2005 Reviews
"De’Ath plays all of this music with great style, and he seems comfortable with the most difficult pieces as well as the trifles."
Bill Marsh, The Delian, Dec.2004
"It is exciting now to find the first of a promised series of recordings (emanating from Canada - shame on our own musical establishment!)... This well-chosen selection is played beautifully."
Colin Scott-Sutherland, at the Classical Music Website
"I have had to be rather dismissive of some other Scott performances recently
so it is a pleasure to say that there are some here which I cannot imagine bettered.
At least the first complete survey is under way and it has many performances which any future sets will find hard to match. The "DeuxiPme Suite" is of itself enough to make purchase essential. De’Ath’s performance has such enormous conviction that I cannot believe it other than magnificently right in its essentials. He builds up the big movements with real sweep and manages to cap climax upon climax without hardening his tone.
But he is also radiant in the "Prelude", sensitive and flexible in the "Solemn Dance"
and mercurial in the Caprice."
Christopher Howell, at the Classical Music Web site
[Chris Howell (Italy) is one of two other pianists worldwide to have released an entire CD of Scott piano music -
‘Moods & Impressions’, Tremula TREM 104-2, 1992]
"Frankly, I have been delighted by the content of this superb issue and regard it as a very important release. ...An issue such as this should be heard by any lover of British music,
and indeed by any lover of piano music of the first half of the twentieth century.
Scott’s music... is well worth exploring, as this outstanding two-CD set from Dutton demonstrates comprehensively. This set affords us a unique opportunity to study his work in the smaller forms, and it has come as something of a revelation to me.
The selection of music and its presentation would have been set at naught if the performances were not up to the task. Thankfully, we have in Leslie De'ath a fine Canadian musician of notable accomplishment ... His performances are quite masterly, every one of them, and the recording quality is first rate. This is music-making of rare quality, and as we also have those additional 8 tracks played by Scott himself... This is an issue of the greatest importance to collectors of British music and to lovers of musical Impressionism."
Robert Matthew-Walker, International Record Review, July 2005
"If you like Debussy you'll adore this beautifully recorded and enchantingly phrased recital."
Julian Haylock, BBC Music Magazine, May 2005
"A tasty starter for what promises to be substantial fare...,
this admirable recording inaugurates the complete solo piano music on disc.
The charm of the salon miniatures, at which De’Ath excels....."
Peter Dickinson, The Gramophone, July 2005
"[De’Ath] brings exactly the right, elegant touch to Scott’s creations.
De’Ath clearly loves this music and play it with relish and joie de vivre....
Dutton’s new recording fills an important void in the catalog."
Lawrence Budmen, American Record Guide, Sept/Oct 2005
"The third volume of Cyril Scott is first rate.
Op.66 is divinely played: not too fast, and you have time enough to revel
in the finely wrought details of this real masterpiece."
Michel Fleury (Paris), June 27 (email to Lewis Foreman)
"... warmly sympathetic unfolding of texture. [Third Sonata]"
Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International
"De’Ath’s performances, especially of the last three sonatas, appear excellent....
De’Ath contributes excellently informative booklet notes, and the recording quality is very good throughout."
Robert Matthew-Walker, International Record Review, Sept.2005
"The [Second Sonata’s] long cumulative spans are admirably handled by De’Ath.
[He] caught the atmosphere perfectly, [and] brings the numbered sonatas back into the mainstream of British piano music. Well recorded, and excellent notes from the soloist."
Peter Dickinson, The Gramophone, Nov.2005
"The Scott revival gathers pace remarkably: two volumes of piano works from Leslie De’Ath (7/05; 12/05)....."
Peter Dickinson, The Gramophone, July 2006
MINIATURES
Valse caprice op.74 no.7 [W396] (1911)
Requiescat [W288] (1917)
Soirée japonaise op.67 no.4 [W325]
Vistas [W409] (1918): A Lonely Dell, In the Forest, The Jocund Dance
Cherry Ripe [W60] (1915)
Autumn Idyll [W25] (1912)
Notturno op.54 no.5 [W220] (1908)
Three Old Country Dances [W226] (1925)
Two Alpine Sketches op.54 no.4 [W10] (1908)
Sphinx op.63 [W348] (1908)
Vesperale op.40 no.2 [W401] (1904)
Three Pastorals [W242] (1919-20)
Three Dances op.20 [W87] (1903): Gavotte, Eastern Dance, English Dance
Twilight-tide [W390] (1918)
A Pageant: Three Dances [W234] (1920): Sentimental Waltz, Exotic Dance, Processional Dance
Miniatures [W202] (1915): To an Old Miniature, A Ballad Told at Candle-light, A Little Dancer from Spain
Handelian Rhapsody op.17 [W134] (1901/1909) (Ed. Percy Grainger)
Three Little Waltzes op.58 [W178] (1906)
SUITES
Deuxieme suite op.75 [W355] (1910)
Pastoral Suite [W239] (1913)
Indian Suite [W159] (1922)
Leslie De'Ath (piano)
Recorded at Maureen Forrester Recital Hall, Faculty of Music, Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario
3-4, 18 January 2004
CYRIL SCOTT PLAYS CYRIL SCOTT
Water Wagtail op.71 no.3 (W414)
Valse Scherzando (no.3 of Three Frivolous Pieces) (W124-3)
Caprice Chinois (W56)
Pensoso (no.3 of Three Pastorals) (W242-3)
Souvenir de Vienne (from Karma, ballet) (W168-5)
Lotus Land op.47 no.1 (W183)
Danse negre op.58 no.5 (W89)
Rainbow Trout (W283)
Cyril Scott (piano)
Recorded between 1928-30
DOUBLE CD/MODERN & HISTORIC CDLX 7150