The Hyperion Romantic Piano Concerto, Vol. 73

The late Romanticism of Roger Sacheverell Coke will appeal to anyone who enjoys Rachmaninov or Delius, Grainger or Scriabin. If that sounds an intriguingly eclectic mix, Coke establishes his own distinctive voice, and this is an important addition to the Romantic Piano Concerto series.

The figures of Auguste Dupont and Peter Benoit may be little known outside their native Belgium, yet both enjoyed pianistic and pedagogical success in their lifetimes. Benoit’s symphonic poem is a piano concerto in all but name, ending with a spiritedly Mephistophelean ‘fantastical hunt’.

Volume 72 of our Romantic Piano Concerto series comes to the rescue of yet another neglected figure with three first recordings courtesy of Howard Shelley and his Tasmanian forces. Composer, pianist, writer and educator (he was an early Principal of the Royal Academy of Music), London-born Cipriani Potter was encouraged by Beethoven and admired by Wagner.

If the warmly Romantic bloom on these concertos suggests the spirit of an earlier generation—both works date from the 1880s—the music of Stéphan Elmas retains its own distinctive voice, a voice heard to best advantage in Howard Shelley's persuasive accounts.

Though lesser-known today, composers Alfred Hill and George Boyle enjoyed distinguished careers, both in their native Australia and abroad. Hill was known as the 'grand old man' of Australian musical life in his time. His Piano Concerto in A minor and Piano Sonata in A major are effectively the same work, the one being an orchestral expansion of the other. In addition to his work as a composer, Boyle took on students in New York that included such luminaries as Copland and Barber. The Romantic Piano Concerto Vol.69 features his Piano Concerto in D minor. All works are performed here by Piers Lane and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra led by Johannes Fritzsch.

Active in every genre other than opera, Carl Czerny is largely remembered for the numerous piano studies he wrote as pedagogical aids. Howard Shelley's advocacy of his three overlooked virtuoso works for piano and orchestra is a welcome reminder of this composer's greater appeal. Alongside the Piano Concerto in A minor Op.214 are two premiere recordings of his Piano Concerto in F major Op.28 and Rondo Brillant in B flat major Op.233.

The common thread—as so often in The Romantic Piano Concerto series—is Liszt, in whose Weimar circle both composer-pianists featured here moved. Both concertos are pleasingly substantial, and the typically demanding piano writing is powerfully dispatched by Emmanuel Despax.

Ferdinand Ries may once have been celebrated as ‘one of the finest piano-performers of the present day’ (the 1820s), but he is now remembered chiefly for his association with Beethoven. Yet the music here is never slavishly imitative: Piers Lane makes a persuasive case for rescuing these works from the pages of musical history.

The Braunfels—a concerto in all but name—and Pfitzner make an apt pairing, two works dating from the twilight of German Romanticism. Both are heroically dispatched by Markus Becker, with Constantin Trinks and his Berlin Radio Symphony forces providing idiomatic support.

Hyperion s Romantic Piano Concerto series continues to surprise and delight with a 51st disc of 19th century pianistic splendor. This release includes works by Wilhelm Taubert and Jacob Rosenhain. Both were near exact contemporaries with Mendelssohn, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, Wagner and Verdi. Nearly half a century separates Taubert s two concertos. The second reflects developments in the areas of harmonic expansion, cyclic development, and, of course, increased virtuosity. It was described by Schumann as one of the best and he noted the parallels between it and Mendelssohn s Op.25. Rosenhain wrote two works for piano and orchestra a Concertino (probably written in the 1840s), and the concerto included on this disc. Although fairly conservative in its form, there is much gorgeous and masterful music here. Howard Shelley directs the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra from the piano; a partnership that has garnered the highest praise for their previous Hyperion recordings.