This is Volume 2 in the series of orchestral music by Miklós Rózsa. No fewer than four exclusive Chandos artists perform on this release: the BBC Philharmonic, the conductor Rumon Gamba, and soloists Paul Watkins on cello and Jennifer Pike on violin.

Miklós Rózsa was best known for his film music, for which he was Oscar-nominated on thirteen separate occasions, winning three times, with A Double Life, Ben Hur, and Hitchcock’s Spellbound. Alongside his film music, Rózsa also wrote music for the concert hall, including some notable concertos.

The Cello Concerto, Op. 32 is a dark, savage, and often quite brutal work. It consists of three movements: a strong driving first movement, an introspective second movement, and an energetic finale which brings the work to a brilliant conclusion.

The new, exclusive Chandos artist Jennifer Pike is the featured soloist in Rózsa’s colourfully orchestrated Variations on a Hungarian Peasant Song, Op. 4. Here the theme is taken from a collection of Hungarian folk tunes. It is presented very simply by solo violin, and followed by a series of fourteen variations. The CD represents Jennifer Pike’s first orchestral release on Chandos.