British Music for Viola Concertos

Album review

Almost all the scores on this album, given over to solo viola in the British concert repertoire, centre on Lionel Tertis: whether he first performed them, played them, or... rejected them, as in the famous case of Walton's Concerto that Tertis sent back to the composer by return mail – the replacement was none other than Hindemith, but everyone knows the story – before realising his error and including the work in his repertoire shortly after. Here we do not hear the original version of 1929, but the re-orchestration that Walton did himself thirty years later, reducing the weight of the orchestra, which had been a touch too heavy in his youthful version.
Among the rarities to discover here, special mention must go to the great master Vaughan Williams: here is his Suite of 1934, written for (and first performed by) Tertis, a little miracle of oh-so-English intimacy, with delicate allusions to folk music which move like breaths of wind. Finally, discover the Concerto by York Bowen (1884-1961), written in 1907 for… that's right, for Tertis! The two friends were also frequent partners in duets, and Bowen knew just how to capture the spirit of the solo viola in an era when the instrument had yet to make its big entrance on the stages of the world. Bowen's writing, in the late romantic mode but never post-romantic in the German style, still seems light, even when it brings in a large orchestra. British viola player Helen Callus has brought forth a remarkable album which will surely even open more doors for her than her brilliant career has opened so far. The American Record Guide has called the young musician "one of the world's greatest violists"; Strings Magazine sees in her "a violist of the highest caliber"; and Fanfare Magazine thinks she is "one of the foremost violists of her generation". © SM/Qobuz