Composer: John Pickard
Performer: Simon Lepper, Roderick Williams, Eve Daniell
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Toccata
Catalogue: TOCC0413
Release: 2017
Size: 971 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
Binyon Songs
01. I. Nature
02. II. Sowing Seed
03. III. Autumn Song
04. IV. When all the World is Hidden
05. V. The Burning of the Leaves
06. The Phoenix
The Borders of Sleep
07. No. 1. Tall Nettles
08. No. 2. The Trumpet
09. No. 3. The Mill-Water
10. No. 4. Out in the Dark
11. No. 5. The Gallows
12. No. 6. Rain
13. No. 7. No One Cares Less Than I
14. No. 8. Last Poem (The Sorrow of True Love)
15. No. 9. Lights Out
The English composer John Pickard (b. 1963) is best known for a series of powerful orchestral works, five symphonies among them. But this album of songs – his complete output for voice and piano to date – demonstrates that he can generate drama on a smaller scale, too. These settings – of two less familiar poets of the First World War, often exploring man’s relationship with nature, and a translation of a ninth-century Anglo-Saxon phantasmagorical allegory – encompass a wide range of moods, requiring soaring vocal lines, declamatory authority and the gentlest intimacy, supported by piano textures that can flare up in freewheeling virtuosity.