Roderick Williams, Susie Allan - A Birthday Garland (2024) [Hi-Res]

Tracklist

01. The Splendour Falls
02. 5 Songs: No. 3, Fortune and Her Wheel
03. Linden Lea
04. Chanson écossaise, M.A 12
05. 12 Schottische Volkslieder: No. 6, O sahst du den Vater?
06. Down by the Salley Gardens
07. 2 Welsh Folk Songs: No. 1, Jim Cro
08. Folk Songs from Sussex: No. 9, Roving in the Dew
09. Darest Thou Now, O Soul, H. 72
10. A Last Invocation
11. Reconciliation
12. 3 Poems by Walt Whitman: No. 2, A Clear Midnight
13. Songs of Faith, Op. 97: No. 6, Joy, Shipmate, Joy!
14. 4 Baritone Songs, Op. 4b: No. 4, The Pulley
15. 5 Mystical Songs: No. 4, The Call
16. 2 Poems by Seumas O'Sullivan: No. 1, The Twilight People
17. 5 Songs, Op. 2: No. 4, The Sorrow of Love
18. 4 Shakespeare Songs: No. 2, The Wind and the Rain
19. English Lyrics, Set 6: No. 6, Under the Greenwood Tree
20. 7 Shakespeare Songs: No. 7, Take, O Take Those Lips Away
22. Let Us Garlands Bring, Op. 18: No. 2, Who Is Silvia?
23. Songs of Travel: No. 9, I Have Trod the Upward and the Downward Slope
24. 4 Last Songs: No. 4, Menelaus
25. A Square and Candle-Lighted Boat: No. 1, Bedroom Dawn
26. A Square and Candle-Lighted Boat: No. 2, The Coast. Norfolk
27. A Square and Candle-Lighted Boat: No. 3, Bicker's Cottage
28. A Square and Candle-Lighted Boat: No. 4, The Country Bedroom
29. A Square and Candle-Lighted Boat: No. 5, Waking in the Attic Bedroom
30. The Shepherd

SOMM RECORDINGS is delighted to announce Vaughan Williams – A Birthday Garland, a recording of baritone Roderick Williams and pianist Susie Allan’s popular 2022 concert tribute to Ralph Vaughan Williams originally marking the 150th anniversary of the composer’s birth.

Curating a “fantasy birthday party concert” in tribute to “the grand-daddy of 20th-century English song”, Williams has assembled pieces by RVW and 18 fellow composers. The result is a wide-ranging celebration of the rich variety of English song over a century and more that pays tribute to Vaughan Williams’ influence with songs inspired by poets ranging from Shakespeare and Tennyson to W.B. Yeats and Walt Whitman.

First recordings include Herbert Howell’s The Sorrow of Love, a setting of the Irish poet Seamus O’Sullivan; Sarah Cattley’s A Square and Candle-lighted Boat, treating verses by RVW’s cousin, Frances Cornford; and Roderick Williams’ own distinctive take on William Blake’s The Shepherd.

The 30-song recital includes songs by RVW’s teachers (Stanford, Parry, Wood, Bruch, Ravel), friends (Holst, Gurney, Howells, Butterworth, Finzi and others), and pupils (Grace Williams, Ina Boyle, Ruth Gipps, Elizabeth Maconchy and Madeleine Dring). Vaughan Williams’ biographer Simon Heffer provides authoritative booklet notes.

SOMM’s previous Vaughan Williams releases include the widely acclaimed four-volume Vaughan Williams Live series (SOMM ARIADNE 5016, 5018, 5019-2, 5020); Mark Bebbington and Rebeca Omordia’s “compelling”(International Piano) survey of his Piano Music (SOMMCD 0164); and the “priceless document” (MusicWeb International) coupling the Fifth Symphony and Dona nobis pace (SOMMCD 071).

Roderick Williams and Susie Allan’s previous SOMM releases include Celebrating English Song (SOMMCD 0177), lauded by Gramophone as “a treat”; the Ivor Gurney-focused Severn & Somme (SOMM 057), “strongly recommended” by BBC Music Magazine; and Somervell’s A Shropshire Lad and Maud (SOMMCD 0615), “performances of much beauty, empathy and sensitivity” (British Music Society).

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