BUSONI : Piano Concerto Op XXXIX (Marc-André Hamelin · City Of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra · Sir Mark Elder) (1999) Serie The Romantic Piano Concerto – 22 | FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

This has to be our Romantic Piano Concerto for the millennium!

The Busoni concerto, with its five movements, choral finale and a length of over 70 minutes, is surely the most grandiose ever written. But this is no over-ambitious monster; Busoni was one of the greatest pianists the world has known, but he was also a great intellectual with very strong views on art and culture. This work is the masterpiece of his middle years, more of a symphony in the breadth and scope of its ideas, but at the same time almost casually requiring the most formidable technical ability from the soloist. There is no doubt that this is one of music's major neglected masterpieces.

Marc-André Hamelin needs no introduction as a champion of the greatest challenges in the piano literature. Here he is joined by Mark Elder who has a particular reputation as a Busoni conductor. He conducted this work with Peter Donohoe in their famed Proms performance of 1988 and he has also conducted Busoni's rarely performed magnum opus 'Doctor Faust' at ENO. Hyperion

Ferruccio Busoni (1866-1924)
    
Piano Concerto in C major Op 39

Credits :
Conductor – Mark Elder
Leader [Of Orchestra] – Jacqueline Hartley
Orchestra – City Of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra
Piano – Marc-André Hamelin

HOLBROOKE : Piano Concerto No 1 'The Song Of Gwyn Ap Nudd' ♦ WOOD : Piano Concerto In D Minor (First Recording) (Hamish Milne · BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra · Martyn Brabbins) (2000) Serie The Romantic Piano Concerto – 23 | FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

These two English piano concertos in the grand romantic tradition were written at almost the same time (Holbrooke 1908, Wood 1909) and were undoubtedly inspired by the great concertos of the previous few decades such as those of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov.

The Holbrooke piece, like so much of his music, has a literary inspiration, in the form of the poem 'The Song of Gwyn ap Nudd' which the score follows closely. Indeed the composer originally described the work as a symphonic poem though he later changed his mind and settled on Piano Concerto No 1 when he revised the work in 1923—the version recorded here. (Incidentally, we have it on good Welsh authority that 'Nudd' is pronounced 'Neeth').

Though Haydn Wood later made his name writing shorter pieces of light music his early concerto is in full blown romantic style complete with first movement cadenza and 'big tune' grand finale. Its emotional heart, though, is in the simple but moving slow movement. This is the work's first recording and it appears not to have been played since 1951. Hyperion

Joseph Holbrooke (1878-1958)

Piano Concerto No 1 'The Song of Gwyn ap Nudd' Op 52 [35'52]

Haydn Wood (1882-1959)
                
Piano Concerto in D minor [33'13]

Credits :
Conductor – Martyn Brabbins
Leader – Bernard Docherty
Orchestra – BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra
Piano – Hamish Milne