The Douglas Lilburn Complete Piano Edition was established to accompany Trust Record's award-winning CD collection of the same. This fourth volume of eight comprises Lilburn's Sonatina No.1 (1946), ‘Short Piece' (1961), Prelude (1948), ‘Untitled Piece' (1965), ‘Untitled Piece' (1981) and A Musical Offering (1941). This selection of Lilburn's piano music provides substantial insight into his compositional style at various points in his career.
Douglas Liburn occupies a pre-eminent position in New Zealand music, with a legacy extending well beyond his compositional output. As a composer, a teacher, and later as a warm, generous and encouraging background presence, he presided in innumerable ways over the artistic growth of this country. His music, from the early works redolent of the influence of Sibelius and Vaughan Williams, to the electroacoustic pieces of his later years, makes up a corpus of works that has been instrumental in establishing a genuinely vernacular voice in New Zealand classical music.
