Alexander Goehr is a central fi gure of the post-war Manchester School of composers with Birtwistle and Maxwell Davies. His work is recognized today for its assimilation of intellectual rigour with transparent expressiveness and richly haunting sonorities. This programme ranges from the Gabrieli-inspired virtuoso brass of Pastorals and the labyrinthine structures of Marching to Carcassonne, to When Adam Fell, with its extraordinary descending intervals discovered in Bach. Alexander Goehr’s close association with Oliver Knussen and the musicians on this recording make these performances uniquely authoritative.

This programme of music by Alexander Goehr is of works unavailable elsewhere on recordings. We have had huge success with our reissues of recordings by Goehr’s Manchester School colleague Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, and this release is also something of a coup for Naxos, including as it does Goehr’s most recent orchestral piece When Adam Fell. With Goehr’s relative recent mainstream neglect this release seeks to help reposition his work as a core element in European contemporary music.