This work was written between 1987 and 1989 it consists of two movements and the composition takes the form of a presentation of contrasting blocks they start in their shortest simplest form and then are juxtaposed with eachother followed by an expansion and development independent of each other.The initial block is for all three instruments with a fan-fare like figure on the horn producing a reoccuring theme. The lyrical block has asustained tune played in the high register of the violin with bass notes on the piano. The third block is a contrapuntal one which sees the first appearance of a tapping motif with the fourth block providing a chordal piano solo.These sections then expanded and developed with themes repeated on different instruments.The final movement of the piece presents three fugatos preceded by a fan-fare like introduction interspersed with rhythmic non-contrapuntal episodes each fugato is led separately by horn violin and piano. This composition is dedicated to Ingrid Lunt. Work for Horn Violin and Piano. Written in fulfilment of the Koussevitzky Foundation Award.

Brahms?s famous Horn Trio op.40 composed in 1865 for the natural horn is a work of considerable significance within the composer?s output. Up until now the work was believed to have a strong emotional connection to the death of his mother three months earlier.However Christopher Hogwood draws on a newly discovered source for this Bärenreiter publication a source that has not been available for any previous edition. We now learn that Brahms wrote at least the trio movement some twelve years earlier in 1853 and that it was originally intended for solo piano. This piano movement is printed in the appendix.This Urtext edition offers notonly the standard instrumentation of violin horn and piano but also the alternative scoring for violoncello or viola instead of horn. The variants found in the violoncello and viola parts are shown as ossias in the score.The introduction (Eng/Ger) describes the compositional process includes information on the performance and publication history of the work and offers comments on performance practice. A critical commentary with facsimile pages of the manuscript rounds off this pioneering edition.Appendix with the 1853 piano version of the trio movementIncludes alternative parts for violoncello and viola

Stormwatch Stormfall by Peter Maxwell Davies was commissioned by the Aventa Ensemble with assistance from the Scottish Arts Council.

This piece has a broad moderately paced first movement which leads to a sparkling scherzo which in turn gives way to an extremely sparsely textured movement that features the horn and its less frequently used techniques. The whole piece turns on this movement then a couple of crisp arpeggios act as a premature cinematic transition into the big finale the longest and the technically most demanding movement of the piece.