Tag Archives: Robin Walker

On Record: Lesley-Jane Rogers – Hommage: Tributes to Handel & Purcell (Heritage Records)

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Lesley-Jane Rogers (soprano), John Turner (recorder), Jonathan Price (cello), Jonathan Bielby (harpsichord)

Ruth Zechlin Hommage á Henry Purcell (1997); Hommage á Handel (2004)
Robin Walker Handel to his Soul (2006)
Pepusch When Love’s Soft Passion (pub. 1720)
Purcell The Blessed Virgin’s Expostulation, Z196; Oedipus, Z583 (1678) – Music for a while; The Indian Queen, Z630 (1695) – I attempt from love’s sickness to fly
Telemann Cello Sonata in D major TWV41: D6 (pub. 1728-9)
Handel Nel Dolce del’Oblio, HWV134 (1709)

Heritage Records HTGCD118 [73’06”] Texts and translations included
Remastering Engineer Paul Arden-Taylor

Live performance on 14 June 2006 at Händel-Haus, Halle an der Saale

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

Heritage releases what was actually a live performance, given at the original ‘Handel House’ in the composer’s hometown of Halle while featuring an imaginative miscellany of Baroque and Contemporary works, all expertly realized by soprano, recorder, cello and harpsichord.

What’s the music like?

The sub-title says it all – tributes to Handel and Purcell that range from pieces by both these composers to works which wear their ‘hommage’ credentials not a little obliquely. Purcell is heard in evergreen extracts from his incidental music to Oedipus and semi-opera The Indian Queen elegantly sung by Lesley-Jane Rogers, who renders the interplay of recitative and aria in The Blessed Virgin’s Expostulation with real eloquence. Handel rounds off this programme with Nel Dolce del’Oblio (In the Sweetness of Oblivion), one of several Italian cantatas that helped establish his reputation prior to his arrival in England. Again, a fine performance that respects this music’s expressive deftness and understatement though without making it seem trite or lightweight; failings which are not so uncommon in latter-day accounts of this music.

Also featured is a cello sonata drawn from Telemann’s collection Der Getreue Musikmeister (The Faithful Music-Master), its simple alternation of Largo and Allegro movements belying the piece’s overall motivic subtlety. Interest naturally attaches to the cantata When Love’s Soft Passion by Johann Pepusch, remembered for his musical contribution to The Beggar’s Opera by John Gay (and lesser-known sequel Polly) but who wrote extensively for various genres – among them the secular cantata, hence the poise and sensuous appeal of the present example.

Two of the contemporary works are by Ruth Zechlin (1926-2007), among the most prominent composers in what was East Germany, whose expertise as harpsichordist or organist informed her own works. Hommage á Henry Purcell juxtaposes recorder and harpsichord with pointed humour redolent of Mauricio Kagel, whereas Hommage á Handel comprises settings of three Shakespeare sonnets (Nos. 36, 78 and 46) with their music derived from three Handel arias to verses by Barthold Brockes. Even more engrossing is Handel to his Soul, a cantata setting his own text by Robin Walker (b.1953) who, known primarily for some seismic orchestral works (Toccata Classics TOCC0283), brings comparable insight to this thought-provoking trialogue between the composer, his soul and the goddess Proserpina – its music being witty and ironic.

Does it all work?

Yes, not least as collated into a programme which elides nimbly if meaningfully between the musical past and present. All credit to the musicians that these performances are so idiomatic across the board, thereby bringing works separated by over three centuries into enlightening accord. Whether the present release is taken from a radio broadcast or an archive recording, its sound lacks nothing in spaciousness or focus; enabling Rogers’s excellent annunciation to come through unimpeded. An occasion which was decidedly making available commercially.

Is it recommended?

It is. The booklet has decent notes and full texts (if not all English translations) – making for a worthy tribute to Percy M. Young (1912-2004), renowned music scholar and soccer historian, in whose memory this concert was sponsored by the British Professional Football Association.

Listen / Buy

You can explore purchase options at the Heritage Records website. Click on the names for more information on Lesley-Jane Rogers, John Turner, Jonathan Price, Jonathan Bielby, Ruth Zechlin, Robin Walker and the Händel-Haus

Published post no.2,914 – Thursday 11 June 2026

On record: Robin Walker: Orchestral Music (Toccata)

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Walker Great Rock Is Dead; Odysseus on Ogygia; The Stone King; The Stone Maker

Novaya Rossiya Symphony Orchestra / Alexander Walker

Toccata Classics TOCC0283 58’13”

Producer Pavel Lavrenenkov Engineers Gennady Tarabantov and Alexander Karasev Recorded September 2nd-5th at Studio 5, Russian State TV and Radio Company Kultura, Moscow

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

Summary

The first disc devoted to the orchestral music of Robin Walker (b1953), whose idiom evolved over several decades before arriving at the singular and uncompromising music featured here, in what is another venture facilitated by the redoubtable Martin Anderson of Toccata Classics.

What’s the music like?

Readers with longer memories may recall certain pieces by Walker which attracted attention during the 1980s, not least the ensemble piece Dance/Still and the plangent Seven Last Words for electric guitar and percussion. Several of his chamber and instrumental works were issued by Riverrun Records (RVRCD66) at the turn of the century, yet anyone familiar with that disc will likely be surprised with what they find here. Interesting, too, that Walker (to judge by his website) is intent on covering his tracks, Ustvolskaya-like, regarding most of his earlier music.

Much the longest work is The Stone Maker, completed in 1995 after an eight-year gestation and described as a symphonic poem, though it could be assessed in terms of a one-movement symphony. The composer’s booklet note avoids any concrete programme, focussing instead on its modification of symphonic archetypes (notably Beethoven’s Fifth and Brahms’s First) in the light of his own aesthetic. This is worth bearing in mind because, unlike numerous of his contemporaries, Walker has not repudiated Modernism per se but reintegrated it into his highly individual take on the musical past. Tippett and Birtwistle are mentioned as guiding presences, and the more visceral passages of this work do indeed recall the latter composer (notably his Earth Dances), but there is equally a modally-inflected tonal underpinning such as sustains its 32 minutes with demonstrable purpose. No less striking are those stretches of more inward expression, notably that before the inexorable final build-up – while the tailing-off that ensues, and the suspenseful concluding bars are both realized with exquisite finesse.

None of the shorter pieces that emerged a decade on suggest a notable broadening or opening -out of Walker’s approach. The Stone King (2005) is another symphonic poem, though here the overall duration (barely a third of the earlier piece) militates against the emotional force shoe-horned into this music with its elemental ground-plan of equilibrium lost then regained. Great Rock is Dead (2007) is a funeral march inspired by the death of the composer’s father, implacable in its forward motion though any sense of emerging triumph is tenuous at best – not helped by the Bruckner-cum-Sibelius bathos of a coda that fails to convince. Best is the Prelude to Odysseus on Ogygia (2011), as adapted from the eponymous opera Walker wrote after 1995 and whose simmering intensity bodes well for this 90-minute ‘staged symphony’.

Does it all work?

Not always (as detailed above), but when it does come together this is impressive music – imbued with that sense of naturally accruing momentum which readily holds the attention. Anyone responsive to the tradition within which Walker is working needs to hear this disc.

Is it recommended?

Indeed, especially given these performances are so attuned to its essence. Alexander Walker secures a committed response from the Novaya Rossiya Symphony Orchestra, which is heard to advantage in a recorded ambience that amply brings out the filmic opulence of this music.
To listen to clips from this release and for further information visit the Toccata Classics website, while for more on Robin Walker you can visit the composer’s website