A Noble Simplicity Piano music by Ronald Stevenson - heard by GERALD FENECH 'Christopher Guild delivers impressively clear and assured performances ...'

When he died on 28 March 2015, Ronald Stevenson was regarded by many as one of the most important composers to have come out of Britain. Born in Blackburn on 6 March 1928 into a working-class family of Scottish and Welsh ancestry, Stevenson soon fell under the spell of the singing of his Welsh father and grandmother, but his works always seem to be dedicated to an object outside music, a sort of 'humane impulse', according to Yehudi Menuhin. Stevenson can also be said to have carried a dialogue with other composers, and very often he seemed to be more interested in other composers' music than his own. His most famous piece is the Passacaglia on DSCH, a vast work in scope and ambition that has strong echoes of Bach and Chopin, but the composer was also capable of writing small pieces that betrayed his love of Scottish folksong and Celtic culture; indeed, the present recording is a prime example of Stevenson's capability of writing miniatures within the range of children and beginner pianists...

RONALD STEVENSON

TOCCATA CLASSICS

PIANO MUSIC

SCOTLAND

WALES