We have reached Vol. 8 in Chandos’s mammoth Grainger Edition, in which the Royal Northern College of Music Wind Orchestra, under either Timothy Reynish or Clark Rundell, more than maintain the impressive interpretative standards of their previous album in this series (Vol. 4, 9/97). Rundell’s compelling realization of the extraordinary Hill Song No. 1 (1901-02) – regarded by Grainger as one of his finest achievements and performed here in its original guise for (wait for it!) two piccolos, six oboes, six cors anglais, six bassoons and double-bassoon – was actually made by BBC Manchester back in November 1992; the remaining items (also set down within the ideal acoustic of Studio No. 7) date from October last year and benefit from the typically splendid sound and balance achieved by producer Ralph Couzens and engineer Don Hartridge.
As well as the Hill Song No. 1, we get the 1929 scoring of its pithier successor from 1907. Another of Grainger’s most striking wind-band compositions opens the disc, namely the 12-minute The Power of Rome and the Christian Heart. To those who bought Hickox’s second BBC PO Grainger concert (Vol. 6, 4/98) its central section will be familiar as the six-and-a-half-minute orchestral piece, Dreamery (both works were completed in 1943), while its closing measures utilize material from the first movement (“The Power of Love”) of the Danish Folk-song Suite. Both the Children’s March and Bell Piece feature some unexpected vocal contributions. In the latter – a charming ‘ramble’ on John Dowland’s Now, O now I needs must part – Grainger incorporates a bell part specially written for his wife, Ella. (According to annotator Barry Peter Ould, the elderly Grainger would sing the Dowland song every night before going to bed.)
The delightfully piquant arrangements of Blithe Bells and The Immovable Do date from March 1931 and November/December 1939 respectively. These fine players equally revel in the ‘scrunchy’ harmonies of the eventful version of Irish Tune from County Derry (made in 1920 for military band and pipe-organ). That just leaves the boisterous Marching Song of Democracy (in a transcription from July 1948), which Rundell again directs as to the manner born.
All in all, a most entertaining and stimulating release.'