Darkest Midnight - Songs of Winter - Papagena SOMM

Darkest Midnight : Songs of Winter and Christmas - an eclectic collection of acapella songs on the theme of winter - with Papagena, a delightful offering for the Christmas season from SOMM Recordings : so enjoyable that you could listen at any time of the year. With Papagena, there are “No props, no microphones, no gimmicks, just five stunning voices“ who “explore the wealth of music from medieval times to the present day”. Their programmes “defy pigeonholing, drawing richly on traditional folk music and women's working songs as well as classical repertoire and new work commissioned for women's voices, many arrangements made by members of the ensemble. This disc is a rewarding purchase, even if you don't mark the season as a religious festival, but appreciate winter as a time for wonder and good music for its own sake.

Don eiche ud im Beithil (I sing of a night in Bethlehem) is a traditional Irish song with a text by a 16th century Archbishop of Armagh. Here it is heard in an arrangement where the voices blend in radiant polyphony. The sopranos (Elizabeth Drury, Abbi Temple, Suzzie Vango) sing with the purity of trebles, while the altos (Suzie Purkis and Sarah Tenant-Flowers) add warmth and richness. Part lament, part ballad, Maria durch ein Dornwald ging (Mary walked through a wood of thorns) is ideally suited for women's voices, given that it describes the trials of the Virgin Mary, walking through a forest of thorns, which suddenly blossoms as roses because she's carrying the infant Christ – a sacred work song for women, from the Middle Ages ! How refreshing it is to hear the Christmas story told from Mary's perspective ! In Nowell, tidings true there be come new, the voices are accompanied by a simple drum, as medieval songs often were. The text honours “A clean maiden and pure Virgin”. The singing is so delicate that it seems to cast a glow. Exquisite stillness in O Jesulein zart, where the altos sing in rapt adoration, cradling the sopranos.

In John Tavener's setting of W B Yeats' A Nativity, the lines stretch, the unison clear and shimmering. The balance of voices in Shchedryk (Hark How the Bells) creates a refrain with the effect of silvery bells pealing in harmony. Ballulalow is an arrangement made for Papagena of a 16th century Scottish song itself based on a poem by Martin Luther. The main melody is surrounded, like a halo, by tones as pure and bright as light shining through stained glass. Then Papagena springs a surprise – a song by Joni Mitchell, The River, transformed as if it were a modern carol. The alto sounds like Joni Mitchell, only more sophisticated and refined, though she captures the feisty irony that is part of Mitchell's style. Det lisle banet (the Little Child) is a traditional Norwegian ballad that tells of a farmer who leaves a fox in charge of his geese. But the fox kills them. In compensation the fox must make “soulgifts” to the farmer's child. A strange, unworldly parable told with dramatic effect. A single drum beats, at first slowly, then more insistently, adding a note of tension to the women's voices which keen as if they were recounting a primeval saga. There is much to listen to on this recording, which is much more than “Christmas listening”.

Elgar The Hills of Dreamland - orchestral songs

The Hills of Dreamland - Edward Elgar orchestral songs, new from Somm Recordings, sponsored by the Elgar Society.  Elgar's genius for oratorio, and large scale works for orchestra and voice somewhat eclipse his ventures in art song, apart from the masterpiece Sea Pictures, and the more recently acclaimed Fringes of the Fleet. Those who have treasured  SOMM's first collection of Elgar songs for voice  (with Catherine Wyn-Rogers, Christopher Maltmann, Neal Mackie and Malcolm Martineau) will seek this out, for they make good companion pieces. In any case, there are some real treasures here, such as  Elgar's Song Cycle op 59 which deserves greater appreciation. Heartfelt thanks to SOMM Recordings for bringing this back into the repertoire.

The first disc in this 2 CD set (offered at the price of one) features Elgar's Song Cycle op 59 and his Two Songs op 60 plus Pleading, The King's Way, Follow the Colours and incidental music to Grania and Dairmid.  The soloists are Kathryn Rudge and Henk Neven, with Barry Wordsworth conducting the BBC Concert Orchestra.  Elgar's Song Cycle op 59 was initially planned as a set of songs to texts by Gilbert Parker, a Canadian born novelist who was later to be knighted for services to Britain during the 1914-18 war.  "O soft was the song",  "Was it some golden star ?" and "Twilight"  are tender, and almost elegaic. They were written for a concert in memorial of A J Jaeger, Elgar's friend, whom he immortalized in the Enigma Variations.  Henk Neven's burnished timbre gives them personal, intimate warmth.  The cycle develops to a high point with "The Wind of Dawn", initally written in 1888 to a poem by Alice, before she and Elgar were married. In its original form it was a song for voice and piano.  In the bolder orchestration the strings surge, suggesting heaving passion, since the text is daringly erotic, for the era. The full orchestra rises to expansive crescendo, the mezzo (Kathryn Rudge) soaring above. It is a song worthy of Sea Pictures, and indeed, the imagery includes references to "the sea stream'd red from the kiss of his brow". A pity it was created after Sea Pictures had made its mark.  It would be interesting to speculate why Elgar concluded this cycle - for it is a cycle - with "The Pipes of Pan". the words are by Adrian Ross who wrote hits for musical theatre, though this text refers to Greek mythology.  But Pan is the god of fertlity and robust disorder,  a shepherd whom polite society cannot contain. Pan is a musician, too,who plays his pipes and enchants those who pay attention.  This song therefore connects to "The Wind at Dawn",  with its fulsome sense of adventure. Ever enigmatic,  Elgar could be making cryptic links between himself and his muse Alice, thus affirming the joy of life even at a time of sorrow.

More secret humour in the Two Songs op 60, poems purportedly by Pietro D'Alba, who was in fact young Carice's pet rabbit.  The words are Elgar's own, and whimsical, the compsoer claiming that they were folk tunes from "Leyrisch-Turasp, 1909", a place which doesn't exist.  Nonetheless, the fantasy gave Elgar a chance to write florid mock-Slavic drama, crashing climaxes blending with delicate expressiveness.

Pleading op 48 is a reverie which might suggest Richard Strauss in autumnal mood, but we're back to exuberance with Follow the Colours: a Marching Song for Soldiers  written for the Royal Albert Hall's Empire Day in 1908. The text, by a military officer,  is jingoistic,  but Elgar seems to relish the opportunity for high spirits. The deliberately four square rhythm evokes images of "Thousands, thousands of marching feet" stomping mindlessly in strict formation.  Thus The King'sWay isn't as banal as it might seem on the surface.  It surges forth with almost parodic expansiveness. "Let every voice in England say - God keep the way by night and day - The King of England's Way!"  But the poem - again by Alice, who must have had a sharper mind than she gets credit for, refers explicitly to the "newest street in London town - the Kingsway" which had recently been constructed. destroying much older parts of London in the process.

William Butler Yeats and George Moore collaborated on the play Grania and Diamid, a Celtic Revival tale of ancient Ireland. Elgar sets the Introduction with dark, brooding chords which suggest forests and mysterious forces. Hunting horns are complemented by harps, for this is an Irish, not a Teutonic Wagner saga.  "There are seven that pull the thread" is a keening song of mourning, with lush harps and strings, written for low female voice. It's Elgar, but he doesn't seem to have been much taken by it.

The second disc in this set features eleven songs for voice and piano (Nathalie de Montmollin, Barry Collett)  which have not previously been recorded.  They are enjoyable, but the first disc, with the orchestral songs, is the one to focus on.
Please also see my reviews of Hubert Parry Complete English Lyrics, also from SOMM HERE

Elgar - music for military band SOMM

Elgar and his peers: The Art of the Military Band, new from SOMM.  Brass bands, both concert and military, are ideal for large-scale, open air ceremonies, where sound has to carry over a distance.  These requirements affect instrumentation. Brass  and military bands have huge followings, but listeners used to  mainstream orchestral performance can acquire a taste for the genre, through transcriptions like those on this recording.

Two transcriptions in this colletion, adapting Elgar's  Pomp and Circumstance op 89, nos 2 and 5, illustrate the art of writing for military band as opposed to concert orchestra.  Both are vigorous, perfectly enjoyable on their own terms.  Also included are two chorales from J S Bach's St Matthew Passion, which Elgar transcribed for brass band.  Inspired by hearing a  Bavarian brass band playing hymns from a church tower, Elgar arranged two chorales for the Three Choirs festival in 1911. These were played at the top of Worcester Cathedral before the main performance. Novelties, but also educational. 

The more substantial With Proud Thanksgiving was commissioned by the League of Arts for National and Civic Ceremonies to dedicate the unveiling of the Cenotaph in London, on the anniversary of the Armistice, in the presence of King George V and numerous dignitaries, and the choir of Westminster Abbey.  The Worcester Herald, ever loyal to Elgar, reported "It is hoped that on the unveiling every choir in London - both Church and secular - will, take part in the ceremony".  Things didn't quite turn out that way.  This new SOMM recording is a world premiere.  Elgar's original was transcribed for military band by Frank Winterbottom, Professor of Instrumentation at the Royal School for Military Music, who had also made arrangements for Elgar's The Crown of India and Seviliana   Elgar later made his own version of the hybrid for full orchestra and chorus, which was first heard in the Royal Albert Hall on 7th May, 1921.

Thunderous drum rolls mark the introduction to With Proud Thanksgiving, "Solemn the drums thrill" runs the text, taken from Lawrence Binyon's For the Fallen, which Elgar had previously used as the third poem set in The Spirit of England.  Thus the same dignified marching pace, as in a funeral procession, the long vocal,lines projected forcefully, "as the stars shall be bright when we are dust".

In contrast,  the Queen Alexandra Memorial Ode, So Many True Princesses Who Have Gone, to a poem by John Masefield, the Poet Laureate, marking the unveiling, in 1932,  of the memorial sculpture to Queen Alexandra at Marlborough House, not indoors, but on the wall facing the street . "So many true princesses who have gone over the sea.......have given all things, and been ill repaid,"  Alexandra was an immigrant, a Danish princess with German origins. "Hatred has followed them and bitter days" Masefield continued :  But Alexandra  "won our hearts, and lives within them still".  Masefield describes London as a "day-long multitude, the lighted dark, the night-long wheels, the glaring  in  the sky". Remarkably modern imagery, and a tenderness not often associated with State occasions.  Elgar's setting is thus more private tribute than public piety. Though written for large choir and orchestra, it adapts well for smaller forces, as in this transcription by Tom Higgins for wind band, where the basic instrumental colours, such as reeds and flutes prevail in contrast to the brass.

Elgar 's Severn Suite, op 87, (1930) was commissioned as a test piece for a brass band competition,  the full score by Elgar himself.  The version heard here is a transcription for military band by Henry Geehl, who lowered the key from C major to B flat, to suit the requirements of military, as opposed to brass band.  Written in five movements played without a break, it's semi-symphonic and exits also in orchestral form.  Elgar didn't write the titles describing Worcester landmarks, which were added on publication.

This recording also includes works by Ralph Vaughan Williams: Sea Songs (1923) and Toccata Marziale (1924), the latter a very interesting band version of what might otherwise be a piece for organ,  There's also a March for Band by Thomas Beecham, as composer, rather than conductor and Three Humoresques by B Walton O'Donnell , the Madras-born son of a military musician in the Indian Army.  O'Donnell joined the army himself, and became a bandmaster before joining the BBC.  Tom Higgins, who helped create the very successful SOMM recording of Elgar's The Fringes of the Fleet (more here) conducts the London Symphonic Concert Band, a new specialist ensemble, and the Joyful Company of Singers.

Kathleen Ferrier Remembered - SOMM

Kathleen Ferrier Remembered, from SOMM Recordings, makes available on CD archive broadcasts  of British and German song. All come from BBC broadcasts made between 1947 and 1952. Of the 26 tracks in this collection, 19 are "new", not having been commercially released. The remaining seven have been remastered by sound restoration engineer Ted Kendall.  Something here even for those who already own the complete recordings.

Bruno Walter accompanies Ferrier in two Schubert and two Brahms songs.  Walter was a major influence on Ferrier, developing her style and repertoire and bring her to international prominence.  Reputedly, she was so overcome rehearsing for Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde that she wept inconsolably.  Perhaps it was that emotional directness that Walter recognized  that convinced him that the relatively unknown young singer had potential.  In these songs, recorded in the Edinburgh studios of the BBC, Ferrier's sincerity shines, though her delivery is more enthusiastic than refined.  But that was part of her charm. Walter responds in kind, his playing particularly free and invigorating.

Ferrier's recordings of Mahler's Rückert Lieder and Kindertotenlieder are classics, but on this disc, she sings Urlicht, from Mahler's Symphony no 2.  This recording was made on 28th September 1950.  The following year,  Ferrier sang the part with full orchestra  in the recording of the symphony with Otto Klemperer and Jo Vincent in Amsterdam.  Here she sings the version for piano and voice, so the closer focus concentrates attention on the voice and its distinctive colouring.  Her vibrato is used to evoke fragility, in keeping with the nature of the piece.  A worthwhile addition to the discography, since she didn't record this version for Decca.  This recording predates the Christa Ludwig recording of this version of Urlicht by 13 years.

Apart from one track on this disc - C Hubert Parry's Love is a bable op 152/3 with Gerald Moore -  all the other selections feature Ferrier with Frederick Stone.  Ferrier sang a lot of Schubert and Wolf,  her contralto richness is most effective in Brahms.  Her Sonntag op 47/3 here, recorded in December 1949, is particularly impressive. Although Ferrier found fame, she was, at heart, down-to-earth and unaffected, rather like the "Das tausendschöne Jungfräulein" standing by her doorway, innocently capturing hearts.  For this reason, perhaps, Ferrier is often most endearing when she sings traditional songs in the English language.  This remastering makes Parry's Love is a Bable bright and shiny!

On this SOMM disc, we have Edmund Rubbra's Three Psalms op 61, which Ferrier recorded for Decca with Ernest Lush, in performance with Frederick Stone, from 1947.  The piano settings are minimal, displaying the voice unadorned, suggesting private prayer.  In Psalm 150, Rubbra writes extravagant lines, which let Ferrier's voice fly exuberantly free. SOMM has also uncovered a special rarity: Maurice Jacobson's Song of Songs, quite probably the original recording, which has lain in the BBC sound archives long known but hitherto unreleased. The text comes from the Book of Solomon, and the setting makes clear reference to Jewish tradition.