Geoffrey Allen was born in the UK in 1927 and after studying at Oxford moved to Australia where he set up a music publishing imprint and facilitated recordings of Australian music. He is still very active and is busy with several projects and compositions. His chamber music is widely neo-Romantic and rhapsodic, repeating motifs indifferent ways, constantly evading fixed tonality but retaining a soft and mellifluous melodic flow. Thus: his music is distinctive and strongly constructed but very attractive–post-modernist in the best sense. This collection of woodwind works begins with the 1964 Bassoon Sonata–more edgy, redolent of Prokofiev or Hindemith–through to the 2007 Fantasy Trio, polytonal, rhapsodic with beautiful textures. All works are receiving their first commercial recording. The four musicians are among Australian’s finest–among many other activities, Waye and Meyer are principals with the West Australian Symphony; Walpole is an internationally-known freelance and Wickham is acknowledged to be among Australia’s most pre-eminent accompanists.

“The performers are very fine throughout this well-made recording which provides an interesting chance to hear an accomplished composer’s way of handling woodwinds in a modern chamber-music context.”
- Mark Estren (Infodad)

“A pleasant album… always interesting, the relatively novel sound of the bassoon always a pleasure, warm and quite often almost amusing while the flute and clarinet often add a dreamier feel. A clever mix of easy listening mood music and more intellectual classical”
– Jeremy Condliffe (The Chronicle Review Corner)