Here's a disc brimming with high-quality music and superlative performances. The Piano Quintet, from 1968, is cast in a single continuous movement divided into four contrasting sections.
Although only 15 minutes long, the quintet abounds with musical ideas and interest. Much of the material is vigorous, powerful and concisely presented, but there's much poetry, too, particularly in the Lento non troppo section and the brief epilogue that closes the energetic opening section.
The Concertante for violin and piano is a much earlier work dating from the mid-1930s and, although early influences such as Shostakovich and even Busoni in 'Faustian' mood can be detected, it's perhaps among the earliest of Rawsthorne's works in which his own voice begins to emerge. First performed by the distinguished Menuhin-Cassadó-Kentner Trio, the Piano Trio of 1963 contains much impressive and finely crafted material, as well as a good deal of colourful soloistic writing. The Viola Sonata dates from 1937, but the score was lost shortly after its premiere only to be rediscovered in a Hampstead bookshop and revised in 1954. The Sonata is something of a watershed in Rawsthorne's early output, and shows a considerable advance in style and technique from the Concertante of only a few years earlier, and both this and the equally fine Cello Sonata of 1948 are particularly valuable additions to the catalogue. Performances throughout are first class, although John McCabe's commanding reading of the Piano Quintet (he played for the work's premiere) stands out as exceptionally authoritative and compelling.