Dame Sarah Connolly and Joseph Middleton have teamed up for another interesting recital album. It’s quite varied. It starts with Chausson’s La Poème de l’amour et de la mer which is actually two songs with a piano interlude. It’s very fin de siècle chanson with the piano line rather more interesting than the vocal line but pretty decent stuff, if a bit emotionally overwrought.
Barber’s Three Songs Op.10 are quite well known, especially the last; “I hear an army”. They are dark and dramatic and suit Connolly’s voice very well. Next is the often heard Debussy piece Trois Chansons de Bilitis which purports to be settings of translations of actual Sapphic texts but which sound exactly like a 19th century Frenchman would imagine a Sapphic text to be; i.e languorous. Nicely done though. Next we come to a pair of declamatory songs by Copland; “The world feels dusty” and “I’ve heard an organ talk sometimes”. Definitely a welcome change of pace. Continue reading
I first came across the music of Errollyn Wallen in a recent recital by Sarah Connolly and Joseph Middleton. There was a quality in her music that reminded me of some other composers of Caribbean origin writing about the immigrant experience in Canada. Wallen is from Belize but now lives in Scotland (in a lighthouse no less) and her music is quite varied. Unusually, besides being a classically trained composer, she also sings while accompanying herself on the piano and the works she has written for that genre definitely have a singer/songwriter vibe.
operaramblings 