Angels Hide Their Faces

"A well-devised programme sung with exquisite purity and real feeling by one of America's favourite sopranos."
Recording of the Month - Gramophone July 2001

"Upshaw's latest Nonesuch disc,
'Angels Hide Their Faces,' with music by Purcell and Bach, is the very model for an imaginative recital, a recording that is devastatingly beautiful to listen to yet also has a startling dramatic premise. First, to get a listener in the mood for something out of the ordinary, there is the cover--a reproduction of a shocking 1903 painting, "Wounded Angel," by Hugo Simberg, an angel with bandaged head carried on a stretcher by two grim, mean-looking boys in bleak landscape. It illustrates a strange musical program, in which Bach's solo liturgical cantata, "My Heart Swims in Blood," is surrounded by Purcell songs of life, love and blessing.
In her live recitals, Upshaw sometimes enacts the Bach cantata in a dramatic context devised by Peter Sellars. Writhing on the ground, suicidal in the recognition of sensual sin, the soprano gradually hears the call of God and rises to redemption. On the CD, sensual Purcell gives us the before and after, the utter delight in the senses and the calmness of transcendence.
Sounding ever fresh and lively, Upshaw brings to Baroque music the same pure, clean tone that makes her a revelation in Vernon Duke songs, the same range of colors that makes her ideal for composers such as Messiaen or Kaija Saariaho, the same expressivity that makes her a seductive Mozartean. To hear her sing Purcell's "Music for a While," which opens the CD, is to be hooked. Yet in the Bach cantata, she also reveals an arresting dramatic intensity and power.
There is no conductor, just chamber music accompaniment--cellist Myron Lutzke and harpsichordist/organist Arthur Hass are her colleagues for Purcell; an ensemble of seven joins her for Bach--and this serves Upshaw well. Here is an example of what a great American singer, one never afraid to be herself and one who never repeats herself, can do."
**** Four Stars (Top rating) Los Angeles Times

"With her radiant, silvery voice and sure technique, her way of drawing words and music deep within herself and communicating their essence to her listeners, Upshaw proves the star system still can work for artists of her rare intelligence and integrity."
Chicago Tribune