Archive for solo piano

John McCabe – The ‘Lost’ Recital

In 1985 the internationally renowned pianist and composer John McCabe recorded an album of contemporary piano music by Australian and American composers. Made in the EMI Studio in Sydney on a commission from Earle Page College, the recording was put aside when the studio closed and was believed lost. Attempts to trace the master through EMI’s successor, Warner Music, were not replied to. Amazingly, a cassette copy was found among the composer’s papers and has been remastered to produce a wonderfully fine album with superb sound. Works by Peter Sculthorpe, George Rochberg, Wendy Hiscocks, Barney Childs, Don Banks, Graeme Koehne and David Maslanka. Probably the last ‘new’ recording to be released featuring McCabe, who died in 2015, as pianist. The album will be scheduled for release by Métier Records in spring 2019 (catalog number MSV 28585).

John McLeod’s complete solo piano works

There are few composers whose genius is fully realised in their own era – but one of them must be John McLeod, a Scot with a truly international voice.

A new double CD/digital album will be issued in summer 2018 by Métier, the contemporary-music division of the Divine Art Group, containing McLeod’s complete (to date) music for solo piano. All are live concert performances by fellow Scot Murray McLachlan, whose previous recordings for Divine Art, and earlier for Olympia, have drawn unstinting praise. This will be a major pianistic recording in all senses, to be released as Métier MSV 77207. One piece is performed not by Murray, but by his daughter, 15-year-old Rose McLachlan; a debut for a very promising star of the future!