Showing posts with label Joseph Middleton. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joseph Middleton. Show all posts

Saturday, 31 October 2020

A chilling operatic tale from Frances-Hoad as centrepiece of Sampson & Middleton's impressive contribution to the Oxford Lieder Festival


7.30pm, Tuesday 13 October, 2020

(reviewed from online stream 31 October 2020)


Holywell Music Room, Oxford

Oxford Lieder Festival


★★★★★





Late to the party, I finally caught up today on Carolyn Sampson and Joseph Middleton’s contribution to this year’s Oxford Lieder Festival online, and I am so glad I did - at the last minute, as the concerts are still available until tomorrow evening, so if you’re quick you can still catch this and the rest of the festival’s concerts.

The theme of the festival was Connections Across Time, and the centrepiece of tonight’s programme was the world premiere of the festival’s Associate Conductor, Cheryl Frances-Hoad’s song cycle, written especially for Carolyn and Joseph, with a text by Sophie Rashbrook, Six Songs of Melmoth.

Frances-Hoad’s happenstance inspiration for the cycle began when she picked up a copy of Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent at a lending library at Bedford station, which led her to read Perry’s other novels, including Melmoth. This book in turn took inspiration from a much earlier work, Charles Maturin’s sprawling gothic tale, Melmoth the Wanderer, from 1820. The original involves Melmoth making a Faustian pact, taking 150 extra years of life in exchange for ensuring that he can convince someone else to agree to take his place, otherwise facing eternity burning in hell. So Melmoth roams through history, searching for someone to pass his curse onto. In Perry’s version, Melmoth is a woman, who seduces her victims as she crosses the centuries. Sophie Rashbrook took both versions as the starting point for her text, and across the six songs of the cycle, she takes the gender fluid Melmoth through time, and ultimately right into the present, the very singer in the concert hall presenting the final temptation to the audience to consent to join her.


Carolyn Sampson & Joseph Middleton
(screenshot from online stream)
Frances-Hoad’s works for voice are always highly evocative, dramatic and in effect, miniature operas, and this is no exception. A gift for Sampson here, with its variety of characters, moods, and an overall narrative arc, complete with dramatic twist at the end, and she certainly relished the opportunity to demonstrate her phenomenal virtuosity as well as her ability to communicate such a complex and dark tale. Right from the piano’s curtain-opening flourish up the keyboard at the beginning of The Painting, Middleton also showed impressive command of the considerable challenges Frances-Hoad’s score presented, providing insistent pace in Shipwreck Gossip, with beautifully fluid, watery accompaniment to the long lyrical vocal lines in Elinora’s Letter, more dramatic flourishes in City of Song-Ghosts, and dark tolling in the final song, Melmoth’s Serenade. Sampson meanwhile took us through the dramatic journey with incredible intensity, and the blaze in her eyes whenever Melmoth is present was positively chilling. The eery tone of the calling voice promising deliverance, contrasting with effortless, long lyrical lines and challenging leaps right through the whole range, passed off with crystal clarity, in Elinora’s Letter. The moment of transition in Deliverance, when the singer’s voice shifts from trembling fear to crazy, wild-eyed consent was truly scary, and Sampson’s final chilling delivery direct into camera, ‘to the audience’, willing us to consent, was definitely disturbing, and hard to resist. A wonderfully striking and operatic cycle, and a highly affecting performance here - a recording must surely follow before too long.


They began their programme with a selection of five Schubert songs, and communication across the spiritual realm featured significantly here, from the heart rending lay dark Schwestergruss to the prayerful Litanei auf des Fest Allerseelen, and finally heavenly peace in Elysium. Again, Sampson shifts from mood to mood, with a desperate, ghostly breeze running through Schwestergruss, contrasting with sheer delight in her bright voice in Die Sterne, attaining bliss at its conclusion. Gott in Frühlinge had a light freshness, whereas her long, lyrical lines in Litanei and the final extended ewig in Elysium showed off Sampson’s impressive breath control. Middleton matched the moods, with warm yet solemn tone in Litanei, and rippling accompaniment building to the triumphant conclusion of Elysium.

Carolyn Sampson
(screenshot from online stream)
They followed the Frances-Hoad premiere with a selection of three songs by Satie, preceded by a beautifully liquid and limpid performance by Middleton of the Gymnopédie No. 1, also bringing out its sad, darker undercurrent. Sampson’s dreamy, fluid lines and bright eyes in Les Anges contrasted with a beautifully playful Mad Hatter in Le Chapelier. They finished this group with the sultry waltz, Je te veux, perhaps with shades of Melmoth the seductress here?
Poldowski was in fact the pseudonym of Belgian-born composer Irène Régine Wieniawska, daughter of violinist and composer Henryk Wieniawski, and she lived most of her life in London. She particularly loved the poetry of Paul Verlaine, and the five songs presented here were all settings of his verse. In Cythère, Middleton’s dancing accompaniment underpinned a playfully flighty delivery by Sampson of the brief romantic encounter, and En Sourdine was all dreamy calmness apart from a muted, brief ecstatic outburst. Sampson’s Colombine was mischievous and balletically light, whereas L’heure Exquise had a beautifully romantic, liquid simplicity. Middleton had great fun conjouring up the strumming textures in Mandoline, disappearing away ‘in the shivering breeze’ with a light flourish. 

They completed their programme with Walton’s Three Façade Settings, less well-known than the ‘entertainment’ piece with spoken voice, Façade. Daphne has a folk-like melody, and is mainly straightforwardly narrative, with hints of a rippling river in the piano part, and a brief solo voice moment at the climax as Daphne transforms into a tree. Through gilded trellises plays with lilting Spanish rhythms, with a stop-start pattern hinting at brief sultry glimpses through the trellises, whilst Old Sir Faulk (which appears in Façade) closes the group with its foxtrot rhythm and jazzy humour. Sampson and Middleton delivered the set with style and a light touch, bringing their hugely varied and challenging programme to an end. 

Carolyn Sampson
(screenshot from online stream)
Franz Schubert (1797-1828):
Schwestergruss
Die Sterne
Gott im Frühlinge
Litanei auf des Fest Allerseelen
Elysium

Cheryl Frances-Hoad (b.1980)
Six Songs of Melmoth
1.The painting (Narrator) 1816
2. Shipwreck gossip (Old Biddy Brannington) 1816
3. Elinora’s letter (some salt-water damage to the text) 1516
4. City of Song-Ghosts (Narrator reprise)
5. Deliverance
6. Melmoth’s Serenade

Erik Satie (1866-1925)
Gymnopédie No. 1
Les anges
Le chapelier
Je te veux

Poldowski (1879-1932)
Cythère
En Sourdine
Colombine
L’heure exquise
Mandoline

William Walton (1902-1983)
Three Façade Settings
1. Daphne
2. Through Gilded Trellises
3. Old Sir Faulk

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Tuesday, 2 October 2018

CD Reviews - September 2018

Mezzo-soprano Sarah Connolly and pianist Joseph Middleton have recorded a wonderful selection of songs, covering 120 years of composers associated with the Royal College of Music, as teachers, students or both.  I heard them perform much of this repertoire in a lunchtime BBC Prom in August, and it was one of my concert highlights of the year so far (read my review here).  The title of the CD, ‘Come to Me in My Dreams’, comes from Frank Bridge’s (1879-1983) beautifully rhapsodic setting of Matthew Arnold’s text, with its bluesy piano opening, passionate swells and dramatic break on ‘truth’.  But the disc opens with a total gem, a touching miniature, ‘The Lost Nightingale’ by Muriel Herbert (1897-1984).  This is a stunning collection, by any standards, but what makes it exceptional is the strong sense of communication and commitment to the texts. From the tender sadness and dislocated syncopation of voice and piano in Ivor Gurney’s (1890-1937) ‘Thou didst delight my eyes’, to the tolling bells and beating heart of the repeated note in Arthur Somervell’s (1863-1937) ‘Into my heart an air that kills’, Connolly always delivers the texts with intensity and passion, without ever becoming mannered in delivery. Her soft, honeyed tone and delicate articulation of ‘drips, drips, drips’ in Stanford’s (1852-1924) ‘A soft day’ is particularly striking. In addition to Connolly’s phenomenal expressiveness and control, Middleton’s playing also deserves equal credit. His rippling watery accompaniment to Parry’s (1848-1918) ‘Weep you no more, sad fountains’ is a perfect example of the subtlety of his touch throughout. In addition to Benjamin Britten’s (1913-1976) set ‘A Charm of Lullabies’, we have ‘A Sweet Lullaby’ and ‘Somnus, the humble god’, two songs written for the set, but rejected by Britten, discovered by Connolly in the Britten-Pears Library, so world premiere recordings here. ‘A Sweet Lullaby’ combines a simple lilting rhythm with an undercurrent of unsettling harmonies, and the urgency of the darker undertone increases, such that the final wail leaves the ‘lullaby’ far from calm. ‘Somnus, the humble god’ is also dark, with its rumbling, rocking piano part and a final stanza likening sleep to death. Many songs here will be unfamiliar to many, but there are some real treasures here.  Cecil Armstrong Gibbs’ (1889-1960) ‘Sailing Homeward’ has a great dramatic arc in its two short minutes, and E. J. Moeran’s (1894-1940) ‘Twilight’ is full of achingly pastoral sadness and loss.  Rebecca Clarke’s (1886-1979) ‘The Cloths of Heaven’ is beautifully lyrical and Romantic, and Connolly’s smooth line is matched by soft textures from Middleton.  Michael Tippett’s (1905-1998) 'Songs for Ariel' are highly atmospheric, and Connolly relishes the drama and quirkiness of Tippett’s settings here. Mark-Anthony Turnage’s (b.1960) ‘Farewell’, written for Connolly, concludes the disc, with Turnage exploiting Connolly’s full range to convey the passion and directness of Stevie Smith’s text. Connolly sounds distraught, almost crazed, delivering the line ‘I loved you best’, contrasted with a beautifully relaxed, bell-like tone in the final ‘ding dongs’, against the high tinkling piano. A wonderful collection of English song, highly recommended.

Various. 2018. Come to Me in My Dreams. Dame Sarah Connolly, Joseph Middleton. Compact Disc. Chandos CHAN 10944.

I first came across lutenist Jadran Duncumb on his recording last year with violinist Johannes Pramsohler.  He now has his first solo recording out, focusing on Silvius Leopold Weiss (1687-1750), who also featured on that previous CD, and Johann Adolf Hasse (1699-1783).  Weiss was one of the most important composers of music for the lute, and was renowned for his technical ability on the instrument.  Hasse wrote a great deal of lute music for Weiss, who performed as a soloist with the Dresden orchestra, where Hasse was Kapellmeister.  Here, Duncumb performs two of Hasse’s Sonatas, although both of these have been transcribed from their original settings for harpsichord.  The Sonata in A major, dedicated to the daughter of Friedrich August II of Saxony, is a delightful two movement piece, and Duncumb has added back some of the detail in the sprightly Allegro that was removed in the original transcription. The Sonata in D minor by Weiss is an altogether more substantial work of Bach-like proportions, in six movements, and from its opening stately Allemande, through to the graceful Sarabande, and the fluid Allegro that ends the work, Duncumb makes this sound totally natural. In his notes, he argues that lutenist Weiss’ writing for the instrument comes alive in a way that Bach’s doesn’t quite, and in Duncumb’s hands this is certainly the case.  There is a lively energy and fluidity in his playing that never sounds difficult or awkward. He also includes a short but harmonically daring Prelude, and a joyous Passacaglia from Weiss to close the disc. Before that, another Sonata from Hasse, with some delightfully delicate Baroque sequences in its opening Allegro, and dancing Presto to finish. The recording is close and resonant, which does mean that one hears the occasional scraping of frets, but the ears soon get used to this, and the pay-off is a richness of tone that makes this a highly engaging debut solo recording from Duncumb. 

Various. 2018. Weiss & Hasse Lute Sonatas. Jadran Duncumb. Compact Disc. Audax Records. ADX 13713.

Barry Douglas (piano) combines Schubert’s (1797-1828) posthumous Piano Sonata D958 with the Six Moments Musicaux for the third volume of his collection of the composer’s works for solo piano.  He finishes off this volume with two of Liszt’s transcriptions of Schubert songs.  The Piano Sonata in C minor, D958 is the first of Schubert’s final three sonatas, written in the final months of his life.  It clearly has its roots in Beethoven, particularly in its dramatic, emphatic opening, but Schubert’s voice quickly emerges, especially in the beautifully poignant Adagio. Douglas delivers the required power and weight in the opening movement, and generally his approach emphasises the dramatic. However, his Adagio has delicacy and sensitive expression, if not going for quite the sense of transcendence here that say, Uchida, achieves.  His finale is powerfully agile, however, culminating in a thunderously emphatic conclusion. The Moments Musicaux are a set of character pieces, varying in style and from the brief, dancing third to the more substantial angst-ridden sixth. There are folk touches here and there, but ultimately, these are intimate ‘moments’, and Douglas gives them individual voices, from the delicate poise of No. 1 to the thundering insistence of No. 5. He ends this volume with two of Liszt’s transcriptions for piano of Schubert songs.  ‘Sei mir gegrüßt’ preserves the beautiful melodic line, but Liszt’s deft variation shifts the melody from the top to the middle of the texture, and resists the temptation to be overly virtuosic. ‘Auf dem Wasser zu singen’ does something similar, but Liszt adds beautifully pianistic textures, adding a new dimension to the song’s watery theme.  Another strong volume in Douglas’ ongoing Schubert cycle.

Schubert, F. 2018. Works for Solo Piano, Volume 3. Barry Douglas. Compact Disc. Chandos CHAN 10990.

 (Edited versions of these reviews first appeared in GScene, September 2018)
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Wednesday, 8 August 2018

Blissful daydreams on a hot afternoon: lullabies and dreams from Connolly and Middleton - Proms at ... Cadogan Hall 4

© Jan Capinski
Sarah Connolly (mezzo-soprano)

Monday 6 August, 2018
Cadogan Hall, London

★★★★★



Charles Villiers Stanford (1852-1924): A Sheaf of Songs from Leinster, Op. 140 - 'A soft day'
Hubert Parry (1848-1918): English Lyrics, Set 4 - 'Weep you no more, sad fountains'
Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958): The House of Life - 'Love-Sight'
Ivor Gurney (1890-1937): Thou didst delight my eyes
Arthur Somervell (1863-1937): A Shropshire Lad - 'Into my heart an air that kills'
Frank Bridge (1879-1941): Come to me in my dreams
Herbert Howells (1892-1983): Goddess of Night
Frank Bridge: Journey's End
Benjamin Britten (1913-1976): A Sweet Lullaby
Benjamin Britten: Somnus, the humble god
Gustav Holst (1874-1934): Twelve Humbert Wolfe Songs, Op. 48 - 'Journey's End'
Benjamin Britten: A Charm of Lullabies, Op. 41
Lisa Illean (b.1983): Sleeplessness ... Sails
Mark-Anthony Turnage (b.1960): Farewell

 'Connolly and Middleton held the audience’s interest ... through a strong sense of communication and commitment to the texts'.

 'Connolly, in her Proms recital debut, and Middleton delivered their programme with assurance and conviction throughout'.

 'Connolly always delivered the text with intensity and passion, without ever becoming mannered in delivery'.

 Middleton:
'His rippling watery accompaniment to Parry’s Weep you no more, sad fountains, and the beautifully placed delicacy of the opening to Vaughan Williams’ Love-Sight are just two small examples of the subtlety of his touch throughout'.

Read my full review on Bachtrack here. 
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Thursday, 8 June 2017

Brighton Festival 2017


















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Friday, 18 September 2015

CD Reviews - September 2015

I recently had the pleasure to experience a première of an amazing work by Cheryl Frances-Hoad performed by The Cardinall’s Musick in the BBC Proms (review here). On the back of this, I’ve been listening to a CD of her vocal and choral works, called You Promised me Everything.  The title comes from her work for soprano, piano 4 hands and cello, You Promised me Everything Last Night, which explores, in repeating this phrase over and over, its many inflections and interpretations, charting perhaps rather depressingly a trajectory from joyous ecstasy to ultimate bitter desperation and sadness. The inflections are expertly characterised with a stunning performance from soprano Natalie Raybould, over a largely simple and somewhat bleak accompaniment.  The disc opens with Frances-Hoad’s response to Schumann’s song cycle, ‘Frauenliebe und Leben’ (Women’s Lives and Loves), which is, although a Romantic masterpiece, perhaps stuck in a male 19th century perspective on female emotions. So Frances-Hoad brings this up to date (while still drawing on elements of harmony or figuration from Schumann’s songs) in a cycle of eight songs, ‘One Life Stand’, setting poems by the poet and crime-writer Sophie Hannah.  As with Schumann’s cycle, the songs cover a range of emotions, but additionally here there is humour, in the dilemma of ‘should I, shouldn’t I phone him’ in ‘The Pros and Cons’, and especially in the mocking of male attitudes to pregnancy and childbirth in ‘Ante-Natal’. Yet Frances-Hoad also captures the depths of emotion, in the beautiful yet anguished lyricism of ‘Tide to Land’, with disturbing undertones in the harmony belying the vocal emphatic climax, and in the moments of cold shock and loss captured by ‘In the Chill’. Throughout, Frances-Hoad uses the texts imaginatively, whether vocally (for example the somewhat comedic yet barely suppressed anger and bitterness expressed in ‘Rubbish at Adultery’), or in the piano writing (such as the departing train in ‘Brief Encounter’). A brave thing to try and ‘update’ Schumann – but this is a highly successful cycle, and mezzo soprano Jennifer Johnston, who inspired the cycle, inhabits the spectrum of emotions here with great expertise. The piano accompaniment is at times highly challenging, yet Joseph Middleton performs this with apparent ease.  Johnston also performs the other major work that ends this disc, this time accompanied by Alisdair Hogarth in a setting of the Anglo-Saxon poem, ‘Beowulf’.  Highly ambitious, this is almost a mini-opera in itself, with barely a break for the singer in roughly half an hour of dramatic narrative. Yet Frances-Hoad achieves surprising variety, with passages of largely recitative over chordal underpinning from the piano contrasted with racing rhythms to portray moments of action, and great word-painting for the serpent and the dragon at the climax. The closing moments of wailing grief for Beowulf’s funeral pyre are heartbreakingly bleak. A live performance would offer greater communication between singer and listener, harder to achieve on CD, but nonetheless this is an impressively individual piece of dramatic vocal writing. ‘Don’t’ 
was dedicated to soprano Jane Manning for her 70th birthday, and wittily sets marriage advice from the 1913 book ‘Don’t’s for Wives’, comically accompanied by the extremes of piccolo and bass clarinet. Jane Manning performs here with great gusto and aplomb. There are three choral pieces on the disc, all performed confidently by the Gonville & Caius College Choir, directed by Geoffrey Webber. They include a seemingly straightforward yet moving setting of ‘There is No Rose’, which avoids the saccharine of so many other modern Xmas settings – all the more impressive given that she composed it aged 14!  Her Psalm 1 setting contrasts stability, underpinned by the organ, with some wild, violent setting, with leaping intervals, and then ends with a striking effect of the organ literally dying away, with the instruction to switch of the blower, creating a bizarre effect of deflation. Her 21-part setting of the Nunc Dimittis is highly challenging, with a particularly high-wire part for 1st soprano, including numerous top Ds, ably sung here by Rose Wilson-Haffenden.  Overall, this disc demonstrates an incredibly wide variety of styles and moods, from humour to real depths of human emotion, and shows that Frances-Hoad is a composer of broad-ranging talent.

Frances-Hoad, Cheryl. 2014. You Promised Me Everything. Various. Compact Disc. Champs Hill Records. CHRCD057.

Violinist Tasmin Little has teamed up with pianist Piers Lane to record all of Schubert’s works for the instruments, and they are also joined by cellist Tim Hugh for the bonus addition of the Sonata for Piano and Arpeggione (or cello), and finally an Adagio for all three instruments.  The three early violin Sonatas, composed when Schubert was just 19 (although we have to remember he therefore had just 12 more years of composing, before his premature death at age 31) are light works, subtitled as ‘Sonatinas’ by Diabelli when they were published, perhaps in indication of their relatively small scale.  These are not juvenile works, however, and although the first movement of the first sonata is clearly based around Mozart’s E minor Sonata, many aspects of Schubert’s mature style are also here.  These are real chamber works, in that the violin and piano are very much in equal partnership, and Little and Lane are sensitive to this.  As ever, Little produces a warm tone throughout, and Lane has a lightness of touch when needed, as well as energy and intensity in some of Schubert’s darker writing. The fourth Sonata, from just under two years after the first group, already shows Schubert’s rapid development, and increases the level of virtuosity required from the violinist in particular. The Rondeau brillant which opens the second disc, composed just two years before his death, is much more virtuosic again, and gives Little a chance to flex her muscles. The Fantasie was the last work Schubert wrote for the combination, composed the year before his early death, and from the very opening feels emotionally from a totally different place. The ‘fantasy’ form allows him more flexibility, although there is still a clear structure, and both instruments are given the chance to shine individually and together. The tender pianissimo playing from both in the Andante opening (which returns towards the end of the work) is very touching, and the central variations on one of his own song themes, first presented on the piano is Schubert at his most sublime.  The arpeggione was a short-lived instrument, a kind of hybrid cello-guitar, with six strings tuned like a guitar but played with a bow, and Schubert’s Sonata is really the only notable work for the instrument to survive, most often now played in a transcription for the cello. Tim Hugh’s warm, relaxed tone brings some welcome respite after the intensity of the Fantasie, and then the three join to close the disc in the very slow, exquisite single movement Adagio.  Another very late work, this was possibly intended as a slow movement for a full piano trio, but as with so many other of Schubert’s incomplete works, it is almost even more sublime for its fragility, without outer movements to diminish its intensity.  Overall, the violin sonatas are perhaps not amongst Schubert’s greatest works, but the playing here has such energy and life that these minor works are lifted beyond their lightness, and the later works, particularly the Fantasie, are works of exquisite beauty, and the trajectory of the programming, right through to the late Adagio, at all times performed with such sensitivity and expertise, makes this an outstanding collection.

Schubert, F. 2015. Chamber Works. Tasmin Little, Tim Hugh, Piers Lane. Compact Discs (2). Chandos 10850(2).

The Cuarteto SolTango are a German group, comprising Rocco Heins (bandoneón), Karel Bredenhorst (cello), Sophie Heinrich (violin) and Martin Klett (piano), and they specialise in authentic tango music.  The new wave of tango music has perhaps been most famously brought to new audiences through the compositions of Astor Piazzolla (1921-1992), and they include a number of his compositions on their new disc, Cristal.  However, there are tangos here by a whole range of presumably Argentinian composers from the twentieth century, and a couple still alive today.  Sadly the CD notes give very little information on the composers or the individual works here (although there are some interesting notes on the history of tango music and its origins), so it’s best to just go with the flow here, and enjoy. Right from the opening flourish of the title track, ‘Cristal’, through the jagged rhythms of ‘La cicatriz’ (‘the scar’), the wonderfully spiky ‘Olivero’, the joyful, waltzy ‘Paisaje’, and the wistfully lyrical ‘Poema’, to the dramatic ‘Alma de bohemio’ (‘Bohemian soul’), the Cuarteto SolTango take us on a wonderful journey through the rich world of tango. The five Piazzolla works are striking in their relative complexity by comparison, however, with the sophisticated ‘Verano porteño’ (‘Summer in Buenos Aires’) and the mysterious ‘Homenaje a Córdoba’ (‘Tribute to Cordoba’) standing out. Beautifully sultry, this is a must for a late summer evening’s listening.

Various. 2015. Cristal. Cuarteto SolTango. Compact Disc. Avi Music. 8553331.

(Edited versions of  these reviews first appeared in GScene, September 2015)


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