If the calendar has anything to do with it, 1984 would of course have been the year to pay a 50-year tribute to Elgar, Delius and Holst. Yet, surely nobody will grudge those three a tribute any old time; and in the last few years the quality of both brass-band arranging and performance—anyway as exemplified on this record—has shot ahead to the point at which Delius might well have joined his colleagues in being won over by the medium.
In fact the Delius contribution, his early March caprice, is a small one; Holst's, also a single one, is not at all small, The Perfect Fool ballet music in a splendid arrangement by Peter Parkes. Elgar, though, has the lion's share (with reason: much of his music suits brass ideally). Gordon Langford's arrangement of the Wand of Youth music sensibly makes one suite out of suitable (and popular) movements taken from the original two; and Parkes makes a relatively conventional arrangement (I would not have guessed that this and the Holst came from the same pen!) of three familiar dances from the Bavarian Highlands suite. And finally, a double arrangement: Handel's Overture from the second Chandos Anthem arranged Elgar (the 'Overture in D minor') arranged Langford is not only obviously highly suitable for this particular record label, but also suits brass very well.
Black Dyke Mills play splendidly throughout, with precision and shading of dynamics which would have been undreamed of, in the brass-band world, in 1934. Once or twice I thought a soloist chose the wrong moment to colour his solo with appreciable vibrato, alongside other times when the right choice was undoubtedly made. Holst's three trombones, however, intoning the magician's invocations are especially impressive (and vibrato-less!).
As the quality of recording, LP and cassette, is also excellent, all three dedicatees of this first-class record should be very pleased indeed with their tribute.'