Release Date: 26 September 2011
Label: Albion Records
Packaging Type: Jewel Case
No of Units: 1
Barcode: 5060158190133
Genres: Classical Chamber Music
Description
This Albion recording of Vaughan Williams's own arrangements of carols for voice and piano includes 23 world premières, recorded by Derek Welton and Iain Burnside at Potton Hall, Suffolk in 2011.
Vaughan Williams had begun collecting folk-songs and carols in 1903. He noted down, for example, On Christmas Night in Horsham in 1904, God rest you merry in Cambridgeshire in August 1906 and On Christmas Day in Castleton, Derbyshire in 1908. Such a lifelong devotion to English carols – or 'poems for singing' – reflects the freshness, compassion, nobility and tenderness of these songs. Legends and symbols abound in folk-carols and songs, most noticeably in this Albion collection in Down in yon forest (track 4). With strong poetic imagery, a sense of atmosphere and memorable tunes, carols evoke like nothing else the essential spirit of Christmas.
The Australian-born bass-baritone Derek Welton is considered one of the most promising Wagnerian singers of the younger generation. He has been a soloist at the Deutsche Oper Berlin since 2015. Welton holds degrees in Linguistics and German from the University of Melbourne and Music from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
Iain Burnside is a Scottish classical pianist and accompanist, and a former presenter on BBC Radio 3. Following study at Merton College, Oxford, the Royal Academy of Music and the Chopin Academy, in Warsaw he became a freelance pianist, specialising particularly in song repertoire. He has written a musical play A Soldier and a Maker on the life of Ivor Gurney, premiered in 2012.
Iain Burnside also features on ALB001 Vaughan Williams: The Sky shall be our Roof, ALBCD002 Vaughan Williams: Kissing her Hair, ALBCD013 Vaughan Williams: On Christmas Day, ALBCD015 Vaughan Williams: The Sons of the Morning and ALBCD018 Vaughan Williams: Stars of the Night.
Reviews
This excellent CD assembles 20 of Vaughan Williams's own carol arrangements, with six folk songs for measure. The soloist is the young Derek Welton, whose manly, oaken baritone is offset by Iain Burnside's superbly supportive accompaniments. The 'Twelve Apostles' and 'The Truth sent from above' are particular highlights of this disc, but every track has something to offer.
Highly recommended. --BBC Music Magazine, December 2011 - Performance ***** Recording *****
Welton is an excellent singer, his vibrant baritone perfect for the swaggering nature of some of the songs, while he can scale down tenderly for others. --International Record Review, December 2011
Vaughan Williams is the focus on a disc spanning his Eight Traditional English Carols, the Six Studies in English Folk Songs and the Twelve Traditional Carols from Herefordshire. Attractively performed by the Australian baritone Derek Welton and the pianist Iain Burnside, the programme makes for an evocative vista of bygone Christmas times. --Sunday Telegraph, December 2011
Tracklisting
Tredegar Town Band, Ross Knight, Ian Porthouse, Martyn Brabbins
Alessandro Fisher, William Vann, The Navarra Quartet
Adrian Sims & Alan Rowlands
David Briggs
Chapel Choir Of The Royal Hospital, Joshua Ryan & William Vann
Timothy West, Samuel West, Mary Bevan, Sophie Bevan, Choir Of Clare College, Cambridge, Britten Sin
Various
David Welton & Iain Burnside
Karolos
The Counterpoints
Narratio Quartet
Danbi Um; Juho Pohjonen
Engegard Quartet, NyNorsk Messingkvintett
Flute Alors
Louise Bessette
Jonas Batstrand, Jorn Fossheim
