More Than Just A Teacher

Pianist Mark Bebbington has been slowly building up a reputation as the current leading exponent of English piano music from the first half of the 20th century. This disc is the first volume of the piano music of Frank Bridge. The reputation of Bridge himself is also slowly coming out from beneath the shadow of simply being known as Britten's teacher and his music is becoming more widely available and appreciated in its' own right. This well filled disc contains several small scale miniatures covering most of the span of Bridge's piano compositions from early to late, 1905 to 1925. He tended to write with particular performers in mind and was aware of both French impressionists and Russian visionaries ( such as Ravel and Scriabin ) as well as fellow English contemporaries ( Ireland, Delius and Bax ). They often inhabit a fantasy world, are not immediately identifiable as stereotypically English, are sometimes descriptive and occasionally programmatic as in the Vignettes De Marseilles. The most substantial work on the disc both in terms of length and content is his one Sonata. This is the most experimental and the most emotionally challenging and it is no coincidence that it was written in the aftermath of WW1 when Bridge's music, in common with that of many others, underwent a significant change in mood and method becoming something altogether darker and more brooding. Bebbington has all the technique and affinity necessary to bring out the quality of these pieces.