Benjamin Frith - John Field: Piano Concertos Nos. 5 & 6 (2002)

Benjamin Frith proves an ideal soloist in these attractive, decorative pieces. Like his close contemporary, Hummel, Field is much more adept at embroidering the themes which bubble from him than at developing them in a conventional way. The passagework which can seem just trivial needs both the virtuosity and the artistry of a pianist of charm such as Frith if it's to come fully alive and compel attention, as it does here.
Frith's articulation is sparklingly clear throughout with rapid scales and decorations pearly and wonderfully even, helped by the relatively intimate acoustic of the theatre in Gosforth where the recordings were made.
The title of the Fifth Concerto, L'incendie parl'orage ('Fire from the Storm'), is inspired by the passage of storm music towards the end of the central development section in the first movement.
Surprisingly Field, the inventor of the nocturne and inspirer of Chopin, here avoids a full slow movement, contenting himself instead with a slow introduction to the jaunty finale. At least he makes amends in the Sixth Concerto, where the central Larghetto slow movement is a nocturne in everything but name, with soaring cantilena for the piano which might well have inspired Bellini. The finale is a sparkling polkalike movement, with passagework breathtakingly elaborate, which Frith rightly treats as fun music, a fine pay-off. Haslam and the Northern Sinfonia are well recorded, too, in the relatively small-scale acoustic.