Benjamin Britten - Cello Symphony; Gloriana Suite; Four Sea Interludes (Paul Watkins; Edward Gardner)

Information

Composer: Benjamin Britten

• Symphonic Suite from 'Gloriana', Op. 53a
• Symphony for Cello and Orchestra, Op. 68
• Four Sea Interludes from 'Peter Grimes', Op. 33a

Paul Watkins, cello

BBC Philharmonic Orchestra

Edward Gardner, conductor

Date: 2011

Label: Chandos

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Review

Getting to grips with Britten’s music in the opera house has done Edward Gardner no harm at all. His conducting of the Symphonic Suite from Gloriana feels as if it has just stepped off the stage. He starts out with flamboyant cut-and-thrust in the jousting of “The Tournament” and gets playing that is light on its feet from the BBC Philharmonic in the “Courtly Dances”. Robert Murray’s intimate singing of the “Lute Song” is a bonus. This is altogether a more enjoyable performance than the one by Britten himself, recently issued by Hänssler Classic (11/10), not least because Britten had an orchestra less sure of the idiom and the live recording falls far short of Chandos’s impressive colour and depth.

It is also Gardner who is the dominant personality in the Cello Symphony. By pacing the score tautly and making sure this often brooding music never stands still (repeated motifs always have their intensity heightened), Gardner provides a strong framework for Paul Watkins’s expressive playing. The deep concentration and nimble technique that he brings to the solo part make this a satisfying performance – at least until comparisons with the composer’s own (London, 9/89). There, Rostropovich’s larger-than-life personality leaps off the page so vividly that he seems even less likely to be surpassed as a Britten interpreter than Peter Pears. Still, with Gardner kicking up quite a storm in the Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes, this makes a highly recommendable addition to Chandos’s extensive Britten catalogue.

— Richard Fairman

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Benjamin Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976) was a leading British composer, pianist and conductor. Trained at the Royal College of Music, he gained early acclaim with Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge and achieved international prominence with the opera Peter Grimes (1945). His major stage works include Billy Budd, The Turn of the Screw, and Death in Venice, alongside innovative church parables such as Curlew River. Co-founder of the Aldeburgh Festival, he also composed celebrated song cycles, choral works including the War Requiem, and notable orchestral and chamber music.

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Paul Watkins (born 1970) is a Welsh cellist and conductor. A former principal cellist of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, he has performed globally as a soloist with leading orchestras and conductors. Watkins served with the Emerson String Quartet (2013–23) and has been Artistic Director of the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival since 2014, as well as Professor of Cello at Yale School of Music since 2018. An accomplished conductor, he has led major orchestras and won the 2002 Leeds Conducting Competition. His extensive discography spans major cello repertoire, and he performs on an 18th-century Venetian instrument.

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Edward Gardner (born 22 November 1974) is an English conductor. Educated at the University of Cambridge and the Royal Academy of Music, he began as a choral conductor and répétiteur before advancing to major roles. He served as music director of English National Opera (2007–15) and later held key positions with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and the Bergen Philharmonic (2015–24), where he became honorary conductor. Since 2021, he has been principal conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, with tenure extended to 2028. Gardner has recorded for EMI Classics and Chandos Records.

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