EMR CD039 | DETAILS
  EMR CD039
   
  HERITAGE AND LANDSCAPE
  Belgian Studio Symphony Orchestra
Midland Philharmonic Orchestra | Philharmonia Orchestra et al.
Paul Lewis (cond.)
   
  EAN 5 060263 500407

Though probably best known for his scores for over 150 TV productions of all kinds, Paul Lewis, a self-confessed composer of place, has for many decades been singing the praises of his beloved native landscape and its historical heritage in music commissioned by background music libraries that supply music to radio, TV and film studios worldwide. ‘Heritage and Landscape’ is a collection of such music, composed mainly in the 1970s and 80s and recorded with various orchestras - from the Philharmonia to the Paris Studio Symphony Orchestra - under Lewis’s baton. Among such impressionistic suites as ‘English Country Pictures’ and ‘Sussex Variations’ are the sparkling ‘Festival of London March’, ‘Battle Over Britain’ (a miniature-tone poem commemorating the Battle of Britain) and the original recording of ‘An English Overture’, Westward Television’s iconic station opening music, composed in 1971 and broadcast daily by the station until they lost their franchise nine years later. The recordings have all been remastered and sound beautifully fresh.

TRACK LISTING AND AUDIO EXTRACTS
     

Paul Lewis (b.1943)

   
HERITAGE SUITE (1990)
(World Première recording)
   
1. Cutty Sark  
2. Cornish Express  
3. Fountains Abbey  
4. Heritage March  
       
ENGLISH COUNTRY PICTURES (1988)
(World Première recording)
   
5. Country Life  
6. Morning Hedgerows  
7. Fields and Rivers  
8. Lakeside Air  
9. Evening Song  
       
SUSSEX VARIATIONS (1972)
(World Première recording)
10. Downland Sunrise  
11. Camber Sands  
12. Cuckmere Haven  
13. Cottage Gardens  
14. Fairlight Glen  
15. Merrily to Market  
16. Village Fair  
17. Sussex Farewell  
       
18. AN ENGLISH OVERTURE (1971)  
       
AN ENGLISH FIELDSCAPE (1993)
(World Première recording)
19. Morning Mist  
20. Spring Flowers  
21. Field Mice  
22. March Hare  
23. Snowplay  
       
24. FESTIVAL OF LONDON MARCH (1970)  
       
SEASONAL VARIATIONS (1988)
(World Première recording)
25. Spring Joy  
26. Summer Warmth  
27. Autumn Sorrow  
28. Winter Chill  
       
29. BATTLE OVER BRITAIN (1990) (World Première recording)  
REVIEWS
Beautifully shaped by Benjamin Frith... Beguiling sounds, graced by the tawny richness and unexaggerated line of Richard Jenkinson’s cello playing... The sense of purpose and sureness of line of Ian Venables’ music is pure oxygen.
EMR CD31 | BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE
Exquisitely rewarding... Ravishing accounts.
EMR CD029 | CHOIR AND ORGAN
This is music of great beauty and integrity and the performances fully do it justice. It would be criminal to let it pass you by.

EMR CD028 | INTERNATIONAL
RECORD REVIEW

The Bridge Quartet approach these pieces with a sympathetic and insightful warmth, and confirm their ambassadorial credentials for British chamber music. A lovely, radiant disc.
EMR CD025 | Gramophone
Duncan Honeybourne’s playing is astonishingly affectionate, yet never saccharine... Honeybourne plays with suave confidence.
EMR CD024 | INTERNATIONAL PIANO
Rupert Marshall-Luck is an ideal interpreter: generously but not effusively lyrical; agile and athletic... The warm, folk-song like slow movement is at times almost painfully beautiful, with a shimmering pastoral central section... Marshall-Luck is, again, indefatigable and keenly picks up on the work’s melancholic strain.  Finely recorded and with comprehensive booklet notes, this is a must for fans of 20th-century English repertoire.
EMR CD023 | THE STRAD