Shop Now

The Times

With the British composer Robin Walker, I know exactly where to find him: on his Pennine farm. Experiencing nature in the raw, writing music from intuition, not intellect; magical, indeed spiritual music that deserves far more exposure than it receives. The present album, excellently performed and warmly recorded contains seven chamber works written over 25 years. The most immediately moving is A Prayer and a Dance of Two Spirits, a double concerto for recorder (John Turner) and violin (Emma McGrath), shaded by the deaths of Walker’s parents, where grief is eventually transformed into nature’s universal dance.

Related trajectories underline a remarkable series of solo pieces. Has any double bass playing ever carried the physical impact of Leon Bosch’s thwacks and harmonics during The Song of Bone on Stone? Miracles like that happen in track after track, making each piece bigger in impact than most of their running ties suggest. Don’t let this pass you by.
Geoff Brown