THE LOVERS' ROBIN WELL HOLLOWAY

Clare Lloyd-Griffiths soprano Kate Symonds-Joy mezzo-soprano James Robinson tenor Simon Wallfisch baritone

Edward Rushton, William Vann piano ROBIN ' HOLLOWAY (b. 1943) WELL

Souvenirs de Monsalvat (1984) Clare Lloyd-Griffiths soprano (tracks 1 & 19) 10 Introduction: Lento solenne – [2:16] Kate Symonds-Joy mezzo-soprano (tracks 1–9 & 19) 11 Sin, Guilt & Suffering [2:54] James Robinson tenor (tracks 1 & 19) 12 Parsifal & Herzeleide [2:26] Simon Wallfisch baritone (tracks 1, 18 & 19) 13 Flowermaidens – [3:47] 14 Kundry, Kiss, Mystic Marriage [5:42] Edward Rushton piano (tracks 2–18) 0:00 Kundry lies in sultry splendour. 0:13 Enter Parsifal. 0:25 She perceives him. William Vann piano (tracks 1, 10–17 & 19) 0:32 Parsifal gazes in wondering astonishment … 0:41 … and perceives Kundry. 0:55 She dances for him. 1:45 Parsifal is puzzled … 1:51 … and pained. 1:55 She bids him relax, and make himself at home. 2:01 She tells him the tale of Herzeleide. 2:22 She dances for him again. 2:57 Thoughts of Herzeleide mingle with his growing desire for Kundry. 1 The Zodiac Song (2017) [5:47] 3:30 A passionate quivering … 3:39 a dark passage … 4:12 they emerge from the obscurity 4:26 … and dance together. 5:11 The marriage, in the Chapel of the Grail at Monsalvat, Three Songs to poems by Edmund Waller (2007) of Parsifal and Kundry.

2 On a Girdle [2:00] 15 Pastorale [4:32] 3 Go, lovely Rose [3:25] 16 Intermezzo – [0:58] 4 Old Age [2:54] 17 Pentecost Sarabande [4:35]

A Medley of Nursery Rhymes and Conundrums (1986) 18 The Lovers’ Well (1981) [16:07] 5 Overture & Dialogue [2:56] 19 The Food of Love (1996) [4:04] 6 Ballad [5:08] 7 First Riddle [1:27] Total playing time [74:30] 8 Conundrums [1:54] 9 Finale [1:27] All tracks are premiere recordings Robin Holloway: The Lovers’ Well Introduction: Holloway’s way with words

This portrait CD on the occasion of Robin Holloway’s 75th birthday was made possible Hidden in plain sight or shining out from round material intimacy with his own abundant – by the generous support of the following: some dark allegorical corner, Robin Holloway’s but less widely disseminated – output of music has always been surrounded by, indebted for voice. The gap between the composition James Altham Joe Herbert Howard Skempton to, complicit with words: the composer’s of the opera Clarissa, in 1976, and its premiere, Stephen Bann Mary Horan Malcolm C. Smith own – often seductively compelling – words of in 1990, surely contributed to obscuring the Raphael Blumenfeld James Howell Tom Sutcliffe explanation and justification, the poets’ words extent to which the private codings of the Morris Brown Christopher Hum Humphrey Thompson that give rise to its melodies and rhythms, Second Concerto for Orchestra (1978–79) Simon Carrington Andrew Hunter Johnston Guy Turner the literary words that underlie its complex drew on self-quotations from the opera. Few John Casey William Lacey Benjamin Walton metaphorical schemes and allegories. listeners to the Proms premiere of Holloway’s Tim Coleman John Latimer Chris Walton massive Symphony (1999–2000), similarly, will David Collins Richard Le Page Geoffrey Webber The notion of words remaining even in the have been in a position to recognise the role in Helen Daniels Nathaniel Lew Judith Weir absence of the voice has been central to that work’s turning-of-the-seasons narrative of Jonathan Dove Simon Maddrell John Williams Holloway’s compositional thought processes a recurring quotation from the composer’s own Richard Duncan-Jones Peter Mandler Nicholas Williams for what is now fifty years and more. The setting of Shelley’s Lament, as can now be Martin Ennis Nicholas Marston Michael Wood secondary quotations – from Schoenberg’s heard on the present album. Alan Fersht Clare, Graeme and Terence Tom Young Pierrot lunaire, Debussy’s Images (‘Rondes Paul Fincham Mitchison de printemps’), Wagner’s Siegfried, etc. – that Tipping the balance in favour of vocal music James Fitzsimons John Mollon With thanks also to the adorn Scenes from Schumann (1970), a set while also registering some of the complexities Michael Foad Stephen Ralls Master and Fellows of of instrumental paraphrases of Schumann of this composer’s approach to questions of Cheryl Frances-Hoad John Robson Gonville & Caius College, songs, are prompted by those songs’ no longer medium (the silent-movie aspect of ‘Kundry, Helen Garrison Philippa Rogerson Cambridge, Claire Wheeler present texts. The Violin Concerto (1987–90) Kiss, Mystic Marriage’, for example, which Gordon Gledhill Paul Rooke and Naomi Clarke for is punctuated by a series of ‘windows’ which perhaps adumbrated another too-long- Michael Zev Gordon Patrick Routley practical assistance. are in fact wordless settings of Rilke’s cycle unheard project, the multimedia epic Peer Gynt James Halliday Julian Rushton of French poems Les fenêtres, presented (1984–97)), this seventy-fifth-birthday tribute Norman Harper Julian Sale in a complex gesture of homage to and at the suggests that Holloway is not done with words Charles Hart Robert Saxton same time avoidance of the words of the poet – nor they with him – yet. John Ashbery. (A similar engagement/dodge is described in Holloway’s own comments © 2018 John Fallas Recorded on 8 & 9 July 2018 at Piano: Steinway D grand, serial no 592087 @delphianrecords in this booklet on the Geoffrey Hill setting Potton Hall, Saxmundham, Suffolk Piano technician: David Beccles Executive producers: Chris Walton Cover image & design: John Christ The Lovers’ Well.) John Fallas studied music at the University @delphianrecords & Geoffrey Webber Booklet editor: John Fallas of Cambridge between 1998 and 2001; Robin Producer/Engineer: Paul Baxter Delphian Records Ltd – Edinburgh – UK @delphian_records 24-bit digital editing: Matthew Swan www.delphianrecords.co.uk At the same time, the popularity of his Holloway was among his teachers there. He is 24-bit digital mastering: Paul Baxter instrumental works has disguised their now a freelance writer and editor. Notes by the composer

The Food of Love, setting Shelley’s famous centrepiece is a rapt setting of Waller’s most ever more impossible tasks and conditions models; one which, unlike them, adheres stanzas in praise of music for four voices and celebrated lyric, much imitated in its day. This from his Girl, ending in happy resolution: true to the plot and characters and attempts to piano, was written for the seventieth birthday is preceded by a more conventional piece of love for ever after. follow their destinies, however burlesqued or in 1996 of Eric Sams, the celebrated writer courtly gallantry, ‘On a Girdle’, and followed even travestied. With the characters and plot on the German Lied. The mood of voluptuous by another poem that cuts deeper – ‘Old Age’ Souvenirs de Monsalvat, a ‘waltz- as too with the music, the mockery is born amorous luxury is broken for a ‘middle eight’ (subtitled by the poet ‘of the last verses in the synthesis on favourite themes from Richard of devotion absolute and indissoluble for a which sets for the tenor alone the same poet’s book’), with its visionary closing quatrain. Wagner’s Parsifal’ for two players at one supreme summit of music and drama: I hope equally famous Lament – ‘O world! O life! piano, was eventually written in January this will always shine out. O time!’ – lines of bitter reproach and regret, A Medley of Nursery Rhymes and 1984. ‘Eventually’, because I’d had the idea before the comforts of roses, music, love Conundrums is a selection from a much longer in mind for years, after absorption in the great There are six waltzes/valses. No 1 is preceded return to assuage the thorns of life. original for soprano and wind quintet which I original since my late teens, then studying by a solemn prelude introducing the opera’s composed in the summer of 1977 as cheerful it closely for my doctoral thesis. And with germinal motif, and also its hero and heroine, The Zodiac Song is a sort of follow-on, diatonic complement to a complex tortuous the other hand was also very fond of the late Parsifal and Kundry. More of them later; composed for the same forces just over modernistic thing entitled The Rivers of Hell. nineteenth- and early twentieth-century meanwhile, a strenuous work-out in waltz twenty-one years later. Its text is as little This latter was extremely difficult to write and French Wagner send-ups (wholly compatible idiom of the harsh words of the title (‘sin’, ‘guilt’, known as Shelley’s is familiar: couplets by tied me up in knots; its companion virtually with fervent idolatry) for piano duet – by ‘suffering’), with, after a coruscating climax, John Ruskin characterising the twelve zodiac wrote itself, with almost mindless fluency. Faure and Messager on motifs from The Ring a long gentle fade-away linking into No 2, signs and creatures. Their original purpose Knots came back a couple of years later in a (‘Souvenirs de Bayreuth’) and by Chabrier on ‘Parsifal & Herzeleide’ – the strapping young is uncertain – perhaps to decorate a dinner briefer sequel for the same line-up, setting favourite moments in Tristan (‘Souvenirs de hero, as yet callous and ignorant, enclosing service or a piece of furniture? I enjoyed trying only conundrums and tongue-twisters. Then Munich’, where he first heard it and said he the tender-aching music for the Mother he has to find fitting matches for these mordant, in 1986 I made the present mix of the two, was ‘ready to die after that A on the cellos’); abandoned. No 3 links on: ‘Flowermaidens’, lyrical, elegant cameos in a sequence of accompanied now by piano, with a few extra not to forget Debussy’s tormented tormenting already a waltz/valse sequence in the original, vocal solos and duets bound together with rhymes amidst the old, the whole medley linked of the latter work in ‘Golliwogg’s Cakewalk’! of course, and, here as there, preceded by the vestiges of a ritornello for the piano: all twelve by a new ritornello not a thousand miles away It seemed like an invitation to take on the iridiscent chromatic rush in 4/4 time before in turn, till an envoi where the four voices, from the link-music in The Zodiac Song (plus ça Master’s ultimate masterpiece (and equally, the girls dance to bewitch the hero into self- unaccompanied, hymn the fusion of the change …). The various riddles and nonsenses if inexplicably, obvious that The Mastersingers betrayal (or into self-fulfilment/-discovery?). disparate characters in a harmonious balance, are diversified by a comic dialogue between a is not open to such treatment). Debussy’s manifest intoxication with this the whole mini-cantata then being rounded louche priest and his acquiescent parishioner, music in his late ballet Jeux is also briefly off by the piano alone. and a long mosaic of wheedling and yearning But earlier, my command of tonal practice was acknowledged. The erotic climax boils over with ‘Ickle ockle’ as its chorus. But at the centre not up to the job. So only when sufficiently without a break into No 4, ‘Kundry, Kiss, Three Songs to poems by Edmund Waller comes something serious – the tender ballad of ripe, many half-baked old attempts were Mystic Marriage’, a re-creation of the opera’s were written in 2007, for no particular occasion ‘The Cambric Shirt’, virtually unaccompanied. rapidly improved, extended, and incorporated heartscene which here, taking a rather different and with no particular singer in mind. Their Three impossible questions from the Boy, four into a fantasia far longer than its French course, is accompanied by ‘stage directions’ Notes by the composer reminiscent of the intertitles from silent films foundation. I’d been drawn some years before [see tracklisting on p3 of this booklet]. to his marvellous live reading – plangent, urgent, passionate, intensely dramatic – of this No 5 is in complete contrast: a ‘Pastorale’ sequence of fifteen lyrics, each comprising on the original’s copious and beautiful nature twelve short, spare, unpunctuated and almost music, with the flowering meadows from unrhyming lines, the whole suggesting but Act III enclosing the purifying lake from Act I never explaining some dark tale from the and the of the swan that first ruffles underside of Mediterranean chivalry (his the feathers of the plot. No 6 is preceded by note mentions a generalised Spanish original). a shadowy Intermezzo in 4/4 time, based The resonances with Parsifal – amorous upon the Monsalvat bells as a sort of ground longing, carnal guilt, a wound that will not bass. Triple time returns for the closing heal – can’t be missed; the cycle’s atmosphere ‘Pentecost Sarabande’, solidly building into and its actual content make The Lovers’ Well stacks of sequences from the music of the a dark brother to Souvenirs de Monsalvat. hero’s anointing and coronation in Act III, and including his own heroic fanfare-shaped ‘Most of …’ is moot. I didn’t wish to motif (with a whiff of the flowermaidens set all fifteen lyrics when they perhaps at the climax) before gently relaxing into circles overlapped a bit; and absolutely could not of dove-descending to rhyme with the swan swallow the moments of explicit religious of No 5. The coronation sarabande swells reference. So Nos 4, 7–10 & 12 are omitted. grandly up again and the saga ends in Geoffrey acquiesced with an internal (but a sonorous and unequivocal peal of the visible) wince, and after the first performance Monsalvat bells. (But there is an alternative I added a long interlude for the piano alone, close, not heard here: what in 1984 I called the on the lines of the one in Janáček’s The ‘Debussian ending’ – wry, ambiguous, ironic, Diary of One Who Disappeared, reworking teasing, to potentially subvert the grandeur material from the surrounding settings, in in that fashion of his …) compensation and, in part, to tell by music alone what lies between the lines of the The Lovers’ Well, setting most of the cycle poems. I hope he liked it well enough to entitled by its poet Geoffrey Hill ‘The Pentecost forgive me! Castle’, was written to a commission from Emmanuel, Hill’s Cambridge college, to © 2018 Robin Holloway mark in 1981 the 400th anniversary of its Texts

1 The Zodiac Song Three Songs to poems by Edmund Waller

Aries Sagittarius 2 On a Girdle Small is the worth Horn for weapon and wool for shield: Numb the finger, narrow the mark: Of beauty from the light retired: That which her slender waist confined Windy weather and lambs afield. Frost on the feather and flight in the dark. Bid her come forth, Shall now my joyful temples bind; Suffer herself to be desired, Taurus Capricorn No monarch but would give his crown, And not blush so to be admired. Head in the sunshine, hoof in the hay Capricorn, Capricorn, His arms might do what this has done. Toss the last of the clouds away. Cowardly heart and crumpled horn. Then die – that she It was my Heav’n’s extremest sphere, The common fate of all things rare Gemini Aquarius The pale which held that lovely deer, Double in leaf and double in light, Snow to flicker or rain to fall: May read in thee: My joy, my grief, my hope, my love Flowers by day and stars by night. Down with thy pitcher and out with it all. How small a part of time they share Did all within this circle move. That are so wondrous sweet and fair. Cancer Pisces A narrow ! and yet there Cancer, cancer, crooked and black: Fish, fish, little fish lying head to tail; Dwelt all that’s good, and all that’s fair; 4 Old Age Answer us, answer us – Forward or back? All daisies round the dish, and a pearl on Give me but what this ribbon bound, ev’ry scale. The seas are quiet when the winds give o’er; Leo Take all the rest the sun goes round! Fierce at eve, at morning tame Envoi So calm are we when passions are no more. For then we know how vain it was to boast Crest of cloud and claws of fame. Signs of the Zodiac, linked like a necklace, 3 Go, lovely Rose Marking the seasons, Of fleeting things, so certain to be lost. Virgo Go, lovely Rose – Clouds of affection from our younger eyes Sickle in hand, sandal on feet, Charting the heavens: Moulding and fusing the body and the soul: Tell her that wastes her time and me, Conceal that emptiness which age descries. Crowned with poppy and swathed with That now she knows, Restore our balance; The soul’s dark cottage, battered and decayed, wheat. When I resemble her to thee, Grant us thy grace. Lets in new light through chinks that Time Libra How sweet and fair she seems to be. hath made: Libra, Libra, truth is treasure: John Ruskin (1819–1900) Tell her that’s young, Stronger by weakness, wiser men become Fair the weight; full the measure. And shuns to have her graces spied, As they draw near to their eternal home. Scorpio That hadst thou sprung Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view Sharp the sting, grand the grief In deserts, where no men abide, That stand upon the threshold of the new. Shiv’ring bough and burning leaf. Thou must have uncommended died. Edmund Waller (1606–1687) Texts

A Medley of Nursery Rhymes and Conundrums

5 Brow bender Oh! but I can’t! Can you plough it with a ram’s horn? But ev’ry dirty sow Eye peeper Oh! but you must! Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. Can get sweethearts enow, Nose dreeper Well, what must be must, And sow it all over with one peppercorn? And I pretty wench can get none. Mouth eater So kiss kiss kiss and away, And you shall be a true lover of mine. Ickle ockle blue bockle … Chin chopper kiss kiss kiss and away, Can you reap it with a sickle of leather? Knock at the door kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss Here am I, Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. Ring the bell Little jumping Joan; And bind it up with a peacock’s feather? Lift up the latch When nobody’s with me 6 Can you make me a cambric shirt? And you shall be a true lover of mine. Walk in I’m all alone. Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. Take a chair When you have done and finished your work, Without any seam or needlework? Ickle ockle blue bockle … Sit by there Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme, And you shall be a true lover of mine. How d’ye do Then come to me for your cambric shirt, I need not your needles they’re This morning? Can you wash it in yonder well? And you shall be a true lover of mine. needless to me, Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. For kneading of needles were needless, Good morning, Father Francis. Where never sprang water nor rain ever fell? you see: Good morning, Missis Sheckleton. 7 In marble halls as white as milk, And you shall be a true lover of mine. But did my neat trousers but need What has brought you abroad so early, Lined with a skin as soft as silk, to be kneed Missis Sheckleton? Can you dry it on yonder thorn? Within a fountain crystal clear I then should have need of your I have come to confess a great sin, Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. A golden apple doth appear. needles indeed. Father Francis. Which never bore blossom since Adam No door is there to this stronghold, What is it, Missis Sheckleton? was born? Yet thieves break in and steal the gold.* Ickle ockle blue bockle … Your cat stole a pound of my butter, And you shall be a true lover of mine. Father Francis. Now you’ve asked me questions three. 8 Ickle ockle blue bockle 9 We are all in the dumps O, no sin at all, Missis Sheckleton. Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. Fishes in the sea, For diamonds are trumps But I killed your cat for it, Father Francis. I hope you’ll answer as many for me, If you want a pretty maid The houses are built without walls; O a very great sin indeed, Missis And you shall be a true lover of mine. Please choose me. The moon’s in a fit Sheckleton, you must do penance. And the babies are bit What penance, Father Francis? Can you find me an acre of land? I am a pretty wench, And the kittens have gone to St Paul’s. Kiss me three times. Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. And I come a great way hence, Oh! but I can’t! Between the salt water and the sea sand? And sweethearts I can get none:

Oh! but you must! And you shall be a true lover of mine. * egg. an … am I Texts

18 The Lovers’ Well

1. 3. 6. 13. They slew by night You watchers on the wall Slowly my heron flies Splendidly-shining darkness upon the road grown old with care pierced by the blade proud citadel of meekness Medina’s pride I too looked from the wall mounting in slow pain likening us our unlikeness Olmedo’s flower I shall look no more strikes the air with its cries majesty of our distress shadows warned him tell us what you saw goes seeking the high rocks emptiness ever thronging not to go the lord I sought to serve where no man can climb untenable belonging not to go caught in the thorn grove where the wild balsam stirs how long until this longing along that road his blood on his brow by the little stream end in unending song weep for your lord you keepers of the wall the rocks the high rocks and soul for soul discover Medina’s pride what friend or enemy are brimming with flowers no strangeness to dissever Olmedo’s flower sets free the cry there love grows and there love and lover keep with lover there in the road of the bell rests and is saved a moment and for ever

2. 5. 11. 14. Down in the orchard Goldfinch and hawk If the night is dark As he is wounded I met my death and the grey aspen tree and the way short I am hurt under the briar rose I have run to the river why do you hold back he bleeds from pride I lie slain mother call me home dearest heart I from my heart I was going the leaves glint in the wind though I may never as he is dying to gather flowers turning their quiet song see you again I shall live my love waited the wings flash and are still touch me I will shiver in grief desiring among the trees I sleep in the shade at the unseen still to grieve down in the orchard when I cried out you the night is so dark as he is living I met my death made no reply the way so short I shall die under the briar rose tonight I shall pass by why do you not break sick of forgiving I lie slain without a sound o my heart such honesty Texts Biographies

19 The Food of Love Edward Rushton studied Born in Bedford, William piano and composition at Vann was a Chorister at King’s 15. Music, when soft voices die, Chetham’s School of Music in College, Cambridge and a I shall go down Vibrates in the memory – Manchester, King’s College, Music Scholar at Bedford to the lovers’ well Odours, when sweet violets sicken, Cambridge and the Royal School. He subsequently and wash this wound Live within the sense they quicken. Scottish Academy of Music read law and took up a choral that will not heal and Drama (now Royal scholarship at Gonville & O world! O life! O time!

© Benjamin Hofer Benjamin © Conservatoire of Scotland). In AllwoodTom © Caius College, Cambridge – beloved soul On whose last steps I climb, his second year in Glasgow, he held the post of where he was taught piano by Peter Uppard what shall you see Trembling at that where I had stood before; Broadwood Junior Fellow in Accompaniment. – and then studied piano accompaniment nothing at all When will return the glory of your prime? In 2001 he graduated with distinction from with Malcolm Martineau and Colin Stone at yet eye to eye No more – oh, never more! Irwin Gage’s masterclass in Lied interpretation the Royal Academy of Music, where he has depths of non-being Out of the day and night at the Zurich University of Applied Arts. He recently been made an Associate. perhaps too clear A joy has taken flight; has taught piano accompaniment at the my desire dying Fresh spring, and summer, autumn, and Musikhochschule Luzern since 2000, and has William is a trustee of the Ralph Vaughan as I desire winter hoar played numerous song recitals with various Williams Society, a Freeman of the Worshipful Move my faint heart with grief, but with singers throughout Europe. In 2015 his love Company of Musicians, co-chairman of Geoffrey Hill (1932–2016), ‘The Pentecost Castle’ (from Tenebrae, 1977). Reproduced by permission delight for Lieder led him to found the company Kensington and Chelsea Music Society, and of Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd No more – oh, never more! Besuch der Lieder (‘The Company of Song’), Artistic Director of Bedford Music Club. He is which aims to further the performance of also Director of Music at the Royal Hospital Rose leaves, when the rose is dead, Lieder in private spaces in Switzerland. His Chelsea, and founder and artistic director of Are heaped for the beloved’s bed; discography includes CDs for Guild, Musiques the London English Song Festival. In April 2019 And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone, Suisses, Musicaphon, BIS, Lyrita and Nimbus he conducts a revival of Parry’s oratorio Judith Love itself shall slumber on. with singers such as Jeannine Hirzel, Robin at the Royal Festival Hall. His discography Both poems by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822); joined by Adams, Sybille Diethelm, Valentin Johannes includes recordings with Albion Records, the composer Gloor and Simon Wallfisch, as well as with Champs Hill Records, Navona Records and the saxophonist Harry White. As a composer, SOMM. Gramophone magazine, reviewing works for voice and piano form a core part of Purer than Pearl, an album of songs by Vaughan his oeuvre. He has already written over thirty Williams, reserved ‘a special word of praise for song-cycles and individual works in this genre. William Vann’s deft pianism’. Biographies

Clare Lloyd-Griffiths read Purcell Room, Luciano Berio’s Sequenza III and Associate Artists for 2016–17 and has at the International Opera Studio of Zurich music at Gonville & Caius Cathy Berberian’s Stripsody for Nonclassical, subsequently worked with many of the Opera. Since then he has sung principal roles College, Cambridge, before Berio’s Folk Songs with the ensemble country’s top ensembles, including Britten at the Staatsoper Nürnberg, Leipzig Opera and furthering her vocal studies at Psappha, a recital entitled DESIRE at Peckham Sinfonia, Ex Cathedra, Tenebrae, Siglo de Oro, Nederlandse Reisopera. the Royal Academy of Music Asylum, and cycling to the most northerly The Hanover Band and the Gabrieli Consort, and the Royal Welsh College inhabited part of the UK to sing Judith Weir’s and in Europe with Le Concert D’Astrée. His true calling is as a concert singer; his of Music & Drama as a Sir King Harald’s Saga in the Shetland Islands’ Recent solo appearances include Bach’s Wigmore Hall debut was broadcast live on Geraint Evans scholar. Her Muckle Flugga lighthouse. Kate also joined B minor Mass at the St Endellion Easter radio in 2017, as was his first appearance at operatic roles include Susanna (Le Nozze di The Prison Choir Project to sing Carmen with Festival, St Matthew Passion at Hampstead Laeiszhalle, Hamburg in 2016. A frequent Figaro), Madame Herz (Der Schauspieldirektor) a chorus of inmates in Dartmoor Prison. She Music Festival, and Handel’s Messiah at guest at Oxford Lieder Festival, the and Adele (Die Fledermaus). A committed teaches singing to choral scholars at both St John’s Smith Square. Forthcoming solo Machynlleth Festival and London Song ensemble singer, Clare is a member of the Gonville & Caius College and St John’s Voices work includes Bach’s Christmas Oratorio in Festival, he and regular duo partner Edward much-admired Solomon’s Knot, whose in Cambridge. Birmingham Town Hall and Handel’s Israel in Rushton have also made several CD recordings innovative performances are given entirely Egypt, again at St John’s Smith Square. together, including an album of songs by from memory and without conductor. She has Kate sings as a regular member of Baroque Geoffrey Bush (on Lyrita) and two anthologies, sung with many other groups including the collective Solomon’s Knot, with performances His operatic roles include Acis in Handel’s From ‘la belle Époque’ to ‘les Années folles’ Gabrieli Consort, The Marian Consort and the including the Bach Weekend at the Barbican Acis and Galatea, Schoolmaster in Janáček’s and Gesänge des Orients (both on Nimbus). BBC Singers, and is a longstanding member of and Bach’s St John Passion at Wigmore Hall. Cunning Little Vixen, Male Chorus in Britten’s the renowned choir of the Brompton Oratory. She appears as soloist in recordings of Giles Rape of Lucretia, and The Madwoman in the As an educator and conductor, Simon is a Swayne’s Stabat Mater (Naxos), Strauss’s same composer’s Curlew River. Other projects lecturer at the University of West London Kate Symonds-Joy Deutsche Motette (Delphian DCD34124), Villa- include recording and performing a new piece (London College of Music), has worked graduated with a first-class Lobos’s Magnificat-Alleluia (Romaria: choral by David Matthews with the Kreutzer , extensively with Aldeburgh Young Musicians, degree in music from Gonville music from Brazil; DCD34147) and Bach’s and singing Brahms’s Zigeunerlieder with The and on the invitation of Murray Perahia has & Caius College, Cambridge B minor Mass (Sir John Eliot Gardiner/SDG). Prince Consort at the Wigmore Hall. given vocal masterclasses at Jerusalem Music and a DipRAM from the Royal Centre, Israel. In 2018 he was music director of Academy Opera course. As James Robinson recently Simon Wallfisch studied ‘Labor Europa’ at the Hochschule für Musik in a concert soloist she has graduated from the cello and singing at the Royal Osnabrück. He is a trustee of the International sung Bach in Sydney Opera Guildhall School of Music College of Music, London Centre for Suppressed Music. House and at the Aldeburgh Festival, Handel & Drama, having taken his between 2000 and 2006, with Bordeaux Opera and at Symphony Hall, undergraduate degree in before completing his vocal Birmingham, Mahler at Cadogan Hall and Verdi music at Gonville & Caius studies in Berlin and Leipzig. at the Royal Albert Hall. Recital appearances College, Cambridge. He was Between 2009 and 2011 he include Ravel’s Chansons madécasses at the named one of Tenebrae’s was engaged as a young artist Also available on Delphian

Romaria: choral music from Brazil Into this World this Day did Come: carols contemporary & medieval Kate Symonds-Joy mezzo-soprano, Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge / Geoffrey Webber Cambridge / Geoffrey Webber DCD34075 DCD34147 A typically intriguing and unusual programme from this choir, combining ‘Romaria’, a word suggesting pilgrimage, crowds, and processions, English works from the twelfth to the sixteenth centuries with evokes much of what is special and distinctive about modern Brazil – its medievally inspired carols by some of our finest living composers. From mix of people, its extraordinary vibrancy, its faith. Geoffrey Webber and his the plangent innocence of William Sweeney’s The Innumerable Christ to ever-adventurous choir sing both sacred and secular works dating from the the shining antiphony of Burrell’s Creator of the Stars of Night, this 1950s through to the present, in a programme developed in conjunction selection will seduce and enchant. The choral singing combines polish with experts from the University of São Paulo’s music department. with verve, and director Geoffrey Webber’s meticulous attention to detail is floodlit by the acoustics of St Anne’s Cathedral, Belfast. ‘Performances are consistently stunning. Diction is impeccable, and the whole packs an exhilarating, very un-English punch. Magical, ‘stunning … an unflinching modern sound with an irresistible spiritual and magnificently recorded’ — The Arts Desk, May 2015 dimension’ — Norman Lebrecht, www.scena.org, December 2009

Deutsche Motette: German Romantic choral music Julian Anderson: Choral Music from Schubert to Strauss Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge / Geoffrey Webber The Choirs of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge and of King’s DCD34202 College London; Geoffrey Webber & David Trendell conductors ‘The desire to evoke the sensation of light was one reason why I became a DCD34124 composer,’ says Julian Anderson. Silver-bright and brilliantly focused, the Delphian’s superchoir reunites after its highly successful recording of Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge is ideally equipped for this Rodion Shchedrin’s The Sealed Angel (Delphian DCD34067). Richard first recording devoted entirely to Anderson’s choral music. From the Strauss’s sumptuous Deutsche Motette is the last word in late Romantic intimacy of the wedding anthem My beloved spake and ringing clarity of choral opulence, its teeming brought to thrilling life by this Bell Mass, to the virtuosic second of the Four American Choruses and the virtuoso cast of over sixty singers. It heads a programme designed to extraordinary sound-world conjured by the Nunc dimittis, commissioned explore the vivid colours and shadowy half-lights of a distinctly German specially with this recording project in view, Geoffrey Webber’s singers music that reached its culmination in Strauss’s extravagant masterpiece. lived with this music over a period of around two years before committing The singing throughout combines a musical intensity and imagination it to disc, and their deep sympathy for its marriage of immaculate with an understanding of period style. technique with emotional directness is evident throughout. ‘Credit to conductor David Trendell for eliciting that sustained intensity ‘reverberates with the richly coloured environments of stained glass, of expression from his combined college choirs, whose youthful timbre pealing bells and architectural symmetry … Tremendously imparts a freshness which … suits the imprecatory nature of Rückert’s rewarding’ poem perfectly’ — BBC Music Magazine, August 2013 — Gramophone, September 2018 Also available on Delphian

Judith Weir: Choral Music Howard Skempton: The Cloths of Heaven Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge / Geoffrey Webber The Exon Singers / Matthew Owens DCD34095 DCD34056 This first recording devoted entirely to Judith Weir’s choral music Best known as a composer of exquisitely quirky miniatures for solo comprises her complete works to date for unaccompanied choir or choir piano or accordion, Howard Skempton has in recent years developed with one instrument (trombone and marimba as well as the more usual an equally strong affinity for the choral medium. The Exon Singers’ organ). Tracking her evolving relationship with the medium from her programme includes a new Missa brevis composed especially for this earliest liturgical commission to the most recent, premiered in 2009, recording, alongside songs and shorter choral and organ pieces it also includes several secular pieces and her two solo organ works, surveying Skempton’s output over the past quarter-century. which are now established classics of the repertoire. ‘elegance of line and economy of means … a sound-world whose ‘The freshness and precision of Weir’s writing is perfectly matched by individuality and expressive beauty is revealed to memorable effect’ the well-tuned, clearly articulated singing’ — Yorkshire Post, August 2008 — BBC Music Magazine, December 2011, CHORAL & SONG CHOICE

Gavin Bryars: The Church Closest to the Sea Buxton Orr: Songs Mr McFall’s Chamber Nicky Spence tenor, Jordan Black clarinet, Nikita Naumov double bass, DCD34058 members of the Edinburgh Quartet, Iain Burnside piano DCD34175 The double bass has always been close to Gavin Bryars’ heart. His own instrument, it has also featured strongly in his music for other players – When Nicky Spence was first shown the score to ‘The Boy in the Train’, as in The Church Closest to the Sea, written for Mr McFall’s Chamber the last of Buxton Orr’s Songs of a Childhood, he was transported to the and their bassist Rick Standley. Voices, meanwhile, are a more recent late 1980s – his own childhood in Scotland. ‘Something about Buxton’s concern, displayed here in typically understated settings of Petrarch sense of humour, excitement and honesty resonated with me,’ Spence translations by the Irish playwright J.M. Synge. Bryars’ music straddles says, ‘and fed my desire to discover more about his work. On contacting worlds: classical and jazz, composition and improvisation, the works on his widow, I was led to a treasure trove of unrecorded works for this disc moving between the lushly sensuous and the coolly laid-back voice.’ Sometimes thrillingly complex and always beautiful, and given as they meditate on geographical and emotional borderlands. character and verve by Orr’s delightful setting of the Scots language, this rich body of work has finally found a worthy modern-day advocate. ‘deceptively simple sounds whose complexity is revealed in the aftertaste ... jazz riffs on the double bass against a distinctly Caledonian ‘A revelation. Imagine a gentler, quirkier Britten with dabblings in drone, hypnotic and insistent. Whenever I hear Bryars’ music, I want to twelve-tone technique and old Scots poems set to generous vocal lines hear more’ and off-piste instrumentation … Spence sounds terrific throughout – — Norman Lebrecht, www.scena.org, November 2009 nimble, direct, deftly playful and expressive with the text’ — The Guardian, March 2017 DCD34216