Malcolm Williamson’s music has been so scandalously neglected during the past decade that this Australian initiative is greatly to be welcomed. The Master of the Queen’s Music, who died last year after a long period of ill-health, was a brilliant pianist and organist and his performances both of his own music and of Messiaen’s, with which he had particular sympathy, were unforgettable.

His musical personality was complex, even schizophrenic. Arriving in London in the early 1950s, he studied with Elisabeth Lutyens and adopted a kind of fragmented post-Webern style. The depth of his feelings about what she symbolised was acknowledged in the striking Ritual of Admiration composed for her 70th birthday in 1976. It was this gritty style that put Williamson into the front line of British composers in the 1950s but it was never the whole story. He soon shocked people by writing brazenly tuneful operas, pop church music and dramas with audience participation: later he generously worked in music therapy. Sometimes the two sides of his personality coalesced in the same work, which confused the critics who never knew where to place him. But Williamson was always himself – ebullient, enthusiastic and absolutely Australian.

Anthony Gray has had a role in rescuing the Third and Fourth Sonatas, which were virtually lost when he went to see Williamson, and his interpretations seem absolutely faithful and sympathetic in all styles. The intense, dissonant Williamson is represented by the Second and Fourth Sonatas and the Variations, written when he was studying with Lutyens. The lyrical, informal aspect comes with the sets of Travel Diaries based on Sydney, Naples, Paris, London and New York and the Haifa Watercolours. These are pretty picture-postcards, vividly descriptive and colourful with some witty touches. The Royal Festival Hall is depicted with tuning-up sounds; the organ is playing in St Paul’s Cathedral; Paris has its honking taxi horns; Versailles is evoked with pastiche Rameau; and you can hear the lift going up and down in the Eiffel Tower. There are naughty waltzes, too, and a Richard Rodgers-type of ballad for Broadway. Some of these sketches would make effective teaching pieces and all show Williamson casually at ease with various kinds of music.

A full revival of Williamson on CD is overdue and it will need orchestral works and operas. But this collected piano music, decently recorded, makes a fine start and Gray sets the scene admirably in his CD booklet.