English Landscapes

Vaughan Williams (Composer), Bax (Composer), Delius (Composer), Elgar (Composer), Finzi (Composer), Ireland (Composer), Elder (Conductor), Halle Orchestra (Orchestra), Fletcher (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Fletcher
• Orchestra: Halle Orchestra
• Conductor: Elder
• Composer: Vaughan Williams, Bax, Delius, Elgar, Finzi, et al.
• Audio CD (November 21, 2006)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Asv Living Era
• ASIN: B000I2J37Q
• Also Available in: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #618,536 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Elder is first rate in English pastoral music, familiar and rare, December 31, 2010

By 

Santa Fe Listener (Santa Fe, NM USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: English Landscapes (Audio CD)

There are times when I feel that English music could use a lot fewer larks and a lot more ascending. This imaginative collection of landscape-inspired music, however, reaches beyond Vaughan Williams's overplayed violin rhapsody. to inveterate anglophiles about half of these works will be familiar; to anyone else they are a superb introduction to English pastoralism (not vicars but green fields and rocky coasts).

Here's the program:

Bax: Tintagel

Delius: On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring, Summer night on the river

Elgar: As torrents in summer

Finzi: Fall of the Leaf

Ireland: The Hills

Vaughan Williams: The Lark Ascending

Lyn Fletcher (violin)

Norfolk Rhapsody No. 1

The readings under Elder are vibrant and direct; you won't hear the special personal stamp of Beecham or Barbirolli, but that's not a major flaw. The recorded sound is leagues ahead of anything that either conductor ever received; excellent sonics have become a hallmark of the house recordings by the Halle under Elder. Finances are difficult in Manchester, and this orchestra is probably still struggling not to founder. They deserve to be celebrated, as this recording amply shows.