HELPS: CHAMBER MUSIC WITH PIANO - HELPS; ATOS TRIO; SPECTRUM CONCERTS BERLIN (2 CDS)

Robert Helps in Berlin

Chamber Music with Piano

Robert Helps (piano)

Spectrum Concerrts Berlin & Atos Trio

Godowsky: Studies on Chopin Etudes - No. 45 in E
Godowsky: Studies on the Chopin Etudes (complete)
Helps: Duo for Cello & Piano
Helps: Fantasy
Helps: Piano Quartet
Helps: Piano Trios (2)
Helps: Postlude
Helps: Quintet
Helps: Shall We Dance
Ireland: Love is a sickness full of woes
Ireland: The Darkened Valley
Mendelssohn: Schilflied, Op. 71 No. 4
Poulenc: Intermezzo in A flat major, FP118

This recording is an exploration of Robert Helps’s ‘subtle sound world’ (ClassicsToday.com on Naxos 8559199), and his shared history with Spectrum Concerts Berlin. Highly regarded as a ‘musician’s musician’, Helps is featured as both composer and pianist. Postlude is suffused with an atmosphere of reminiscence, and the flow of ‘endless melody’ in the Piano Quartet is comparable to Scriabin. Associations with the Second Viennese School are heard in the poetic Quintet and the virtuoso Fantasy, while the two Piano Trios mark the stylistic boundaries of his career. Helps’s Shall We Dance for piano (CD 2, Track 12) was among his last recordings.