REVIEWS

Chamber & Instrumental Music, Gramophone 2020

Chamber & Instrumental Music -Toccata Classics, TOCC0538

…The scintillating melodic angularity of the compact Sonata may be of its time yet remains thoroughly involving; that this is one of the finer English violin sonatas I have no doubt... despite their modest dimensions, the two quartets are major offerings. Like the Sonata, Quartet No.1 (1958, rev 2010) wears its modernity lightly - although may not have seemed to at the time - a vividly concise three-movement design. Quartet No. 2(1976) is as differtent as could be for a work of similar size haunted by taped fragments of a lost piano rag, which is played whole by the quartet...A superb example of Dickinson's compositional and expressive ingenuity, the Second Quartet stands out as a work of range and subtlety in a programme exemplifying those very qualities. Magnificent playing and sound. A marvellous disc.

Guy Rickards, Gramophone April 2020