commissioned the work – and the Boston Symphony under Charles Munch. Here is a highpowered reading, given an upfront recording, commendably full and open for 1959. Similarly Heifetz, who commissioned the Violin Concerto, remains supreme as an interpreter of that work, urgent beyond any rival as well as passionate.
Here he plays with the composer conducting the Philharmonia. The 1950 mono recording has been nicely opened up, putting more air around the sound, making the absence of stereo a minimal drawback. The other two concertante works come in digital versions: Kathryn Stott, originally for Conifer, adventurously going back to the original more elaborate version of the Sinfoniaconcertante, and Yuri Bashmet bringing his yearningly Slavonic temperament and masterly virtuosity to the Viola Concerto.
Bashmet's partners are the ideal combination of Previn and the LSO, and it's Previn's vintage version of the First Symphony with the LSO of an earlier generation that sets the seal on the whole package. Previn has never been matched, let alone surpassed. Also remarkable is the clarity, definition and sense of presence of the 1966 recording, with the stereo spectrum more sharply focused than in the digital recordings.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Naxos opts for the original version of the Sinfoniaconcertante rather than Walton's revision, with piano writing and orchestration slimmed down. Walton himself, before he died, suggested such a return. As soloist Peter Donohoe plays with power and flamboyance, brought home the more when the piano is very forwardly balanced, too much so for a work which doesn't aim to be a full concerto, leaving the orchestra a little pale behind. Even so, hopefully this account, broad in the first movement, flowing in the central Andante, will persuade others to take it up, young man's music built on striking, colourful ideas, used with crisp concision.
Paul Daniel is splendid at interpreting the jazzy syncopations with the right degree of freedom, and in the Spitfire Prelude and Fugue he adds to the impact by taking the big march tune faster than many, similarly demonstrating that The History ofthe English Speaking Peoples March, buried for rather too long, is a match for Walton's other ceremonial marches. Best of all is the performance of the Hindemith Variations, given here with winning panache. The strings of the English Northern Philharmonia may not be as weighty as in some rival versions, but the articulation is brilliant, and the complex textures are all the more transparent. The fire and energy of the performance has never been surpassed on disc.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Stott savours the dreamy sonorities of Ireland's Concerto; she's also superb in Frank Bridge's darkly flickering Phantasm and Walton's heavy-handed early work. Powerful accompaniments, too.” BBC Music Magazine, June 2009 ****

“Stott, most sympathetically accompanied by Vernon Handley and the RPO, proves a persuasive, committed interpreter” Penguin Guide, 2011 edition