WILLIAM BUSCH (1901-1945): Cello Concerto, Piano Concerto.

Description: Of German parents who emigrated to England in the late 19th century, Busch studied with Alan Bush (who remained a great friend), Ireland and Bernard van Dieren and had a career as a piano soloist (cut short by stage fright). The concertos here share what must be Busch's main quality - an economy of discourse which never uses a note too much to convey his ideas - but they are rather different in their effect. From 1938, the piano concerto is more harmonically adventurous, showing continental influences of the sort which Alan Bush also exhibited in his music and it has a contrapuntal first movement and a variation-form finale surrounding a pastoral slow movement. The cello concerto (1941) sounds purely English in its modal lyricism and will likely make collectors think of Finzi's yet to be written cello concerto. Raphael Wallfisch (cello), Piers Lane (piano), Royal Philharmonic Orchestra; Vernon Handley.