the piano concertos

George Lloyd approached the form of the piano concerto with imagination and individuality. His idiomatic solo writing avoids superficial virtuosity and empty rhetoric, and there are none of the mighty battles between piano and orchestra that you find in archetypal large-scale concertante scores. Instead, the composer offers a series of deeply personal attempts to reconcile ancient performance elements with symphonic concerns such as expansive tonality, rhythmic energy and melodic growth. Altogether, Lloyd's four piano concertos form a compelling and distinctive branch of his creative legacy.