These two works are separated by about half a century, which constitutes the main of Sir Michael Tippett’s celebrated career, and yet they are united by the composer’s stealthy originality. Tippett found his voice early on, as heard in the Ritual Dances, a suite drawn from the opera The Midsummer Marriage, a stage work conceived in the early 1940s, when the composer was in his thirties, although it was not performed until 1955. The music has a post-Debussy sense of enchantment about it, making me wonder if Tippett’s opera might not be a sort of British Pelleas, as filled with mystery, subdued emotion, and daring sensuality, but especially, an almost subversive aversion to the conventions of grand opera.

Alas, this is conjecture, as I do not know the opera. Certainly, the music that is revealed in the dance suite is characterful and nonconformist, with a strong whiff of the Freudian imagery and fairy tale fantasies that inspired Tippett. Although his harmonic language is conventionally tonal, Tippett’s sense for melodic pattern and dynamics is distinctive, even quirky. He shares his compatriot Britten’s sense for delicate and colorful orchestral texture.

In The Rose Lake, finished in 1993 at about the time of the composer’s 90th birthday, the little quirks of Tippett’s style are more concentrated and to the fore. Here, Britten is again recalled, this time as a British impressionist of the sea. Here is not the lush, even heroic ocean of Debussy, but the cold, menacing waters of a more challenging climate. Britten, in Peter Grimes, and Tippett, here, give us a natural world that is, indeed, harsh, but also one that is integral to human existence. Tippett presents a lake that glistens and crackles as the temperature drops, yet still teems with mysterious life. Tippett’s music takes some getting used to, but once the acclimation process is completed, it is more than compelling; it can be downright hypnotic.

This is a typically classy Chandos production, with terrific, sensitive performances by Hickox and his band, excellent SACD sound, and informative notes.

FANFARE: Peter Burwassser