Lesley-Jane Rogers, John Turner, Duncan Honeybourne, Harvey Davies, Benedict Holland, Laura Robinson - Ronald Stevenson and Friends

This CD celebrates the Scottish, but Blackburn born, composer Ronald Stevenson, best known for his piano music (he was himself a virtuoso pianist), but his enormous work list spans most genres except opera, and this disc includes all his works for recorder, interspersed with some of his songs in widely divergent styles with piano and instrumental accompaniment. His Scottish composer friends were legion, and this disc includes music by several of them, David Johnson, John Purser, Wilma Paterson and Eddie McGuire. His overseas friends were many, and notably included Grainger, some of whose music Stevenson arranged for various instruments. Grainger himself made two entrancing versions of the well known and much loved Country Gardens for recorders, at his friend Balfour Gardiner's house, which bookend this disc, and have not previously been heard.

John Turner, March 2023

This is a splendid programme. The repertoire is original and interesting. All performances are superb. Special mention must be made of John Turner's fine playing on the recorder and of Lesley-Jane Rogers's beautiful, clear soprano voice. � MusicWeb International