Rosie Lavery & Robert Melling - Portraits of Scotland Recital Robert Schumann - Gedichte der Königin Maria Stuart Strauss - Morgen Claire Lidell - 5 Orkney Scenes James Macmillan - Scots Song & Ballad

solo accordion Neil Sutcliffe acting/movement coach Ewan Miller videography Hamish MacLeod, Elly Lucas sound engineer Tim Cooper producer Paul MacAlindin filmed in the Billiard Room, Pearce Institute, Govan reproduced with kind permission from the Ronald Stevenson Society supported by Creative Scotland https://www.ronaldstevensonsociety.org.uk/

Recorded as part of "Stravaig: A Journey Through Scotland's Music" concert during the 2021 Piano Festival at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Ronald Center was born to musical parents in 1913 in Aberdeen, in the North East of Scotland. His father was a good amateur piper, despite this not being his trade. He studied piano, organ and conducting in his home town under the guidance of Julian Rosetti and Willian Swainson. In 1943, upon his marriage to Evelyn Morrison, a renowned Scottish soprano, he moved to Huntly where he became the music master of Huntly Gordon School, became the local choir director and organist, whilst simultaneously undertaking an apprenticeship as a dispensing chemist. At that time, very few people in Huntly, let alone in Scotland, knew of Center’s gift as a composer, mainly due to his introverted personality and quiet life. This was exacerbated by the employment conditions for composers at the time, and so during his lifetime was not recognised for his talents as a composer. Center did not have the financial means to travel nor did he have professional training, and so according to his wife Evelyn Center, he listened to the radio and studied scores instead. He used this tool to understand his fellow composers of the time, and tried to impersonate them. This resulted in many influences from Hindemith, Debussy, Bartok, and especially from the school of post war English composers, including Kenneth Leighton and Lennox Berkeley. Many believe that this is why critics claimed that he didn’t find his own style, but I believe despite taking influences from other composers, a unique style is audible in his music. His piano sonata, written in 1958, was the piece that Center was most proud of - he often played it to his wife in their home. It was premiered in 1979 by Scottish pianist and composer, Ronald Stevenson, who was a close friend of Center.