by Christopher Guild
ON TUESDAY 7th August, 2018 I have the real honour of doing something I’ve wanted to do for a long time. I will give what is believed to be the first of many performances of an all-Scottish piano recital in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Scottish piano music remains a pretty rare niche, and, for many reasons, I think it’s time that we as a nation began to take note of the sheer wealth of music that has remained unacknowledged – and in some cases undiscovered – for a very, very long time, in spite of it lying right under our noses. The concert, ‘A Really Short Introduction to the Piano Music of Scotland’ aims to briefly show the listener that the artistic achievements of Scotland’s classical composers, many of them also fine pianists, lie on the same level as some of Scotland’s greatest artistic achievements in other realms.
Since 2013 I’ve been immersed in the piano music of Scotland, chiefly through an ongoing collaboration with Toccata Classics. This fantastic record label, run by Crieffborn Martin Anderson from his London home, has released three of my recordings of the Aberdonian composer Ronald Center (1913-1973) and Lancashire born, Peeblesshire based Ronald Stevenson (1928-2015). A fourth CD, again of Stevenson, is due out in late 2018. It’s been amazing to take some of this music on tour, as far afield as Luxembourg, and see what a strong effect it’s had on audiences. Clearly we as a nation are in possession of some truly remarkable works of art, and not even we ourselves know about it. But it isn’t only through my recent performances and recordings of Scottish composers that has prompted this. It’s a much longer journey, beginning from childhood, which had led me to pursue this niche alongside all my other performing and teaching commitments.
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