Hyperion Records

Bridge’s third Phantasy was commissioned by Cobbett and given its first performance, by the Henkel Piano Quartet, in 1911. Through his three previous competitions, Cobbett had provided the stimulus for a new repertoire of chamber music from the younger British composers. In commissioning an additional eleven works from the most promising, he furthered his objective of founding a wide-ranging library of chamber music.

Of all the eleven composers—who included Vaughan Williams, Benjamin Dale, York Bowen and Thomas Dunhill—Bridge’s debt to Cobbett, in terms of his musical development and the growth of his reputation, was easily the greatest, particularly in the evolution of the ‘phantasy’ arch-form. Bridge’s three Phantasies are all uncomplicated in their episodic construction, but the Phantasy for piano quartet is the most effective, revealing Bridge’s early style at its finest—refined and eloquent in its musical language and concise in its thematic procedures and symmetrical construction (introduction—A, andante—B, scherzo—C, trio employing the opening theme—B—A'—coda).

from notes by Paul Hindmarsh © 1988