Percy Grainger
Percy Aldridge Grainger (1882–1961) was an Australian-born composer, arranger and pianist. A brilliant folk-song collector and arranger, he was also a restless experimenter whose work ranged from tuneful percussion to Free Music machines that foreshadowed electronic synthesis.
Born in Brighton, Victoria, he left Australia as a boy for study in Frankfurt, then made his name in London as a society and concert pianist while collecting English folk songs with a phonograph. Friendship with Grieg deepened his feeling for national music; settings such as Country Gardens, Molly on the Shore and Shepherd’s Hey later carried his name around the world.
From 1914 he lived in the United States, taking citizenship yet always calling himself Australian. Concert tours and teaching filled the decades; in the 1930s he founded the Grainger Museum in Melbourne as an archive of his life and work. He championed music beyond the European mainstream and, late in life, pursued Free Music unbound by fixed pitch or metre—sketches realised long afterwards on Full Spectrum (MD 3027).
His complete music for tuneful percussion, played on instruments he designed and left to the museum, is heard on Tuneful Percussion (MD 3222). Songs, brass and piano pieces, and transcriptions continue to appear across the catalogue, from art-song recitals to organ, cello and chamber programmes.
Percy Grainger is featured on the following titles
Blue Silence: Australian Music for Cello and Piano
This is the first disc of its kind released in Australia: an overview of important works for cello and piano spanning 108 years. The earliest is Grainger’s Scandinavian Suite, a tour de force that deserves a place in the concert hall.
Compositions by Percy Grainger also appear on
Porgy & Bess Fantasy: Music for Two Pianos
In the early 1980s two of Australia’s finest pianists joined forces in masterpieces of the piano-duet literature. The set draws on concert and studio sessions from a period when such collaborations were still readily captured.
Arranger
Australian Fantasia: Orchestral Works by David Stanhope
Orchestral works by David Stanhope and four of his transcriptions, realised with a digital orchestra. Apart from Olympic Fireworks, written for the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games opening ceremony, these scores had not been heard in public performance.
Midnight Songs
Three is a Melbourne-based trio of trumpet, trombone and guitar. With little extant repertoire for this combo, the group commissioned four Melbourne composers and pairs those works with Jane Hammond’s arrangement of Percy Grainger’s Random Round.
Recital: Australian Art Song
Merlyn Quaife (soprano) and Michael Kieran Harvey (piano) present a recital of Australian art song spanning the twentieth century, from Percy Grainger and Fritz Hart to Keith Humble and David Horowicz.
An Australian Collection
Nineteen tracks drawn from the Tall Poppies catalogue, chosen to show the range and depth of Australian composition and performance across the label’s first decade.
Viola Power
It's hard to imagine a CD of Australian music for the viola, but here it is. From Grainger's chirpy love song through Ross Edwards' intricate dance to Peter Sculthorpe's masterful work with percussion.
Virtuoso Transcriptions
These ‘one take’ studio recordings were made for ABC broadcast about a decade before release. That they stand as a finished album is a tribute to David Stanhope’s prodigious musicianship and technique.
Retrospect: Pre-War Australian Miniatures
Larry Sitsky is known throughout Australia as a composer. He is also one of the finest pianists, and he has a healthy respect for the work of his fellow Australians. Here he plays pre-war miniatures with evident affection.