Mischa Spoliansky was born in Poland into a Jewish musical family and spent the pre-war years in Berlin successfully writing songs for cabarets. In 1933, he escaped the Nazis and, like Hans Gál, Franz Reizenstein and others, made his way to England. There he had a major career as a film composer through the 1940s to the 1970s.

Mischa Spoliansky

This release brings us three late concert works. The main thing to note is Spoliansky’s colourful and idiomatic use of instrumental forces: as a pit orchestra pianist in Berlin accompanying silent movies he learned his craft thoroughly. (Marlene Dietrich played in the second violins in the same orchestra!)   

The Overture My Husband and I (1967) is the vivacious prelude from a failed musical inspired by Sheridan’s play The School for Scandal. It concludes with a lilting waltz. Boogie (1957) begins in a stolid manner, and the boogie rhythm take a while to emerge. Eventually Spoliansky – and the Liepāja orchestra – get into a groove, but I find the piece overlong and the swing motif...