'Allied to good craftsmanship, Standford has the virtue of knowing when he has said what he has to say. His Preludio is short and to the point and makes colourful and eventually cheerful and raucous listening with its free development of three main ideas. These are a rhythmical motif for drums and plucked strings; swirling colours from the woodwind, and a striking chordal figure in the brass. It was refreshing to hear a modern English composer so free from fashionable "-isms", and determined to express himself in his own way.'