Steffen Schleiermacher - British!: Piano Music (2011)

This curious little album focuses on four contemporary British composers, all working in dissonant but not serial idioms. Some have written quite violent music, but the pieces here have an intimate quality that comes in some cases from personal connections among the composers. Several pieces were written for the 50th birthday of composer Michael Finnissy, who in turn wrote pieces for Laurence Crane and Howard Skempton; Crane also dedicated his Chorale (1997, with the lovely performance indication "fragile") to Skempton. The music is mostly lyrical, and, with the exception of Skempton's Notti Stellate a Vagli (track 9), turns on a single technical device. Highlights include Finnissy's highly playful Sonata for toy piano (track 13), the pair of tangos by Finnissy, both stretching the rhythm drastically in different ways but remaining recognizably tangos, and the two collections of abstractly numbered but expresive and delicate short works by Richard Emsley, the only composer of the group apparently not linked in the chain of friendships. A major attraction here is the playing of German pianist Steffen Schleiermacher, one of the best there is in bringing expression to this kind of repertoire, which will be of most interest in academic settings. MDG's sound works very well within the intimate dimensions of the music.