Justin Connolly: Music for strings (plus ...)
MEX 77209 (Métier, CD, 2 discs)
FIRST RELEASE (14 March 2025)
Playing time: 73'34"/59'39" - TT 133'13"
Tracks: 15 + 13
Booklet pages: 28
℗ 2025 Métier Records
© 2025 Métier Records
Main country of recording: United Kingdom
Reviewer: Geoff Pearce
Review of Justin Connolly: Music for strings (plus ...) published on 5 April 2025
Members of the Kreutzer Quartet
Roger Heaton, clarinet
Royal Academy of Music Musicians
Justin Connolly (1933-2020):
CD1
String Trio, Op 43
Tesserae C, Op 15/III
Triad V, Op 19
Gymel B, Op 39/II
CD2
Ceilidh, Op 29/I
Celebratio per viola sola, Op 29/IV
Collana, Op 29/III
Celebratio super Ter in lyris Leo, Op 29/II
Tesserae E, Op 15/V
Métier celebrates the music of Justin Connolly with a double album of first recordings of his music for strings which shines a long-overdue spotlight on a composer once named by Pierre Boulez among the most compelling British voices of his era. Connolly's music, characterized by conceptual rigor, lyrical intensity, and flashes of playful invention, has remained largely absent from the public stage in recent decades. A long compositional hiatus in the late twentieth century may have contributed to this neglect, but his unique voice is now rediscovered through this comprehensive recording. The two ‘Celebratio’ pieces and the String Trio were all first performed as part of the recording project during 2024. Gymel B has never been heard before. The album includes performances by Royal Academy of Music students. The technically brilliant and challenging Ceilidh for Four Violins was a commission from the Menuhin School, meant for performances to be given by the school's teenage violinists. First performances were at the Smithsonian and then the British Embassy in 1976 as part of the British contribution to the US Bicentennial celebrations.