Works are a breath of fresh air

English Northern Philharmonia

OH to be in England now that spring is come. If only, I hear you cry.

But don't despair, because there is a breath of fresh air in this CD of English String Miniatures.

There is something about these sons of Albion's country works which makes them instantly recognisable.

I could wax lyrical about country lanes, hedgerows, bees buzzing, ploughs and horses and all those other chocolate-boxy type images of this fair land.

But with every field and lane seeming to reveal some new foot-and-mouth horror, it's probably not an image of England circa April 2001 that people would recognise.

Some of the top names are included on this recording.

And yes, no collection of anything with English in the title it would be complete without the eponymous Edward Elgar.

The compilation opens with the very Merrie Old England sounds of Frank Bridge's Sally in Our Alley (luckily, there's no Gracie Fields on here).

Cue images in mind of sunlight, and hay, and Merchant Ivory frocks.

Well, there's nothing like a bit of escapism, which is what you get with the likes of Vaughan Williams' Charterhouse Suite and Frederick Delius' Air and Dance.

When you get to Elgar himself, it is a bit of a pleasant surprise, because rather than the usual fare, Naxos has selected the Worcestershire composer's Sospiri, which is really quite lovely.

The work was written on the eve of the Great War and is described as capturing something of the impending tragedy. Very 40 Years On.

Haydn Wood, John Ireland, Peter Warlock and Geoffrey Bush make up the rest of the programme which could be seen to lift the spirits in these gloomy pastoral times.

Naxos

8.555068