Owain Park is one of several young British composers contending for the throne of John Rutter, who was one of his teachers. On this album, he takes a big step forward to becoming Rutter's heir apparent. Park is active both as a conductor and as a composer, but here, he leaves the performance to the Epiphoni Consort under director Tim Reader. To say that this has advantageous results is not in the least to impugn Park's skills as a conductor, only to suggest that the original perspective of the Epiphoni Consort adds ...
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Owain Park is one of several young British composers contending for the throne of John Rutter, who was one of his teachers. On this album, he takes a big step forward to becoming Rutter's heir apparent. Park is active both as a conductor and as a composer, but here, he leaves the performance to the Epiphoni Consort under director Tim Reader. To say that this has advantageous results is not in the least to impugn Park's skills as a conductor, only to suggest that the original perspective of the Epiphoni Consort adds something to the music. Park is certainly influenced by Rutter but also shows the influence of Vaughan Williams and the late Romantics such as Stanford. His own contribution comes partly in his ability to add variety within groups of works, using an impressive economy of means. Listen to the first Interlude and then the setting of the insanely familiar "Loveliest of Trees" in Sing to Me, Windchimes, a group of A.E. Housman songs: the way the poem pops out vividly is the essence of Park's...
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