British Violin Concertos: My Personal Baker’s Dozen

As promised in my recent post about Arnold Bax’s great Violin Concerto is a baker’s dozen of MY favourite examples of the genre. Some are old favourites such as the Elgar, the Moeran and the Walton, however many I have discovered only recently with the release of much material from the Lyrita archives and the sterling efforts of Dutton Epoch.

I have put them roughly chronologically, as I could not settle on my personal ratings for these excellent works. However, I find that I could not live without any of them now. Furthermore, there are over a hundred examples of the British and Commonwealth Violin concerto currently in the CD catalogue, See Michael Herman’s listings on MusicWeb International for further details. Finally I do expect that other enthusiasts of British Music would come up with a different, but equally impressive list!

Alexander Mackenzie Violin Concerto in C sharp minor, Op. 32 (1884-5 ) [Hyperion]
Charles Villiers Stanford Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 74 (1899) [Hyperion]
Edward Elgar Violin Concerto in B minor, Op. 61 (1909-10) [Many!!]
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Violin Concerto in G minor, Op. 80 (1911) [Lyrita, Hyperion and Avie]
Haydn Wood Violin Concerto in A minor (1928) [Dutton]
Arthur Somervell Violin Concerto in G minor (1930) [Hyperion]
Guirne Creith Violin Concerto in G minor (1932-34) [Dutton]
Arnold Bax Violin Concerto (1938) [Chandos]
William Walton Violin Concerto (1938-9) [Many]
E.J. Moeran Violin Concerto (1941) [Lyrita]
Thomas Pitfield Concerto Lirico for Violin and Full Orchestra (1958) [Dutton]
David Morgan Violin Concerto (1965-6) [Lyrita]
Lionel Sainsbury Violin Concerto, Op. 14 (1989) [Dutton]

Finally, out of the above listings, I have to admit that the Elgar and the Walton are my two favourite concertos. However, I feel that David Morgan’s essay is probably one of the finest of the ‘undiscovered’ works. And Lionel Sainsbury has written a masterpiece that demands to become a concert favourite.