Talent and temptation

​​​​★★★★

Walton, a Northerner born in 1902, did his best to dissipate his talent among the temptations of London’s high society. Sustained by wealthy women, he took the first half of the 1930s to complete a symphony, managing the last movement only after the first three had been performed. The symphony went down well. Britain, in 1936, was looking for the next Elgar and Walton seemed to fit the bill. He followed the symphony with a violin concerto for Jascha Heifetz, probably his most successful work. Then Benjamin Britten broke and Walton was consigned to the wings.

The first symphony has a haunting opening, a fast-car second movement and a melancholy Andante that harks back to the first world war and ahead to future miseries. The language owes much to Sibelius, with acrid episodes reminiscent of Shostakovich. The 13-minute finale is a let-down: only true-belief conductors conceal its shortcomings.

The second symphony, 25 years on, betrays self-dissatisfaction. Gone is the youthful promise. Behind Walton is a reel of wartime film scores and a failed Shakespearian opera at Covent Garden. Published in three movements, its best section is a nine-minute concluding Passacaglia. Walton had migrated with his Argentine wife to an Italian island, where he died in 1983.

There are some 30 recordings of the first symphony, half as many of the second. Neither has appeared before on the elite Deutsche Grammophon label and the outcome is convincing. The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra play with brassy swagger for their effervescent Japanese conductor Kazuki Yamada. The introspections sound more effective than Andre Previn’s landmark LSO performances. Among recent releases, Edward Gardner gets the melancholy but less of the hedonism. If you want to explore Walton’s exceptional gift for orchestral composition, this is as good as it gets.

The bonus track is his blustery Coronation March of 1953. Skip it.