01. - 06. Port Essington [14'53]
07. - 11. Sonata for Strings No.1 [13'56]
12. Lament for Strings^ [9'39]
13. Sonata for Strings No.2 [13'15]
14. - 15. Sonata for Strings No.3 [12'55]
16. Irkanda IV* [10'45]
Richard Tognetti- violin*, Cameron Retchford- cello^, Australian Chamber Orchestra conducted by Richard Tognetti
ABC Classics 4545042 [recorded January1996 and March 1995^; CD issued 1996]
[digital download; flacs, cover and poor back scans, no booklet]
Recording venue: Sir Eugene Goossens Hall, ABC Centre, SydneyRecording engineer: Allan MacLean; Producers: Colin Cornish and Nathan Waks^
Here we start a series of recordings by various Australian forces of works by whom I consider to be Australia's greatest composer, Peter Sculthorpe (born 1929 in Tasmania), succeeded after his death in 2014 by Carl Vine.
Although his music is basically tonal, as with his rough contemporary, the great Finnish composer Aulis Sallinen (born 1935), Sculthorpe's music can be quite astringent at times.
This recording including Port Essington was recently requested in the c-box. I generally prefer Sculthorpe's illustrative and descriptive works so Port Essington and Irkanda IV please me most in this stimulating collection. Sculthorpe's interest in the music of native Australian tribes and of surrounding countries frequently becomes apparent in his compositions.
Unfortunately, no booklet is included with any digital download of ABC Classics (an offshoot of Universal Music) issues of Australian music, so detailed information is only available with a few of the issues posted here. In this case, I have included a PDF of Andrew Achenbach's perceptive review of the original release in the October 1997 issue of Gramophone magazine.
Port Essington is an inlet at the very far north tip of the Northern Territories with a very early British settlement, of which very little remains, in the remote Garig Gunak Barlu National Park. Irkanda IV exists in versions for string quartet, flute and solo strings in addition to this one for string orchestra with solo violin and percussion and was the first work to bring Sculthorpe world-wide recognition. Irkanda is an aboriginal word for 'remote and lonely place'.
More abstract in nature are the Sonatas for Strings and the Lament (derived from music from Sculthorpe's opera Rites of Passage).