Bennett: Piano Concertos Nos. 4 + 6

William Sterndale Bennett was recognized in England and Germany as an outstanding pianist, and he wrote his best and most characteristic compositions for his own instrument. In addition to numerous works for solo piano, including two sonatas, he composed six piano concertos and a single-movement Caprice for piano and orchestra. He performed all of his works for piano and orchestra in public, appearing as the soloist himself. During a visit to his friends in Leipzig from January to March 1842, Bennett mentioned in a letter that he was working on a new concerto, which he hoped to perform before his departure for London. Although that did not happen, a large part of the work on the later unpublished Piano Concerto No. 6 in A minor, WoO 48, must have already been completed by that time. Bennett continued to work on the concerto in the summer of 1843 and hoped to publish it, but it was repeatedly delayed. Martin Yates, who conducts the Royal Northern Sinfonia in this recording, completed the unfinished work based on his knowledge of Sterndale Bennett's style, the music of the time, and also the music already completed in the manuscript. The Concerto for Two Pianos in C major, WoO 29, actually a single movement, was composed in the spring of 1835 as a joint work by Bennett and his fellow student at the RAM, George Alexander Macfarren. Bennett and Macfarren were the leading composition students of their year, and so the two pianists decided to compose a concerto for two pianos and orchestra together and then perform it with their fellow students. The composition of a double piano concerto was not a requirement of their studies, but rather served for their own amusement. The two men began to alternate: Bennett composed the first thirty-seven bars, Macfarren the next fifty, and so on, with the final 125 bars or so apparently being a collaboration.