Bliss: Cello Concerto & Suite from Miracle in the Gorbals

The ballet Miracle in the Gorbals (named after the working-class quarter of Glasgow), still rarely recorded, is a very somber and violent piece of music, one of the most intense among the works of Arthur Bliss. The suite recorded by Paavo Berglund finally makes its digital debut, coupled with a late cello concerto (of a quite different kind, cheerful and optimistic), premiered by Mstislav Rostropovich at Britten’s Aldeburgh Festival in 1970, and here performed by Berglund fellow countryman Arto Noras.