The Piano Music of Frank Bridge – Volume 2
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Track 1 |
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Track 21 |
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Track 24 |
“A magical recital of exquisite miniatures that confirms Mark Bebbington as one of the most gifted colourists of his generation. In the shamelessly Ravelian Characteristic Pieces Bebbington conjures up shimmering landscapes in sound via an alluring range of textures, touch-sensitivity and micro-pedalling that has one positively aching to hear him in Jeux d’eau or Miroirs.
Bridge’s heady mix of Scriabinesque chromatic sensuality with middle-period Debussy-like charm and whimsy is enormously challenging to master both technically and interpretatively, yet Bebbington makes it all appear effortless. This is a recital that seduces simply by the sound it makes, enhanced by state-of-the-art engineering from producer Siva Oke and engineer Paul Arden-Taylor. It is impossible to imagine this wonderful music ever being better played.”
Julian Haylock, International Piano, January/February 2009
“The second volume of Mark Bebbington’s survey of Frank Bridge’s piano music is easily up to the standard of the first and the programme is well-balanced, juxtaposing pieces written for children against complex nature-meditations, early against late, salon against concert hall.
There’s nothing here on the scale of the great Sonata included in the first volume, but the two most challenging pieces here are also highly contrasted: the big early Dramatic Fantasia (1906) which only came to light in the 1970′s, is a splendid display of late-Romantic extravagance, while the 1924 Retrospect is one of Bridge’s most anguished and searching utterances.
Bebbington’s playing is always sensitively nuanced, every phrase expressively shaped and pedalled, without losing sight of each piece’s overall thrust and import. He makes one aware, too, of how open Bridge’s ears were to his contemporaries; the Fairy Tale Suite clearly owes something to Ma mere l’oye, ‘Fireflies’ from the Characteristic Pieces relates to Debussy’s ‘Poissons d’or’ and ‘Mouvement’, and late miniatures like Graziella assimilate Scriabin’s late harmonic innovations. But Bridge was not an imitator: these examples define his range, and no one else in Britain was writing piano music that occupied the same territory. Buy with confidence.”
Calum MacDonald, BBC Music Magazine, February 2009, 5***** Performance, 5***** Recording
Volume 1 in Mark Bebbington’s Frank Bridge series (SOMM,10/06) gave us (among other treasures) the finest version yet of the towering Piano Sonata (1921-24), and I’m delighted to be able to report that this successor shows no falling off in terms of interpretative insight or pianistic pedigree.
With his pleasingly refined touch and pellucid tone Bebbington proves more than a match for Ashley Wass on a rival Naxos release (6/06) which overlaps four items here, namely A Fairy Tale (Suite), In Autumn, Miniature Pastorals (Set 1) and the Three Pieces of 1912 (about thirty firve minutes of music in all). However, his generous selection encompasses an even wider chronological and stylistic range…
I need only reiterate that all this rewarding material is realised with total dedication and acute understanding by Bebbington. The recording, too, is most truthful.
