Duncan Honeybourne – De Profundis Clamavi (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

De Profundis Clamavi is a double CD with recordings of English piano music that contrasts three dramatic sonatas with a lively selection of shorter pieces ranging from sublime poetry to dark rhapsody.

Frank Bridge began writing his grandiose piano sonata exactly a century ago, in the wake of the First World War, and she is imbued with a mood of devastation and torment. The sonata by contemporary composer Richard Pantcheff was completed in 2017 and evokes a similarly intense emotional landscape; hence the quote from Psalm 130, which gives the album its name (“From the depths I called to You, Oh Lord”). The sonata by Christopher Edmunds from 1938, which was recorded here for the first time, also oozes with lively pianistic colours, melting tenderness and an irresistible romantic warmth.

The three sonatas are complemented and contextualized by Parry’s delicious Shulbrede Tunes – loving portraits of the composer’s family and their home in Sussex – as well as by the first recording of two breathtaking romantic showpieces by a composer better known for his vocal works, Cecil Armstrong Gibbs. Three unreleased – and not yet recorded – pearls by Edgar Bainton give the CD another special feature.

The selection of composers represented on the CDs is characterized by many friendships and connections, and the sonatas of Bridge and Pantcheff are connected with each other by a special pedagogical aspect. The young Richard Pantcheff was a mentor to Benjamin Britten, Bridge’s most famous pupil, and Britten is represented with his captivating Night Piece, composed for the first Leeds International Piano Competition. Duncan Honeybourne studied the work with the founder of the competition, Dame Fanny Waterman, who commissioned it in 1963 and recently died at the age of one hundred.

Tracklist:
1-01. Duncan Honeybourne – Piano Sonata in B Minor: I. Allegro, fieramente e rubato (07:53)
1-02. Duncan Honeybourne – Piano Sonata in B Minor: II. Lento e mesto (04:31)
1-03. Duncan Honeybourne – Piano Sonata in B Minor: III. Allegro scherzoso (Poco rubato) (04:53)
1-04. Duncan Honeybourne – Variations & Fugue in B Minor, Op. 1 (11:47)
1-05. Duncan Honeybourne – An Essex Rhapsody, Op. 36 (07:34)
1-06. Duncan Honeybourne – Ballade for Piano in D-Flat Major (04:16)
1-07. Duncan Honeybourne – Nocturnus, Op. 90: No. 5, Wind oor die Branders (04:16)
1-08. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 1, Shulbrede (02:10)
1-09. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 2, Elizabeth (02:04)
1-10. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 3, Dolly No. 1 (02:27)
1-11. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 4, Bogies and Sprites That Gambol by Nights (02:50)
1-12. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 5, Matthew (03:11)
1-13. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 6, Prior’s Chamber by Firelight (06:07)
1-14. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 7, Children’s Pranks (03:12)
1-15. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 8, Dolly No. 2 (03:47)
1-16. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 9, In the Garden with the Dew on the Grass (02:24)
1-17. Duncan Honeybourne – Shulbrede Tunes: No. 10, Father Playmate (05:26)
2-01. Duncan Honeybourne – Willows (06:49)
2-02. Duncan Honeybourne – The Making of the Nightingale (03:03)
2-03. Duncan Honeybourne – Piano Sonata, H. 160: I. Lento ma non troppo – Andante ben moderato – Allegro energico (16:04)
2-04. Duncan Honeybourne – Piano Sonata, H. 160: II. Andante ben moderato (09:43)
2-05. Duncan Honeybourne – Piano Sonata, H. 160: III. Lento – Allegro non troppo (09:57)
2-06. Duncan Honeybourne – Night-Piece for Piano (06:51)
2-07. Duncan Honeybourne – Piano Sonata, Op. 99: I. Inquieto (06:36)
2-08. Duncan Honeybourne – Piano Sonata, Op. 99: II. Elegia. Lento e tenebroso (10:21)
2-09. Duncan Honeybourne – Piano Sonata, Op. 99: III. Alla vortice (08:18)