The A-Z of Piano by Nicholas Lumsden
A is for Alkan, whose hands were gigantic,
B's for Balakirev - wild but pedantic.
C is Chaminade, Cui and Clementi,
D is for Dussek's sonatas a-plenty.
E is for Etudes that nobody learns,
F is for Field and his lilting nocturnes.
G's for Godowsky's insane paraphrases,
H is for Hummell's E flat Polonaises.
I is Illinsky (who wrote a Berceuse)
J is for Jongen, neglected for years.
K is for Kopylov's Fugues and Mazurkas,
L's for Lyapunov - not for slow workers!
M is for Medtner (a thank-you to Hamish)*
N is for Nielsen, who brought home the Danish.
O is for Out-of-print works, long obscure,
(Some of Scharwenka's are hard to endure).
P's Paderewski's great Polish Fantasia;
(All of the Q's have been chucked in the brazier).
R is for Rebikoff, Russia's own Satie;
S is for Sorabji - quite wilfully scatty.
Then we can have the Tcherepnins for T;
Which leaves with U, quickly followed by V.
There's Wihtol and Wilklund both making up W;
As for the rest, there's no reason to trouble you. #

*By which I mean Milne who, with consummate ease,
Has put his best work on four splendid CDs.
#Ussachevsky and Valen? There's no need to linger;
For neither of them barely lifted a finger.
Xenakis, Ysaye, Zemlinsky and such
Didn't write for piano - at least not that much.

Nicholas Lumsden, London E9
Taken from Classic CD magazine issue no.9 Jan 1991 (used with permission)