Dances and Laments is the new release from British composer Peter Fribbins, following two critically acclaimed Guild albums from 2010 and 2012. Renowned for his passionate and direct musical voice, Fribbins’s music convincingly mixes elements of traditional tonality and established forms, with contemporary ideas and approaches, to create a sound that is at once distinctive and deeply personal. Dominated by associations with poetry and painting, the new CD opens with The Zong Affair, a striking septet based on a painting by William Turner, expertly performed by the Turner Ensemble, comprised of principal players from the Royal Opera House and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. Dances & Laments follows, played by the wonderful French duo Philippe Graffin and Henri Demarquette. Then come two further duos: That which echoes in eternity for cello and piano (after Dante); and Porphyria’s Lover for flute and piano (after Browning), again beautifully performed. The beguiling ‘Softly, in the dusk’ (after D.H. Lawrence) follows, sensitively executed by the Rosamunde Piano Trio. The disc ends with its only ‘abstract’ offering, a powerful Prelude and Fugue based on the English hymn tune ‘Cromer’, masterfully played by Michael Frith on the organ of Brentwood Cathedral.

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