Lines Written During A Sleepless Night
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RACHMANINOFF / SIBELIUS / GRIEG / TCHAIKOVSKY / MEDTNER / BRITTEN
Lines Written During A Sleepless Night
Louise Alder (soprano), Joseph Middleton (piano)
[ Chandos / CD ]
Release Date: Friday 7 February 2020
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The soprano Louise Alder has been described as 'the brightest lyric soprano of the younger generation' (The Arts Desk), 'a born actress' (Opera), and as having 'a voice of sparkling beauty' (Gramophone).
In this her debut recording for Chandos, she and her pianist, Joseph Middleton, have devised an unusual but rewarding programme that explores the works of six contrasting composers. As she writes in her booklet note: 'When Joseph suggested making a CD of Russian songs, including Russian composers who set poems in other languages, I jumped at the challenge. The more we discussed the repertoire, the more amazed I was to see how well it fitted with my own family history. In 1916 (the same year that Rachmaninoff composed the Opus 38 songs), huge political unrest forced my great-grandparents and family to flee, shutting up the house in Odessa, travelling 1,687 km north by rail to St Petersburg, and then by sleigh into Finland, through Norway, and back to Britain. It is my pleasure to be able to honour my family's Russian connection with this meandering sleigh ride through Russia, with songs in Russian, French, and German, into Finland, in Swedish, and Norway, in German, back to the UK for a cycle of Britten songs in Russian.'
"Her light lyric soprano is closer to that of Joan Rodgers than to [Vishnevskaya], but her artistry is such that she deploys a wide-ranging colour...With Joseph Middleton her sensitive pianist, Alder is as compelling in poetry of loss and despair as she is in Tchaikovsky's airy Rondel or Grieg's carefree Lauf der Welt, her tone always as lovely as her diction is clear." Sunday Times
"Alder is in glorious voice, her soprano fresh and untethered; the assurance of youth and the doubt born of experience come across equally convincingly. Her high notes gleam, and her words are direct and communicative, whether in Russian, Swedish, German or French. Middleton's playing fills in everything those words can't say, perfectly calibrated to support Alder but huge in its expressive scope." The Guardian Five Stars
"Alder and her marvellously resourceful and imaginative pianist, Joseph Middleton, have devised a strikingly original programme that travels through Russia and Scandinavia with songs both familiar and unfamiliar...She has a beautifully clean, even and shining lyric soprano that projects with crystalline clarity. More than that, she engages emotionally with what she sings, shaping vocal lines with rare sensitivity and a wide range of colours." Daily Telegraph Five Stars
Tracks:
SERGE RACHMANINOFF
Six Songs, Op.38 (1916)
JEAN SIBELIUS
Våren flyktar hastigt, Op.13 No.4 (1891)
Flickan kom ifrån sin älsklings möte, Op.37 No.5 (1901)
Var det en dröm?, Op.37 No.4 (1902)
EDVARD GRIEG
Seks Sange, Op.48 (1884-88)
PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY
Six Mélodies, Op.65 (1888)
NIKOLAI MEDTNER
Mailied, Op.6 No.2 (c.1901-05)
Meeresstille, Op.15 No.7 (1905-07)
BENJAMIN BRITTEN
The Poet's Echo, Op.76 (1965)
