Vaughan Williams: Piano Concerto / English Folk Song Suite etc.

The popular overture from Vaughan Williams’s incidental music for Aristophanes’s The Wasps introduces a suite whose mischievously witty, noble and farcical movements underline the play’s satire of the Athenian legal system. A similar vivacity characterises his English Folksong Suite and The Running Set, where Vaughan Williams relishes setting tunes such as Barrack Hill, Irish Reel, The Blackthorn Stick and Cock o’ the North. Folksong-like melodies also feature in his magnificent Piano Concerto, in which the magisterial influence of Bach and Busoni may also be heard. "Make no mistake about it: this boy is special. What I love about his playing is its sincerity and tenderness. He doesn’t just caress the piano, he probes its soft depths with the utmost consideration.” The Independent