James MacMillan: Piano Concerto No.2: Piano: Study Score

Hawkes Pocket Scores HPS 1468-Originally a ballet score this 30' work is scored with strings and consists of three movements:'cumnock fair': A 12-minute fantasy based on dance melodies by the 18th-century Cumnock composer John French. The moods range widely from playful rustic archaic ungainly dreamy boisterous stately brutal and grotesque to mysterious and unnerving.'shambards'': Memories of Burnsian folksong are interrupted by new dance tunes built on fragments from the Mad Scene from Act 3 of Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor based on the novel by Walter Scott.'shamnation'. Low throbbing in the piano becomes a drumbeat to accompany a fast violin reel using three tunesand following a traditional 8-bar structure. The solo piano part emerges as a counterpoint to the Scottish themes after which the music winds its way through many different keys.