Chandos Movies, conducted by Rumon Gamba has the deserved reputation as a label preserving under-recorded film music from the halcyon days of British cinema. In this latest instalment, Chandos Movies welcomes the film music of Mischa Spoliansky.

BBC Concert Orchestra makes a welcome return with the premiere recordings of The Happiest Days of your Life Galop, The Man who could work miracles, The Ghost goes West, Suite: King Solomon’s Mines and Suite: North West Frontier and Five Robeson Songs.

Having fled Russia after the Revolution Mischa Spoliansky found himself in Weimar Berlin where he enjoyed a reputation in the booming theatrical and cabaret life. Here he worked with notable people such as Max Reinhardt and Marlene Dietrich.and was seen as a more upbeat version of Kurt Weill. In 1933 Spoliansky left his adopted Germany after Hitler’s rise to power and emigrated to London where he began a second career as a film composer. He was commissioned by film-maker Alexander Korda of London Films to writer the scores for Sander of the River (1935), which won the prize for Best Music at the Venice Film Festival, and The Ghost Goes West (1935). He went on to score over 50 movies in his 40 years as a composer in England.

‘I’m very happy to have finally recorded a disc of the film music of Mischa Spoliansky. An admirer of his ‘cabaret’ songs, it has been a pleasure to dig deeper into his scores for such well known films as North West Frontier, Sanders of the River and King Solomon’s Mines. Something a little unusual this time as well – a new suite for Bass voice and Orchestra; Five Robeson Songs – songs written for Paul Robeson, the star of two of the films featured on the disc.’ Rumon Gamba.

Interest in the composer is on the rise with recent revivals at London’s Battersea Arts Centre, re-stages across Europe, a production at the Covent Garden Festival and a radio broadcast on BBC Radio 3.