Ruth Gipps: Orchestral Works, Vol. 3 in Bloomington, MN

After a long period of neglect due not only to her gender but also to her relatively conservative idiom, the music of British composer
Ruth Gipps
is being rediscovered and is proving highly listenable at the very least. This is the third in a series by the
BBC Philharmonic
under conductor
Rumon Gamba
, and all the installments have included works that could enliven a symphonic concert anywhere.
Gipps
is certainly in the line of her teacher,
Ralph Vaughan Williams
, but she is never derivative, and a variety of influences on her music are evident. Consider the splendid finale of the
Horn Concerto, Op. 58
, of 1968, with wonderful instrumental writing unfolding on a broad
Sibelian
canvas. The
Symphony No. 1, Op. 22
, completed in 1942 when
was 22, is an exuberant work, not fully formed in its language but never dull; sample the constantly shifting finale. The closest to
Vaughan Williams
may be the pastoral
Cringlemire Garden: An Impression for String Orchestra, Op. 39
, with its pastoral mood and solo instrumental writing, but it is no knock-off, and really it can stand with any of the English string orchestra classics of the 20th century.
Ambarvalia, Op. 70
(1988), has a novel dance flavor inspired by accounts of ancient Roman dances. Even the opening
Coronation Procession, Op. 41
, written for the accession of
Elizabeth II
, is lively and appealing. The
and
Gamba
are excellent, in works that were entirely unfamiliar to the players (three of the five works are world-premiere recordings), and special note should be made of the
Chandos
label's MediaCity studio sound, sensitive indeed to the details in the performance. Sample the transparency at the beginning of
Cringlemire Garden
. For those wanting to sample
' music, there could hardly be a better place to start. ~ James Manheim