The brief concertos which Sir Malcolm Arnold has written for a whole range of instruments, generally inspired by particular performers, form a most attractive aspect of his work. This very welcome Conifer issue, superbly performed and recorded, makes the perfect complement to an earlier disc (8/89) of Arnold concertos from the same company, also with Mark Stephenson conducting the London Musici and with some of the same soloists. The only pity is that many who want to sample this music would prefer to have both clarinet concertos, both flute concertos and both horn concertos, each on the same disc, instead of spread between the two. On any count Arnold devotees need to have both.
Only recently I was reviewing the Arnold Second Clarinet Concerto, written for Benny Goodman in 1974, which Thea King includes in her latest disc for Hyperion (see page 60). Michael Collins has also played it as a very welcome item in the 1993 last night of the Proms. Both his and King's performances are outstanding, colourful and sympathetic, but Collins is even more persuasive and more volatile, playing with that much more freedom, both in the bravura passages and in the expressive melodies. As at the Proms, in the first movement he plays the cadenza he commissioned from Richard Rodney Bennett. Yet in the finale with its blatant re-creation of ''the pre-Goodman rag'', King's account has an edge, thanks to the more immediate recording, which otherwise brings the penalty of not allowing her quite such a hushed pianissimo as Collins achieves.
The Horn Concerto No. 1 is the earliest work here, written in 1946, not for Dennis Brain as No. 2 was, but for Charles Gregory, then Arnold's colleague in the London Philharmonic. It is also the longest of the works here, with an extended central Andante with dark overtones and a hunting-rhythm finale. Richard Watkins, Principal Horn of the Philharmonia, plays it with great panache and glorious tone. Karen Jones, Principal Flute of the Bournemouth orchestra and Shell/LSO prize-winner in 1985, is equally sympathetic in the Flute Concerto No. 2, like Watkins following up her success on the earlier Conifer issue. In its layout this concerto, written in 1972, is the most original work on the disc, with a central scherzo flanked by an equivocal Allegro moderato and a final lyrical Allegretto. The first movement starts gently but later includes military rhythms in the manner but not the style of Shostakovich, while the finale is based on one of Arnold's lazily haunting popular melodies, like a valse grise.
The Concerto for Piano Duet of 1950 should not be confused with the three-handed Concerto for Two Pianos that Arnold wrote for Cyril Smith and Phyllis Sellick. In its use of block chords for the four hands at one keyboard, it is a chunkier work, but full of characteristic Arnold touches. After an emphatic first movement a central Passacaglia brings craggy contrasts, leading to a jazzy finale with relaxed episodes. Nettle and Markham play as one at their single keyboard, and under Mark Stephenson the young musicians of London Musici perform throughout with the understanding and precision that have characterized all their Conifer recordings.'