Rowley

Ivor Gurney’s songs (Naxos 8.572151) have long earned him renown but his works for piano, composed over the period of a decade, are hardly known. The lyrically beautiful Five Preludes reflect influences as wide as Schumann and Scriabin but preserve Gurney’s expressive freshness. The Sonatas Nos. 1 and 3 inhabit very different sound worlds from each other, and only one movement of Sonata No. 2 has survived, a deeply poignant elegy – all of which are heard here in world premiere recordings. His poem for piano, Autumn, offers further opportunity to discover this rarely heard music by a composer for whom the pursuit of beauty was of the utmost importance.

They say its good to take your time with things that are important to you, and certainly no one can accuse Rowley of rushing the process of recording her much anticipated second album.