Leighton – Complete Chamber works for Cello

The Elegy … [is] a seven minute essay whose songful countenance owes not a little to Vaughan Williams and Finzi.

… the Partita is cast in three movements, its opening, imploringly expressive Elegy leadingto a biting Scherzo and prodigally inventive Theme and Variations. Thi is music of impeccable craft and genuine substance, always sure of its goal and shot through with Leighton’s own pungent brand of lyricism.

Likewise the meaty and rewarding Sonata for cello that Leighton wrote for Joan Dickson … amply repays close scrutiny, its enviably concentrated and exhilaratingly resourceful finale … ultimately returning tothe elegiac mood of the work’s introduction.

Suffics it to report, Wallfisch and Terroni are superbly persuasive exponents, the performance of Alleluia Pascha Nostrum in every way a match for dedicatee Wallfisch’s own blistering workld premiere recording with his father, peter, on Chandos.

… this valuable BMS anthology merits the heartiest of plaudits.

Andrew Achenbach – Gramophone