Lambert: Pomona; Tiresias. English Northern Philharmonia/David Lloyd-Jones (Hyperion)
Constant Lambert (1905-51) was a star who burned early and bright. He was commissioned by Diaghilev's Ballets Russe while still in his teens. The success of his Rio Grande in the late 1920s temporarily placed him alongside Walton as a leader in English music. And his remarkable book, Music Ho! (1934), provided a wittily pungent analysis of the state of contemporary music. The two ballets recorded here come from either end of his creative life, the early Pomona (1927) reflecting his affinity for the cheeky populism of Les Six in France, the late Tiresias (1951) a darker, harsher undertaking which, though not an effective whole, has many well-calculated moments. Sympathetic performances and recording. By Michael Dervan