A little while ago I bought the new Naxos recording of Edward German’s comic opera “Tom Jones.” At the time I had a vocal score of German’s slightly later concert version in two acts. However, last week, I wandered in to see what was new (but old) in Travis and Emery, London’s best second hand music shop, located on Cecil Court, a little unspoilt street of antiquarian bookshops and the like. As well as some lovely Mozart scores published by Broude Bros of New York, I found a complete vocal score of Tom Jones. This prompted me to listen to the recording last weekend. It’s a joy. Edward German’s very English tunes are there in abundance, and the orchestration is wonderfully nuanced. It’s helping nudge my collection of recordings of German conducting his own music back towards the top of the list of items to transfer. German is in some ways a successor to Arthur Sullivan, although there is more of a romantic inflection to his harmony and orchestration, and he’s perhaps more adventurous than Ketelbey and Eric Coates who followed him. Like Sullivan he was keen to be acknowledged as a serious composer of major works, but it’s his lighter pieces that have survived. If you like this kind of English music from the early 20th century, then buy this recording.

Franz André’s recordings of Bizet’s Arlèsienne Suites are almost ready for my website, and should be available there for the New Year. I hope also to have some interesting Balakirev recordings, that although from a 1961 Saga LP were almost certainly recorded in the early to mid 1950s.

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