Walton Audio CD – CD, July 12, 2011

It is nice to have all this great music on one album. An excellent set of pieces to add to one's collection of Walton music!

I'm surprised Walton's pieces are not more popular, but when I look through my collection of LPs and CDs I find only a few other recordings of the symphonies and the concerti. I'm not sure why, either, as these works are not radical in any way, are quite pleasant to listen to, and don't seem out of the normal classical repertoire in any way.The recordings here are excellent, with typical EMI engineering quality of the LPO (for the symphonies), and three different orchestras for the concerti (RPO for the violin, BSO for the cello, and CBSO for the Wise Virgins). All the recordings are dynamic, have decent soundstaging, and have good isolation of the soloists (where appropriate).If you haven't heard Walton's works, you may be pleasantly surprised by the musicality, especially considering some of the more avant-guarde music being written around the same time. Certainly this is a decent set of these works to sample, if you're getting into Walton.