This Piano Sonata, commissioned by the Dartington International Summer School and the first performance was given on the 12th August 1986 at Dartington by its dedicatee Julian Jacobson.
The Piano Sonata has an unusual shape: the opening Adagio prefaces a pair of toccata-like quick movements; the second of these dissolves into a long, slow, ornately inflected melody over a pedal bass, before a coda brings back earlier ideas to round off the work. Chapple displays his skill in devising virtuoso figuration in unconventional but effective patterns.
