Composer: Ralph Vaughan Williams
Performer: Mary Bevan, Nicky Spence, Roderick Williams, Jack Liebeck, William Vann
Audio CD
Number of Discs: 1
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Albion
Catalogue: ALBCD042
Release: 2020
Size: 1.08 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
Folk Songs from Sussex
01. No. 1, Bold General Wolfe
02. No. 2, Low Down in the Broom
03. No. 3, The Thresherman and the Squire
04. No. 4, The Pretty Ploughboy
05. No. 5, O Who Is That That Raps at My Window?
06. No. 6, How Cold the Wind Doth Blow
07. No. 7, Captain Grant
08. No. 8, Farewell, Lads
09. No. 9, Come, All You Worthy Christians
10. No. 10, The Turkish Lady
11. No. 11, The Seeds of Love
12. No. 12, The Maid of Islington
13. No. 13, Here’s Adieu to all Judges and Juries
14. No. 14, Lovely Joan
English Folk Songs
15. No. 1, Robin Hood and the Pedlar
16. No. 2, The Ploughman
17. No. 3, One Man, Two Men
18. No. 4, The Brewer
19. No. 5, Rolling in the Dew
20. No. 6, King William
21. The Golden Vanity
22. Five English Folksongs – . No. 3, Just as the Tide Was Flowing
23. The Spanish Ladies
This is the first in a series of four albums recording all 80 of the folk songs in English that Ralph Vaughan Williams arranged for voice and piano or violin. 57 of the 80 songs have not previously been recorded in these arrangements, so there is a good deal of unknown – but very beautiful – music to be found here.
This first album has 23 tracks including 15 world premières. It includes Folk Songs from Sussex (1912) and Six English Folk Songs (1935). Later volumes will include songs collected in the Eastern Counties (1908), the Appalachian Mountains (about 1938) and from Newfoundland (1946). Vaughan Williams is well known as a collector of folk songs, but his own collection by no means predominates in this series; most of the arrangements were made and published as a collaborative effort, drawn from many sources.
The 14 songs from Sussex on this album were all collected by Percy Merrick from Henry Hills, a farmer from Lodsworth, Sussex, around 1900. Some will be well-known in other arrangements; others will be unfamiliar.
Praised by Opera for her “dramatic wit and vocal control”, British soprano Mary Bevan is internationally renowned in baroque, classical and contemporary repertoire, and appears regularly with leading conductors, orchestras and ensembles around the world.
Opera singer Nicky Spence is one of Scotland’s proudest sons and his unique skills as a singing actor and the rare honesty of his musicianship are steadfastly earning him a place at the top of the classical music profession.
Roderick Williams is one of this country’s most sought after baritones and is constantly in demand, encompassing a repertoire from the baroque to world premières. In 2016 he won the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Singer of the Year award.
In 2010, British violinist Jack Liebeck won a Classical Brit in the young British classical performer category.
A multiple-prize winning and critically acclaimed conductor and accompanist, William Vann is equally at home on the podium or at the piano and is the founder and Artistic Director of the London English Song Festival.