Full Score 

The idea for the present work had been germinating in the Mediterranean sun for a number of years but took its final shape only in the early months of 1976 and was completed in April of that year. That this should be anything other than, as the composer himself describes it, a free transcription of the earlier Bagatelles is scarcely surprising, given the apparent fundamental disparity between the two media. Yet such reworking of familiar material provides and admirable opportunity not only for comparison of the results, but more important, the means to obtain new perspectives on the original. And one must conclude retrospectively that the seeds of the present variations are indeed evident in the Bagatelles, characterized as they are by wide-reaching melodic lines, rich in harmonic implications and piquancy of instrumental figuration. . . . . Sir William Turner Walton OM (1902-1983) was an English composer. During a sixty-year career, he wrote music in nearly every classical genre and style, from film scores to opera. His best-known works include Façade, the cantata Belshazzar's Feast, the Viola Concerto, and the First Symphony. Walton's music has often been too neatly dismissed by a few descriptive tags: 'bittersweet', 'nostalgic' and, after World War II, 'same as before'. Such convenient categorizations ignore the expressive variety of his music and slight his determination to deepen his technical and expressive resources as he grew older. His early discovery of the basic elements of his style allowed him to assimilate successfully an astonishing number of disparate and apparently contradictory influences, such as church anthems, jazz, and the music of Stravinsky, Sibelius, Ravel, and Elgar, to name a few. Walton's allegiance to his basic style never wavered and this loyalty to his own vision, along with his rhythmic vitality, sensuous melancholy, sly charm, and orchestral flair, gives his finest music an imperishable glamour. - from Amzon