Sir Arthur Bliss

[Guest]

I haven't much knowledge of Sir Arthur's music, but am tempted by the new EMI 5 CD compilation. Is anyone familiar with these recordings? Advice would be appreciated.

[Thomas Roth]

They are all very good and you will get a lot of pleasure from them. One thing puzzles me though, if the info from MDT is correct the set doesn´t include Paavo Berglund´s recording of Miracle in the Gorbals. A strange decision.

[PJPJ]

I don't have some of the third and fourth CDs, and have yet to hear some of the fifth, but recommend these wholeheartedly. The Groves-Handley-Berglund-Arnold contributions are splendid, and I must get round to listening to the last CD. Vintage analogue EMI stuff.

[PJPJ]

They are all very good and you will get a lot of pleasure from them. One thing puzzles me though, if the info from MDT is correct the set doesn´t include Paavo Berglund´s recording of Miracle in the Gorbals. A strange decision.

Yes, they went for Bliss's own recording of that and include Bliss and Boult's Music for Strings. So, you won't get a stereo Miracle.

http://www.gramophone.net/Issue/Page...1205+%28155%29.

[Op. XXXIX]

Regarding Bliss, has anyone heard the Naxos recording by Peter Donohoe of the piano concerto? It should be self-recommending at that price.

[Roehre]

Regarding Bliss, has anyone heard the Naxos recording by Peter Donohoe of the piano concerto? It should be self-recommending at that price.

Not only at that price. Even at full price it should be a show stopper.
The EMI 5 CD set is IMO value for money, even taking in account the age of most of the recordings.
IMO Bliss is one of those unjustly neglected British composers as well.

[BBMmk2]

Naxos recorded the Piano Concerto? And Peter Donohoe? What a bargain. This, to my mind seems to me to be a monster of a PC! I have Philip Fowke playing it. I am sorely tempted to buy this one!

[Stanfordian]

I am a great fan of English music and Bliss has made some wonderful contributions. I admire Bliss's oncertante works especially his violin concerto and his very, very brief 'Fanfare for a Dignified Occasion’ is a superb morsel. Its amazing that his violin sonata has just been recorded for the first time after all these years.

[Serial_Apologist]

I only vaguely recall Sir Arthur Bliss on Desert Island Discs - somewhere around 1968. His choice of discs was pretty unconventional for one of his generation back then, and iirc included Beatles and Ravi Shankar items, and this made me reassess a composer who, up to then, I'd imagined purely from his mustachoed photo as a stuffy post-Elgarian. He was - or became, after being initially a follower of Stravinsky and Les Six - a post-Elgarian... but not a stuffy one.

S-A

[Chris Newman]

Arthur Bliss may have looked exactly like a country squire but his music and the subject matter he wrote his music about show a much more with it man. Miracle in the Gorbals is no sweet tale. Its themes are as seedy and as violent as Bartok's ballets. His best music is rich and colourful: Music for Strings stands proudly alongside Elgar, Dvorak and Tchaikovsky. His incidental music for the film Things to Come shows him capable of drama (the march is as good as Elgar and IMO much better than Walton's Crown Imperial). His Colour Symphony is a masterpiece, a British symphony to place with RVW between Elgar and Tippett. Morning Heroes is neglected with its title misleading listeners to think it jingoistic whereas its sentiments are quite close to Britten's in the War Requiem: I heard Bliss conduct it at the Proms and it grew on me as it developed. I do not know his opera The Olympians, which was deemed a failure but if the music is as good as the other pieces I have skimmed over I would guess it is probably much better than that. His piano concerto is very fine: the Peter Donohoe recording has already been mentioned....superb.

[EdgeleyRob]

As well as the works already mentioned there is plenty of fine chamber music which I love (clarinet and oboe quintets,the string quartets,viola sonata,piano quartet etc).
I have most of these works on the Naxos label and can recommend them.

[Suffolkcoastal]

I greatly admire Bliss and 2nd the opinions of other contributors to the thread. I've got part of The Olympians on tape, definitely worth another listen too I think. Morning Heroes is a very powerful and moving piece that foreshadows some of the sentiments of the War Requiem, it was I believe written in memory of his brother Kennard. I love the Colour Symphony, I believe it had a Proms outing a few years ago. The Naxos discs are all very good and an excellent and cheap way of getting to know this fine composer. As well as the Piano Concerto there are also concertos fro Violin and Cello. The Cello Concerto, a late work, is very fine, I'm pretty sure that it was premiered at the Aldeburgh Festival around 1970-72. At the other end of his career, his early works such as Madam Noy strongly reflect the influence of Stravinsky. This country has produced so many wonderful composers and thank God for recorded music, otherwise I doubt I'd have ever had the opportunity to hear these works.

[Op. XXXIX]

Not to throw cold water on the subject, but wasn't Bliss very critical of Elgar in his later years? Maybe that dates from the '50's wherein many musicians thought Elgar an embarrassment to the Realm, but wasn't Elgar was very supportive of Bliss? A fine way to pay him back methinks, maybe Bliss was only trying to be au currant. Would be curious what others think.

[BBMmk2]

Ive mentioned in another thread re Bliss's mammoth Piano Concerto! What aworkand I hear that Peter Donohoe has recorded it on the Naxos label. I have Philip Fowke playing this, but I cant remember what labelit's on, or even if this is still available. If anyone hasn't heard this, the should asap!

[Suffolkcoastal]

Not to throw cold water on the subject, but wasn't Bliss very critical of Elgar in his later years? Maybe that dates from the '50's wherein many musicians thought Elgar an embarrassment to the Realm, but wasn't Elgar was very supportive of Bliss? A fine way to pay him back methinks, maybe Bliss was only trying to be au currant. Would be curious what others think.

I believe you've got that wrong I'm pretty sure Bliss with several other composers wrote in support of Elgar after a damning criticism in the 1920's.