Bennett: Complete Piano Concertos

William Sterndale Bennett's first three piano concertos were written at one-year intervals, in 1832, 1833, and 1834. Each of them was begun during his summer holidays and completed in the autumn term at the Royal Academy of Music. The first concerto made such an impact that Bennett was invited to perform it before King William IV and Queen Adelaide at Windsor Castle. Following his habit of beginning the composition of a new piano concerto during the quieter summer months, Piano Concerto No. 4 in F minor, Op. 19, was composed in the summer of 1838. In July, Bennett wrote to both Mendelssohn and the concert director of the Gewandhaus that he had composed a new concerto, intended specifically for performance at the Gewandhaus during his next visit to Germany. The premiere took place on 26 September in London before a small audience at the RAM, with the slow movement being a revised version of "A Stroll through the Meadows," which had originally been composed for his earlier F minor concerto (now designated as number 5).