Sonata for Viola

Robin Holloway (b. 1943) is renowned as a composer, essayist and teacher. A chorister at St. Paul's Cathedral, he subsequently took private lessons with Alexander Goehr whilst reading initially English and then Music at Cambridge. His doctoral thesis at Oxford became the book 'Debussy and Wagner.' Returning to lecture at Cambridge he was later appointed Professor of Composition before retiring in 2011. His many students include Judith Weir, Huw Watkins, Thomas Ades, George Benjamin, Peter Seabourne, and David Collins. Holloway's early works were complex and modernist. What followed, namely his 'Scenes from Schumann,' caused much controversy for it's radical reengagement with Romanticism, both in gesture and use of tonality. His mature style could be said to forge a path between the two, with excursions more fully into each. This refusal to be constrained is a feature of his musical thinking. On this release we hear two trios and a sonata, all performed by some of the finest young musicians of our day.