CLASSICAL

John Wilson celebrates his 50th birthday in style, with a fine new album of the orchestral music of the sadly neglected British composer

John Ireland (1879-1962).

My own interest in Ireland started with his symphonic rhapsody Mai-Dun, a description of the ancient British fort

Maiden Castle in Dorset, just a few miles from where I was born.

Ireland was also, of course, a man of Chelsea, spending more than two decades as organist and choirmaster at St Luke’s Church, just off the King’s Road. His blue plaque, on Gunter Grove, is on my regular walk to

Stamford Bridge and I have often wondered why Ireland is not better appreciated. The answer can readily be found in this CD of his shorter orchestral works, beyond doubt the best executed and most insightful recording that Ireland’s music has ever received.

Ireland, right, had a fine melodic gift and there are some memorable tunes here, notably the one he honed from a bus conductor’s cry of ‘DillyPiccadilly’ that dominates his A London Overture. Also, his carol, The Holy Boy, played here in an arrangement for strings and, most distinctively, the reworking for strings of his brass-band piece, A Downland Suite. But Ireland, sadly, could also be a bit perverse. For instance, his wartime Epic March (1941-42) contains some good things but so determined was he not to sound like Elgar that the clean lines of the march are obscured.

John Wilson has always been an exceptional orchestral trainer, as well as a fine interpreter. When only 22 he founded the John Wilson Orchestra to recreate the music of the golden age of Hollywood. He was rewarded by several hit albums and a standing ovation, led by John Williams, at a packed Los Angeles concert hall.

Now he has revived the Sinfonia of London, a recording orchestra that made many great discs in the 1950s and 1960s. Players have been recruited from various orchestras at home and abroad and the sound, and the precision of their playing, throughout this album has to be greatly admired.