Violin Sonata in E Minor

It wasn’t for nothing that they called York Bowen "the English Rachmaninoff", and the full-blooded, fervent late Romanticism of his 1945 Violin Sonata in E Minor explains why. That he had no time for the pastoral leanings of English music in the first half of the 20th century made him an outsider figure and contributed to the neglect his works have suffered until recently. He wrote extensively for strings, preferring to spotlight the darker, softer sound of the viola. But there are two sonatas for violin, the first an unpublished student work written at 18. And although his style changed little over time, so that the language of the two is close, the gap of nearly half a century between them gave him an opportunity to polish his technique. This 1945 score glows with confidence, maturity and strength, delivering expansive gestures on compact terms in three movements, two of them marked con fuoco (with fire). They open with a heroic call to arms that’s followed by a quiet, slow middle movement and a vigorous third with a particularly fiery coda. As with many Bowen works, the piano writing is formidable, intended for himself to play: he was a keyboard virtuoso.