Composer: Samuel Barber, Sally Beamish, Frederick Delius, Peter Warlock
Performer: Roderick Williams, James Gilchrist, Sophie Bevan, Coull Quartet, Roger Coull, Philip Gallaway, Johnathan Barritt, Nicholas Roberts
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Somm
Catalogue: SOMMCD0654
Release: 2022
Size: 1.12 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
Warlock: Peterisms, first set
01. No. 1, Chopcherry
02. Warlock: Corpus Christi
03. Warlock: The Fairest May
04. Warlock: Mourne no moe
Warlock: Peterisms, first set
05. No. 2, A Sad Song
06. Warlock: My gostly fader
07. Warlock: My lady is a pretty one
08. Warlock: My Little Sweet Darling
09. Warlock: Sleep
10. Warlock: Sorrow’s Lullaby
11. Warlock: Take, O take those lips away
12. Barber: Dover Beach, Op. 3
Barber: Three Songs, Op. 10
13. No. 2, Sleep Now (Arr. R. William for Voice & Strings)
Barber: Four Songs, Op. 13
14. No. 3, Sure on This Shining Night (Arr. R. William for Voice & Strings)
Beamish: Tree Carols
15. No. 1, The Miracle Tree
16. No. 2, The Trees Are Troubled
17. No. 3, Vigil
18. No. 4, The Tree Is a Changing Sky
19. No. 5, Bushes and Briars
20. Delius: I-Brasîl
Delius: Seven Songs from the Norwegian
21. No. 1, Twilight Fancies [Sung in English]
22. No. 2, Sweet Venevil [Sung in English]
With six first recordings, “On This Shining Night” is a ravishing recital focusing revealingly on a 20th-century phenomenon: works for voice and string quartet. It takes its title from a James Agate setting by Samuel Barber (whose masterly Dover Beach is also heard), here in a sublime arrangement by Roderick Williams.
Williams also provides arrangements of Barber’s Sleep Now and three Frederick Delius pieces from his Seven Songs from the Norwegian: the evocative Twilight Fancies, vivacious Young Venevil and exotic I-Brasil. They serve, as Robert Matthew-Walker’s erudite booklet notes observe, as companions to 11 songs by Delius’s close friend and associate, Peter Warlock, including the gentle intimacy of Corpus Christi, the “mini-cantata” Sorrow’s Lullaby, and unique free-recitative of My gostly vader.
Composed for Williams and the Coull Quartet, Sally Beamish’s five-part Tree Carols offer striking, variegated settings of poems by Fiona Sampson in their premiere recording.