British Viola Music

"The most immediately impressive work here is the newest.David Matthews's Winter Remembered is a full-bloodedexcercise in English Romanticism, but convincinglyreinvented for modern times. George Vass and his OrchestraNova make highly effective partners for Bradley, and theclear, warm-toned recording does all concerned fulljustice."
Five Stars ***** BBC Music Mag (June 2007)

The remarkably eloquent playing of soloist Sarah-Jane Bradley illuminates this persuasive programme of music for viola and small orchestra. This is heard in works ranging from the haunted half-lights of Holst's Lyric Movement and Alwyn's Pastoral Fantasia on the outbreak of war in 1939, to Maconchy's Romance, McCabe's Concerto Funebre and David Matthews's response to Schubert's Winterreise, which he called Winter Remembered after a poem by the American John Crowe Ransom. The McCabe is among his earliest works, and has been specially revised for its inclusion here. This is a lovely collection, and George Vass and Orchestra Nova respond to the music with passion, finding a luminous intensity that allows Sarah-Jane Bradley's plangent viola full reign.