ウェールズの弦楽作品集

オウェイン・アーウェル・ヒューズ!
世界初録音ウェールズの弦楽作品集!

本作はウェールズの作曲家による弦楽作品のみで構成され、全収録曲が世界初録音という貴重な1枚です。ヴォーン・ウィリアムズに師事したグレース・ウィリアムズやアーウェル・ヒューズ(指揮者の父)の作品、26歳の若さで亡くなったモルヴィズ・オーエンの繊細な《ロマンス》、そして1966年におきたイギリス史上最悪の産業事故「アベルヴァン(アバーファン)の悲劇」を追悼するクリストファー・ウッドの強烈な音楽的記念碑《アベルヴァン》 など、多彩な音楽性を通して、ウェールズの知られざる創作の伝統が鮮やかに浮かび上がります

1942年にウェールズのカーディフに生まれたオウェイン・アーウェル・ヒューズ(オワイン・アルウェル・ヒューズ)は、作曲家・指揮者として成功したアーウェル・ヒューズ(1909-1988)の息子として育ち、ボールト、ハイティンク、ケンペらに指揮を学び、40年以上にわたって情熱的な音楽制作を続けてきました。日本での知名度はまだ途上ながらも、欧米では堅実に評価を積み重ね、2009年にはCBE(大英帝国勲章第3位)を受勲している実力者です。
東京エムプラス

This release, which made classical best-seller charts in the summer of 2025, has a delightful sense of immersion in a tradition that is less well-known to those outside Wales. The conductor, Owain Arwel Hughes, was born in 1942, and his father, the composer Arwel Hughes, who is the only one represented twice on the program, wrote the sole choral work on the program, Gweddi ("A Prayer"), which one learns here is a favorite among Welsh audiences although it has apparently never been recorded before. The booklet note writer, Rhiannon Mathias, is the daughter of William Mathias, the composer of the three-movement Music for Strings (1961). All the pieces on the album, in fact, receive their world premieres here. Their dates range from 1911 in the case of Morfydd Owens Romance for strings to 2023 for Paul Mealors devotional O sacred heart. Despite this chronological spread, there is a certain melancholy, yearning quality connecting the works that one may enjoy without arguing about whether or not it is characteristically Welsh. The Morfydd Owen work is especially interesting and may be worth the price of the whole for buyers of the Rubicon physical album. Owen died of appendicitis at age 26 but left a substantial output of some 250 works, and she has been almost completely ignored during the recent revival of music by women. This slightly swinging piece, written while Owen was a student at University College, Cardiff, may be the first of her works to have been recorded. Everything else on the album is well-constructed, with a few faster pieces in the middle, avoiding an unbroken lyrical mood. The many listeners acquiring this album will thoroughly enjoy it. ~ James Manheim