Composer: Thomas Campion, John Danyel, John Dowland, Thomas Ford, Jean-Baptiste Lully, Henry Purcell, Robert de Visée
Performer: Toby Carr, Alexander Chance
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Linn
Catalogue: CKD711
Release: 2023
Size: 980 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
01. Dowland: Can she excuse my wrongs? (First Booke of Songes, 1597)
02. Dowland: Praeludium
03. Dowland: I saw my Lady weepe
04. Dowland: Flow my teares (Lacrimæ)
05. Dowland: Captain Digorie Pipers Galliard
06. Campion: I care not for these ladies
07. Campion: The cypress curtain of the night
08. Campion: Never weather-beaten sail
09. Dowland: Mignarda
10. Ford: What then is love sings Coridon
11. Ford: Faire, sweet, cruell
12. Danyel: Pavan
Danyel: Mrs M E her funeral tears for the death of her husband
13. I. Grief, Keep Within
14. II. Drop Not, Mine Eyes
15. III. Have All Our Passions
16. Danyel: He whose desires are still abroad
17. Dowland: In darkness let me dwell
18. Lully: Entrée d’Apollon
19. Purcell: O solitude, my sweetest choice, Z406
20. Visée: Prélude
21. Purcell: An Evening Hymn ‘Now that the sun hath veiled his light’, Z193
Named Gramophone’s One to Watch and winner of the 2022 International Handel Singing Competition, Alexander Chance makes his recording debut on Linn. Drop not, mine eyes is a recital of English lute songs that soaks up the zeitgeist of the past couple of years to create a programme full of melancholic works by Dowland, Campion, Danyel, Purcell and others. If the ever-popular Dowland was readily prone to sadness, as exemplified by the pair I saw my lady weep and Flow, my tears, or indeed In darkness let me dwell, the polymath Thomas Campion favoured a more sober style, as shown in I care not for these ladies. Thomas Ford displays his more profane side here with Fair, sweet, cruel and What then is love. When it comes to melancholy, John Danyel’s Grief, keep within and Drop not, mine eyes are every bit as good as Dowland. The programme closes with Purcell, the other English Orpheus. Toby Carr provides sympathetic accompaniment on lute and theorbo