ADELA MADDISON (c.1862-1929): Piano Quintet, FRANK BRIDGE (1879-1941): Piano Quartet in C Minor, EDWARD ELGAR (1857-1934): 3 Movements for Piano Trio (compl. Paul Adrian Rooke [b.1945]).
Catalogue Number: 04K007
Label: Dutton Epoch
Reference: CDLX 7220
Format: CD
Price: $19.98
Description: First the Elgar: the seven-minute Lento assai- Allegro moderato dates from 1920 and was reconstructed from a handwritten manuscript; the trio of the five-minute Menuetto and Trio of 1882 furnished Rosemary and Elgar dumped the minuet; March for the Grafton Family (1924) is a version of Empire March. These were commissioned by ElgarWorks, publishers of the Elgar Complete Edition, for the 150th anniversary of the composer's birth. Bridge's 33-minute work dates from 1902 and is one of several he later suppressed. Coming from five years before his Cobbett-prizewinning Phantasy Piano Trio, this work has even less of the mature Bridge about it but it has plenty of warmth, attractive motives and a constant melodic flow with numerous memorable flashes like the delicate, elfin trio of the scherzo which will delight all chamber music collectors. Maddison was rumored to be Fauré's mistress and she wrote both mélodies and Lieder while living in Paris and Berlin before the war but the style of this 30-minute quintet (1916) is mostly French with Ravel adding to the presence of Fauré. Its episodic character gave the performers some pause and, later, much delight and a few places in the slow movement seem to be reactions to the carnage of the Western Front. The Fibonacci Sequence.