Hans Bichel’s Concertino is ideal for the intermediate bassist and remains primarily in bass clef, apart from a few easy harmonic passages, utilising the orchestral range of the double bass.

Composed at the end of the 19th-century, there are numerous opportunities to display musical and technical prowess and this is useful for both recital and educational use. Tonal, traditional and straightforward, the Concertino is similar in approach and style to Eisengräber’s Variations on a Favourite Styrian Folk-Song (also published by Recital Music), and is a useful introduction to the ‘easy virtuoso’, Repertoire.

The Concertino is a smaller version of the concerto, usually in one extended movement, and is for a solo instrument with piano or orchestral accompaniment.

This composition is typical of the music written at the end of the 19th-century and is centred around the working orchestral register of the double bass. The theme and variations format divides the work into well-defined and distinct sections, with a lively and supportive accompaniment.

A dramatic piano introduction leads directly into the ländler-like theme (in C major), and its simple harmonic structure lends itself to the variation form. Three variations follow and a short and dramatic recitative leads into a lively and rhythmic finale.

There is much scope for the intermediate bassist to display both musical and technical prowess in a work of character and invention.

Very little, if anything, is known about Hans Bichels, who is likely to be a 19th- century bassist-composer, but this new edition takes the name of Bichels into the 21- st century and to a new audience.