20th-century English quintets at Cadogan Hall: sensitivity and orchestral scale

Mark Bebbington & RPO Principals
© Jenny Robinson

Mark Bebbington (piano)
Principals of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Tamás András (violin)
Andrew Storey (violin)
Abigail Fenna (viola)
Jonathan Ayling (cello)
Benjamin Cunningham (double bass)

3.30pm, Sunday 24 March 2024
Cadogan Hall, London

★★★★
 
John Ireland (1879-1962): Phantasie Trio in A minor
 
Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958): Piano Quintet in C minor
 
Edward Elgar (1857-1934): Quintet in Q minor for Piano and String Quartet, Op. 84

Ireland: 

'Jonathan Ayling’s opening lyrical cello melody was supported by gentle rippling from Bebbington, and violinist Tamás András responded with quiet delicacy'.

Vaughan Williams:

'The strings delivered warmth, with Bebbington soft-toned and sensitive throughout'.

'The free variations of the expansive finale gave all opportunities for fuller expression, and the string response to an emphatic statement from Bebbington midway was orchestral in magnitude'.

Elgar:

'The players followed András’ lead, with great swagger and bounce'.

'... with full-blooded passion from today’s players throughout'.

Read my full review on Bachtrack here. 

CD Reviews - January 2018

If you have any interest in song, particularly English song, then I cannot recommend this disc highly enough – and if you don’t think you like English song, give it a go anyway, I’m sure you will be converted.  Baritone Roderick Williams’ beautiful honeyed tones, accompanied expertly by pianist Susie Allan, communicate this repertoire in a way I’ve rarely heard it before.  George Butterworth’s (1885-1916) ‘Six Songs from A Shropshire Lad’ that open the disc are achingly moving, not least with the added poignancy of Butterworth’s death in the First World War aged 31, just five years after composing the songs.  Williams’ heartfelt sadness in ‘The Lads in their Hundreds’ is almost unbearable, and his characterisation of the ghostly apparition and his old friend in ‘Is my team ploughing’ is deeply affecting.  I have to confess to shedding several tears when I heard them perform this at the CD’s launch, and the recording is no less affecting.  There’s so much here – twenty-eight songs in total – that it’s hard to single things out.  Ireland (1879-1962), Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) and Britten (1913-1976) are all represented here, but also Ivor Gurney (1890-1937) – another casualty of the war, his already fragile mental health never recovered, and he ended his days in a mental hospital.  His setting of ‘Sleep’ by John Fletcher that ends the disc again has added significance perhaps, with its plea for peace and joy through sleep.  There are lighter moments too, with Gurney’s jolly ‘Captain Stratton’s Fancy’, and Peter Warlock’s (1894-1930) brief ‘Jillian of Berry’, and Williams relishes the chance to let loose.  And two songs from the only living composer represented, Ian Venables (b.1955), confirm the art of English song is still alive and well – his fleeting expression of a butterfly in flight, ‘Flying Crooked’ is a delightful miniature, and Williams enjoys the melodic twists and turns, with delicate support from Allan.  Vaughan Williams’ ‘Silent Noon’ and Britten’s ‘The Salley Gardens’ receive particularly touching renditions from Williams – I could rave about every song on this disc, there are truly no fillers here, but space restricts me to urging you to seek this recording out.

Various. 2017. Celebrating English Song. Roderick Williams, Susie Allan. Compact Disc. Somm SOMMCD 0177. 

French harpsichordist Philippe Grisvard has taken part in many recordings, including several with Audax Records’ founder, Johannes Pramsohler, and his Ensemble Diderot.  But the latest Audax recording, a wonderful collection of works for keyboard by Georg Friedrich Handel (1685-1759), is Grisvard’s solo recording debut.  Whilst the Suites are the most well-known and established of Handel’s keyboard works, Grisvard has also included a number of rarities, and a few pieces by lesser-known contemporaries.  This is a wise move, as it offers the listener much needed variety on a solo instrumental recording.  A particular gem is the arrangement by William Babell (1690-1723) of ‘Lascia ch’io pianga’ from Handel’s opera, Rinaldo – Babell’s arrangement of the opera’s overture is also here – in which Grisvard really makes the instrument sing out the aria’s familiar tune.  In his informative notes, Grisvard speculates as to whether these were arrangements by the English composer, or possibly even transcriptions of performances by Handel himself – the bell-like Prelude Presto from Babell that opens the disc certainly sounds like an improvised introduction to such a performance.  The Suite No. 2 has an almost mournful opening Adagio, and the E minor Suite has a delicate, graceful Sarabande.  As well as showing his virtuosic command in the showier movements (such as the E minor Suite’s final Gigue), it is in these subtler moments that Grisvard communicates most directly with poise and grace.  A lively if a little formulaic Capriccio by Wilhelm Zachow (1663-1712), Handel’s teacher, a brief Prelude from contemporary Johann Mattheson (1681-1764), and a pleasing Toccata by Johann Krieger (1649-1725) serve to further demonstrate the imaginative superiority of Handel’s compositions, and the wonderful Chaconne in G major here includes variations from several versions of the work, making it the most substantial piece on offer, and Grisvard clearly enjoys the virtuosic challenges, building through the increasingly complex variations to an impressive conclusion.  This is a delightfully varied and impressively commanding debut from Grisvard.

Various. 2017. Handel: Works for Keyboard. Philippe Grisvard. Compact Disc. Audax Records. ADX 13709.

Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Sinfonia Antartica, his seventh symphony, has its origins in the composer’s music for the film Scott of the Antarctic in 1948.  The symphony followed in 1951, and it makes use of a wordless soprano soloist (Mari Eriksmoen here) and a female chorus, also worldless (the singers here drawn from the Bergen Philharmonic Choir and the Edvard Grieg Kor) – hauntingly ethereal here, without being overly intrusive.  But the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, under Sir Andrew Davis are the stars here, with some breathtakingly taut and controlled playing, perfectly capturing the desolation and desperation of Scott’s ill-fated expedition.  There is a real sense of the expanse of the landscape, and impending doom, and the crashing entry of the organ at the end of the third movement is truly terrifying.  Vaughan Williams wrote his Four Last Songs, settings of poems by Ursula, his second wife and longtime muse, shortly after their marriage in 1953 (although their love affair had begun in 1938).  The songs were orchestrated by Anthony Payne (b.1936) in 2013, and were premiered at the Proms by mezzo-soprano Jennifer Johnston, but here they receive their premiere recording by a male voice, none other than baritone Roderick Williams.  Payne’s sensitive scoring, and Williams’ aforementioned rich tones, bring these brief romantic gems to life.  The disc is finished off with Vaughan Williams’ Concerto for Two Pianos.  This started life as a Concerto for Piano, but his piano part proved overly challenging, and the suggestion of a version for two pianos followed.  Pianist Joseph Cooper (1912-2001) was charged with the arrangement, but Vaughan Williams changed the ending and added a new cadenza.  It opens with crashing, percussive explosions from the pianos, setting up a lively, energetic Toccata.  The central Romanza is more lyrical and romantic, with some subtle writing for woodwind, and the final Fugue and Finale, separated by a cadenza, return to the opening’s lively extrovert style.  Canadian pianists Hélène Mercier and Louis Lortie add great muscular attack and bite to the outer movements, as well as bringing sensitivity, lush lyricism and subtlety to the Romanza.  Once again, Davis and the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra provide sumptuous orchestral textures in support. 

Vaughan Williams, R. 2017. Sinfonia Antartica, Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra, Four Last Songs. Louis Lortie, Hélène Mercier, Roderick Williams, Mari Eriksmoen, Bergen Philharmonic Choir, Edvard Grieg Kor, Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Andrew Davis. Hybrid Super Audio Compact Disc. Chandos CHSA 5186.


(Edited versions of these reviews first appeared in GScene, January 2018)

CD Reviews - February 2017

Countertenor Iestyn Davies is joined by the early music ensemble Arcangelo, directed by Jonathan Cohen, for a showcase recording of solo alto Cantatas by J S Bach (1685-1750).  These cantatas are the perfect vehicle to demonstrate Davies’ pure, even tone and Arcangelo’s range, from subtle continuo to full ensemble, always maintaining chamber intimacy.  The first cantata on the disc, BWV170 ‘Vergnügte Ruh’, beliebte Seelenlust’, opens with a beautifully warm aria, with long notes expertly sustained by Davies underpinned by a slow descending bassline and a intertwining oboe line. Davies’ recitatives are suitably dramatic, within an overall contained aesthetic, with great attention given to the text. The closing aria here has an energetic pace, with some impressive organ playing.  Cantata BWV54, ‘Widerstehe doch der Sünde’ is shorter, with just two arias and a central recitative, but the building repeated chords and suspensions of the opening aria is a highlight of the disc, with Davies delivering an even line over the pulsing accompaniment.  The descending chromatic line of the second aria takes Davies into a lower register, yet there is no audible ‘gear change’, and the overall effect is as smooth as the instruments on the same fugue theme.  Sandwiched between the alto cantatas, Arcangelo give lively performances of Sinfonias from two other cantatas, BWV52 and 174.  Here, Bach reworked movements from his Brandenburg Concertos – with BWV52, he adds hunting horns, oboes and bassoon to the third Concerto’s opening movement, whereas BWV174 comes from the first Concerto.  Arcangelo are spirited and energetic, and these provide a welcome lift amidst the more contemplative mood of the solo cantatas.  The final Cantata, BWV82, ‘Ich habe genug’, was originally for bass, and then Bach rewrote it for soprano, with a flute replacing the solo oboe, before producing a version for alto.  Here, the combination of warm oboe tones from Katharina Spreckelsen with the smooth, steady line of Davies in the opening aria is incredibly moving, and the central lullaby with its lilting accompaniment is equally touching.  An impressive and highly moving recording.

Bach, J. S. 2017. Widerstehe doch de Sünde, Ich have genug,Vergnügte Ruh'. Iestyn Davies, Arcangelo, Jonathan Cohen.  Compact Disc. Hyperion CDA68111.

Violinist Tasmin Little joins pianist Piers Lane for their second volume of British Violin Sonatas.  The meat of the disc is John Ireland’s (1879-1962) wonderful Sonata No. 1.  With it’s turbulent opening movement, a beautifully song-like central Romance, and a folksy Rondo to finish, this is a striking work, despite being less popular than Ireland’s Sonata No. 2 which followed some seven years later.  Little is lyrical and sensitive in the touching Romance, and Lane rises to the challenges of Ireland’s weighty writing for the piano in the first movement, without allowing it to overpower the violin.  Sir Arthur Bliss’ (1891-1975) early single movement Sonata is by contrast rather over dramatic and a little over-emphatic.  It was part of a fuller Sonata that he was working on when his brother Kennard was killed in the First World War, and he abandoned the work, never completing it.  The Sonata by Frank Bridge (1879-1941) that opens the disc is another incomplete work, with the second movement completed by Paul Hindmarsh.  The opening is surprisingly brash for Bridge, but it settles down into a more recognisable style, with intriguingly unusual harmonies, and in the second movement, a galloping central scherzo surrounded by a beautifully subdued and lyrical slow section, and a subtle coda (composed by Hindmarsh, but drawing on ideas from the first movement, as Bridge would surely have done himself).  A Romance and Pastorale from Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958), both with wandering modal themes, and more than a hint of The Lark Ascending in the Romance, are beautifully performed here, with Little in particular enjoying Vaughan Williams’ meandering, rising lines for the violin.  The disc ends with a brief piece by William Lloyd Webber (1914-1982) (father of Andrew & Julian), ‘The Gardens at Eastwell’, his final composition.  It is a pleasant enough miniature, with a captivating tune, but rather inconsequential when compared with the other works on the disc.  The highlight of the disc is their compelling performance of the Ireland, but overall this is a stimulating survey of some lesser-known yet striking British chamber works.   

Various. 2016. British Violin Sonatas, Volume Two. Tasmin Little, Piers Lane. Compact Disc. Chandos CHAN 10899. 

I recently reconnected with an old school friend, pianist Adrian Lord, discovering he has just released a recording of his own Twelve Romances for Piano, entitled Journey.  As the name would suggest, this is a very personal set of solo piano pieces, some inspired by significant places, such as childhood holidays in the Peak District, and travels in Scotland.  The album was recorded in the stunning setting of a studio at Crear in Western Scotland, overlooking the Paps of Jura.  This is a highly enjoyable and atmospheric short set of miniatures, with a common thread of rhythmic momentum and interest over simple harmonic progressions.  The result is often very effective and engaging.  There are clear references to family roots in the Lancashire mills, with spinning rhythms in ‘Blaize’ and ‘Revolutions’, and a similar sense of perpetual motion in the hypnotic opening ‘Prelude’.  The pieces are united by their use of repetition and arpeggiated patterns, yet variety is achieved in imaginative use of dynamics, such as in the fiery sections of ‘Wildfire’, and the moving concluding ‘Time to Remember’, written in memory of his recently deceased mother.  Adrian performs this personal collection with conviction, and the quasi-improvisatory nature of his compositions makes for very engaging listen. 

Lord, A. 2016. Journey: Twelve Romances for Piano. Compact Disc. Music Media MMC115.

(Edited versions of these reviews first appeared in GScene, February 2017)