Radhika de Saram

All recordings featured on this album are live studio recordings made in 1971 and 1972 for radio broadcast in Holland. Written for the great cellist Rostropovich and considered one of the most difficult cello concertos, Prokofiev's Cello Concerto, Op. 58 is not often recorded and thus this FHR album is a welcome issue.

Rohan de Saram releases an album featuring the premiere recordings of works whch were both written for and premiered by the virtuoso cellist. Showcasing works by Richard Drakeford, Hilda Paredes, David Matthews and, the collection follows on from an earlier release [FHR49] and is devoted to works that were written for and were premiered by Rohan de Saram, his championing of new and unfamiliar music having been a hallmark of a career which now stretches back across six decades. A repertoire that is as extensive as it is varied in overall range, encompassing as this does many of those stylistic traits that have emerged during the post-war era and which here eschew the mutual exclusiveness that has too often proved an obstacle to the reception of contemporary music. A vindication, if such were necessary, of Rohan de Saram’s advocacy.

Virtuoso cellist Rohan de Saram's new album features four works which have come to the forefront of repertoire for solo cello from the modern era: Arnold Bax's Rhapsodic Ballad is his only solo piece for this instrument. Likely the most often performed of his earlier works, Ligeti's Sonata for Solo Cello has for over a decade been used as a test piece for the Rostropovich Competition in Paris. Dallapiccola's composition was written for the Spanish cellist Gaspar Cassado. It is a substantial, powerful work, and an early serial composition of the composer, full of colourful effects and humour.