IVOR GURNEY (1890-1937): Violin Sonata in E Flat, LIONEL SAINSBURY (b.1958): Soliloquy for Solo Violin, Op. 21, EDWARD ELGAR (1857-1934): Violin Sonata in E Minor, Op. 82.

Description: World Premiere Recording of Gurney's sonata of 1918-19 (same period as Elgar's) which was one of six he began during a period of burgeoning creativity between the end of the war and the beginnings of the signs of his mental illness and the only one he completed. It's a full-length (34 minutes), four-movement work with plenty of sweep and power with some beautiful melodies, the most attractive of which may be that of its Lento slow movement, wistful and melancholy, although the rhapsodic, surging and singing melody of the finale, coming close to the ecstatic quality of The Lark Ascending but also containing something dark and troubled, like a flash of late afternoon sun coming through a ragged gap in a range of storm clouds. Hearing it will make you believe that it belongs next to its coeval sonata by Elgar. Rupert Marshall-Luck (violin), Matthew Rickard (piano).