Roger Palmer News
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2024-04-24
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2024-04-20 09:51:00
A Leeds Songbook and a showcase performance: Leeds Lieder Young Artists 2024
[…] over careful in the vocal writing. The Birdman of Adel Woods by Huw Mears (music) and Susan Darlington (words), performed by Felicitas Wrede (soprano) and Abhisri Chaudhuri (piano), was dark an expressionist in tone, conjuring real atmosphere.Richard's Song by Dawn Walters (music) and Laura Strickland (words), performed by Thomas McGowan (baritone) and Benjamin Collyer (piano), felt very mid-20th century English, attractively lyric and well-written for voice with discreet yet atmospheric piano writing, creating something touching. The Changeling Moss by David Palmer (music) and Lizzie Nolan (words), performed by Laura Coppinger (soprano) accompanied by the composer, featured athletic, quasi-instrumental writing for the voice, impressively performed by Coppinger. The very distinct atmosphere of the piece reflected the poem's tone, but lacked the intriguing sense of irony Lizzie Nolan gave it when she read the poem, also I was unclear whether Palmer had set all the words that Nolan read out to us.With Cheer by Peter Cooper (music) and […]
2024-02-23 08:50:00
Vivid intensity and profound expressivity: Vox Luminis explores the world of the 17th century Italian Stabat Mater at Wigmore Hall
[…] at once and the programme moved between a single voice right through to the ten voices, always one per part.We began with the anonymous lai, sung from the balcony by one of the sopranos. Unaccompanied and intensely personal, this was a very affecting performance with beautifully plangent tone and a striking use of silence. This was followed by Lotti's well-known eight-part Crucifixus. This, in fact, comes from a larger-scale work, a complete Credo and Ben Palmer's 2016 recording with the Syred Consort and Orchestra of St Paul's on Delphian demonstrated that there is much to be said for considering Lotti's complete work [see my review], but the Crucifixus remains a striking and very forward-looking fragment, here sung with great intensity by the vocal ensemble, each voice individually expressive and on the edge.. What is distinctive about the Vox Luminis sound is how they focus on individual intensity rather than blend, a collective […]
2024-02-06 07:30:00
Upload May 28,2022 “Death in Venice was to be Britten’s last full-length opera, first pe
2024-01-30 07:50:00
Back with vengeance: Nina Stemme in Richard Strauss' Elektra at Covent Garden
[…] roles as their voices change, from Chrysothemis to Elektra and finally to Klytämnestra. This latter is, however, a mezzo-soprano role (the first Klytämnestra was a dramatic contralto), but quite often taken by older sopranos like Karita Mattila who has made the move into what Rosalind Plowright calls the 'hags, bags, witches and bitches' repertoire with great dramatic aplomb. Perhaps the lower register rather lacked the resonance that a mezzo-soprano would have brought to it (Felicity Palmer was notable in this role, we saw her in the 2014 BBC Prom with Christina Goerke, see my review). But Mattila made up for it with a thrilling dramatic focus, giving us a sense of over-the-top divadom in the role. Mattila's Klytämnestra had a striking look of Ivana Trump in later life, and her vivid behaviour seemed to tie in with that sort of media personality. Perhaps this Klytämnestra was not the most intensely […]
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