OLYMPIA CDS

PIANO MUSIC FROM SCOTLAND Murray McLachlan, piano

Francis George Scott (1880-1958) was a prolific and striking composer of songs and Ronald Stevenson's very free transcriptions, somewhat after the fashion of Liszt's concert paraphrases, are imaginatively creative in their own right. Ronald Center's Piano Sonata is restless and mercurial, lacking much in the way of repose, but the joyous syncopations of the first movement are infectious and the work is a major contribution to the repertory and not in the least difficult to approach. The Six Bagatalles are even more strikingly diverse in mood. Children at play is an enchanting piece, with a musical-box miniaturism of texture at times, yet the writing is by no means inconsequential. All this music is played with commitment and considerable bravura by Murray McLachlan who is clearly a sympathetic exponent, and the recording is extremely vivid and real. Our Rosette is awarded not just for enterprise, but equally from admiration and pleasure.

Penguin Guide to Compact Discs, 1997 (*** plus Rosette)

ALEXANDER TCHEREPNIN: PIANO CONCERTOS VOLUME 1

Murray McLachlan, piano; Chetham's Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Julian Clayton

The three (concertos) chosen here cover most of Tcherepnin's career. The Second is a cheerful, extrovert work, very much in the manner of those other exiles who encountered Paris in the 1920s. So it is not surprising to find the voice of Prokofiev sounding here... but this is a lively, well-fashioned work. The Third Concerto is a fairly succinct two-movement work. (It) places considerable demands upon soloist and conductor... The last of the series, No.6 is a much bigger work but in many ways a more straightforward one, though it too requires virtuoso musicianship.

This it receives from Murray McLachlan, not to mention from the brilliant young orchestra of Chetham's. The school has been turning out virtuosos for a quarter of a century now, and the playing here has not only freshness and exuberance but a sense of style... collectors interested in Tcherepnin need have no hesitiation in acquiring this excellent set of performances.

Gramophone, November 1994

ALEXANDER TCHEREPNIN: PIANO CONCERTOS VOLUME 2

Murray McLachlan, piano; Chetham's Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Julian Clayton

...Here now are the other three (concertos), in their various ways cast in the same exuberant, heartfelt romantic manner. However, there is considerable variety within this general approach. The First, written in Paris in 1920... looks east, to a Georgia which Tcherepnin had known before exile, and north to an influence from, of all composers, Sibelius. The Fourth, written in 1947, looks further east to China, a country which Tcherepnin had toured in the 1930s and where he met his future wife. It is more a set of three tone poems, lightly accomodating Chinese musical gestures into the familiar romantic language, than a symphonic concerto. The Fifth belongs to 1963, and is a much more enigmatic work, and also by some way the most original of the entire set of six.

Murray McLachlan is a fine advocate of this music, which is technically demanding... The Chetham's Symphony Orchestra reaffirm their ability to cope with technically testing scores and, guided by Julian Clayton, to make musical sense of them with the command of more experienced musicians.

Gramophone, December 1995

ALEXANDER TCHEREPNIN: SOLO PIANO MUSIC VOLUME

Murray McLachlan, piano

Murray McLachlan's commitment to, and understanding of, twentieth century Russian piano music is obvious, and among his notable ealier issues from this repertoire can be found the first integral recording of A. Tcherepnin's 6 piano concertos (OCD 439 and OCD 440).

Hopefully, McLachlan's efforts to bring this music to the public will be rewarded. His playing is always fully up to the occasional demanding technical aspects of the pieces.... Tcherepnin's 1st Sonata from 1918... is an admirably fluent, stylish composition, quite remarkable for its time and place, not least for its contrapuntal writing in the first movement which betrays more than a momentary Rachmaninov influence in its exposition. McLachlan gives a commanding account of this striking, if not wholly characteristic, work.

The other works are equally well played... the recordings are excellent, and Benjamin Folkman's fine booklet notes are a model of what such things should be. Recommended.

Robert Matthew-Walker, International Record Review, January 2001

ALEXANDER TCHEREPNIN: SOLO PIANO MUSIC, VOLUME 2

Murray McLachlan, piano

This second volume in Murray McLachlan's survey of Alexander Tcherepnin's solo piano music makes an excellent follow-up to the first. It further broadens out knowledge of a composer-pianist whom, if he did not rank quite as high for invention and originality as his near-contemporaries and compatriots Stravinsky, Prokofiev and Shostakovich, nevertheless contrived to create a varied, highly effective and distinctive oeuvre.

Moreover, Tcherepnin was not prone to repeat himself. Thus his Toccata No.2 of 1922 is a very different proposition from the exciting but conventionally percussive and machine-like First Toccata recorded on Volume 1 (OCD 681) - it's a much more varied piece, by turns witty and lyrical, rhythmically highly inventive and presenting its challenges by calling for a very wide range of touch. And he late Second Piano Sonta (1961) eschews the conventional structural frameworks of the First, each of the three movements continually evolving like a narration rather than arriving at any formal gestures of reprise.

Calum MacDonald, International Piano Quarterly, Summer 2001

McLachlan is a fine pianist with a superb technique and is sympathetically attuned to the needs of this material. With good notes and excellent sound, it's an unusual, refreshing and attractive release.

American Record Guide, September/October 2001