REPRINT SERIES  Concerto Grosso is a work for string orchestra by Ralph Vaughan Williams. Originally composed in 1950 for a performance by the Rural Schools Music Association conducted by Sir Adrian Boult, the piece is unique in that the orchestra...

For St. Cecilia (subtitled “Ceremonial Ode”) was commissioned by the St. Cecilia’s Day Festival Committee and premiered in the Royal Albert Hall on 22 November 1947, St. Cecilia’s Day (Cecilian works by Purcell and Handel were...

REPRINT SERIES Dances from Don Quixote is the orchestral suite derived from Roberto Gerhard's "Don Quixote" ballet. The ballet was composed in 1940-41, while the Dances were revised and assembled in 1957.

REPRINT SERIES Poulenc's Concert Champêtre for Harpsichord (or Piano) and Orchestra was written in 1927–28 for the harpsichordist Wanda Landowska who said she "adored" playing it as it made her "insouciant and gay!" Landowska was responsible...

Composed in 1934, the Cello Concerto No.1 is not only the frist composition for cello by Milhaud, but also the most popular. It was dedicaated to Maurice Maréchal, who premiered it in Paris on June 28th 1935. This concerto was one of Grégor...

REPRINT SERIES Riders to the Sea is a short one-act opera by Ralph Vaughan Williams, based on the play of the same name by John Millington Synge. The composer completed the score in 1927, but it was not premiered until 1 December 1937, at the Royal...

Hans Kindler was one of the most brilliant and dedicated musicians of his generation. Born in Rotterdam in 1892 and trained at the city’s conservatory, Kindler emigrated to the United States in 1914 to become Principal Cellist of the Philadelphia...

REPRINT SERIES Bacewicz's Cello Concerto No. 1 was written 1951, following a commission from Miloš Sádlo, an eminent Czech cellist of international renown. The piece reflects a stylistic tendency most vividly manifested in Sonata No. 1...

ORIGINAL CHORAL VERSION 1938 Serenade to Music is an orchestral concert work completed in 1938 by English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams, written as a tribute to conductor Sir Henry Wood. It features an orchestra and 16 vocal soloists, with lyrics...

The accompaniment of this piece exists in two versions:A version - for strings, harp (or piano) and cymbals, which is intended for performance with a small chorus. B version - for full orchestra (instrumentation as listed above) which is the version...

REPRINT SERIES There are plentiful ingredients in Respighi’s Piano Concerto in A minor. Rhapsodic flourishes, triumphal declamations, huge, dense chords and passages of lyrical contemplation. Written in 1902, when he was in his early twenties, it...

Koncertantní symfonie č.2; Sinfonia Concertante Nr.2, for Solo Oboe, Bassoon, Violin, Cello and Chamber Orchestra with Piano.

Funeral Song (Погребальная песнь / Pogrebal'naya Pesnya, or Chant funèbre), Op. 5, is an orchestral work by Igor Stravinsky. Composed in 1908 in memory of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, the work received its first performance in 1909.The premiere was...

REPRINT SERIES Epithalamion (which the Oxford English Dictionary defines as ''A nuptial song or poem in praise of the bride and bridegroom'') is a large-scale cantata from 1957 based on Edmund Spenser's love-poem of the same name: musically, it draws...

REPRINT SERIES The Concerto for String Orchestra (1948) is commonly regarded as Grażyna Bacewicz's opus magnum and even called her "Ninth Symphony". It is unquestionably one of the foremost works of 20th century Polish music. Written in 1948, the...

Certainly Prokofiev’s own ‘stories’ for children end happily – and there are quite a number, not merely those recorded here. The first was The Ugly Duckling, a setting of an adaptation (by Nina Meshchersky, Prokofiev’s first...

REPRINT SERIES Straussiana was Korngold’s last completed work. Since the Theme and Variations was its companion piece perhaps that was his penultimate work. Both pieces owe their existence to a commission from the American School Orchestras...

CIRCUS OVERTURETOCH was a very versatile student of medicine and philosophy who taught himself music by studying the great masterpieces. He won many prizes for his works and came to the United States from his native Germany in 1940. He has written many...