Janice Watson

“The singing is suitably majestic for Nietzsche's vision of mankind's destiny...Hill draws some marvellously expressive playing from the BSO, with soloists – chief among them Alan Opie – in magnificent form.” The Observer, 27th May 2012

“Alan Opie, who has the lion's share of the solo music in the work, is almost Wotan-like in his performances...Andrew Kennedy, Catherine Wyn-Rogers and Janice Watson also offer fine lyrical interpretations of their solo parts...This is a must for any Delius Liebhaber and...a marvellous starting point for anyone new to Delius's unique but compelling art.” Gramophone Magazine, July 2012

“Even if you already have those discs, the excellent line-up of vocal and orchestral forces in this new one is well worth investigating, the Bach Choir on fine form and the four soloists sounding thoroughly immersed in their roles...Hill maintains the inner momentum and points up the essential poetry of the piece.” The Telegraph, 7th June 2012 *****

“David Hill's impressive new recording with his Bach Choir (in the original German) boasts confident, ardent choral singing and orchestral playing, and a string solo team - even if Alan Opie, representing the prophet Zarathustra, perhaps makes his points with too much Wagnerian declamation at the expense of line....But listeners tempted by Naxos's bargain price into exploring this work won't be disappointed.” BBC Music Magazine, July 2012 ****

“splendid modern sound, a thrilling choir and orchestra, and, in David Hill, a conductor no less devoted to Delius than his more celebrated predecessor [Beecham]. His soloists are outstanding: Janice Watson, Catherine Wyn-Rogers and Andrew Kennedy sing with clarity and radiance, but the star is Alan Opie, whose lyrical singing is wonderful.” Sunday Times, 10th June 2012

“Even I, congenitally allergic to Delius’s music and Nietzsche’s writing, can scarce forbear to cheer this stunning recording...it certainly celebrates life, especially in this thrilling performance by the Bach Choir, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and quality soloists” The Times, 16th June 2012 *****

“fresh, finely nuanced singing.” Financial Times, 23rd June 2012

“It's a tribute to David Hill and his musicians and technical team that this rolling wave of joy is exceptionally well caught.” MusicWeb International, August 2012

“Given its length and the understandable prevailing sadness of the music, perhaps it's not surprising that performances are relatively rare, but as this recording...shows, it nevertheless contains moments of ravishing beauty, when it seems as if Dvořák was remembering happier, more tranquil times. It's the suave beauty of the orchestral writing that comes across most vividly from the London Philharmonic under Järvi.” The Guardian, 26th April 2012 ***

“Peter Rose's commanding resonance is full of warmth. Janice Watson floats with a beautiful ease...From an orchestral point of view this performance is a triumph, with flawless playing. The LPO Choir also make an excellently incisive contribution. Jarvi's adoption of flowing (and occasionally brisk) tempi helps to drive the piece on...An interpretation to savour.” Gramophone Magazine, September 2012

“Scintillating pace and quality, with Brian Asawa's classy Oberon and Robert Lloyd's Bottom outstanding. Sylvia McNair's Tytania is beautiful but mannered.” BBC Music Magazine, November 2012 ****

“Everything is heard with great clarity, the sensuousness of Britten's ravishing score, with all its mysterious harmonies and sonorities, is fully realized, action and reaction among the singers are keenly heard...Another plus for the new set is the casting of the lovers with young singers in their early prime.” Gramophone Magazine, December 1996

“These are…engaging performances… in spacious modern sound…” BBC Music Magazine, December 2007 ****

“This is a work that should be done far more often… The clamour of bells, large and small, and of celebration prepare any audience to go out glowing into the snowy night and home.” MusicWeb International

“Hickox and Collegium Musicum 90 are especially fine in the exultant, springing Gloria and the rough-hewn vigour of the Credo… Led by the sweet toned Janice Watson, the soloists sing with a chamber-musical grace and intimacy in the 'Et incarnatus est' and the Benedictus, while their supplicatory tenderness in the 'Dorna nobis pacem' contrasts with the choir's urgent demands for peace.” BBC Music Magazine, February 2008

“Hickox generates the physical and spiritual elation essential to this music, calling to mind Haydn's own much-quoted remark that whenever he praised God his heart leapt with joy. In the glorious Theresienmesse of 1799 Hickox's manner is particularly fine in the exultant, springing Gloria and the rough-hewn vigour of the Credo. He understands, too, the Mass's dramatic and symphonic impetus, bringing a powerful cumulative momentum to the sonataform 'Dona nobis pacem' and thrillingly tightening the screws in the closing pages. The choir is placed forward, though never at the expense of orchestral detail, keenly observed by Hickox. His uncommonly well-integrated solo quartet framed by the sweet-toned Janice Watson and the gentle, mellifluous Stephen Varcoe, sings with a chamber-musical grace and refinement in the 'Et incarnatus est' and the Benedictus. And their supplicatory tenderness in the 'Dona nobis pacem' contrasts arrestingly with the choir's urgent demands for peace.
Hickox also captures the peculiar serenity and innocence of the much earlier Missa brevis SanctiJohannis de Deo, or Little Organ Mass, its intimacy enhanced here by the use of solo strings. A disc guaranteed to refresh the spirit.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Richard Hickox's command of the score...banishes once and for all the idea that the work was a mere appendix to the composer's operatic career: its pacifist theme was a central one to Britten's creative being, and he invested the opera with all the musical richness and textural originality of an unrivalled master of the medium, best expressed here in the playing of the City of London Sinfonia, which is wonderfully alive.” The Telegraph, 14th June 2008

“This excellent recording by Hickox and the City of London Sinfonia conjures shimmering life into oft-ignored episodes of brilliant musical characterisation. The stand-out in a first-class cast is James Gilchrist's Lechmere, full of eager innocence, loyalty and vim.” The Times, 14th June 2008 ****

“Hickox and his cast make the strongest possible case for the opera: Peter Coleman-Wright’s eloquent, idealistic Owen might seem mature casting, but there are fine cameos from Alan Opie (Owen’s tutor), Robin Leggate (the General) and James Gilchrist (Lechmere). Pamela Helen Stephen’s Kate is not as bitchy as Janet Baker’s, Elizabeth Connell’s Miss Wingrave not quite as formidable as Sylvia Fisher’s strident, domineering portrait, but both sing well.” Sunday Times, 8th June 2008

“Hickox's excellent cast boasts some supreme exponents. Hickox draws haunting colours and chordings from his City of London Sinfonia, and the recording is flawlessly presented.” BBC Music Magazine, July 2008 ****

“The new set… becomes the first recording in any medium to do the work full musical and dramatic justice. It should also satisfy the curiosity of those who wonder why its devotees hail Wingrave as Britten's greatest completed opera.” Gramophone Magazine, September 2008

“After experimenting with smaller-scale forms of musical theatre throughout the 1960s, Britten returned to 'grand' opera in Owen Wingrave, based on Henry James's pacifist debate about following the flag or one's conscience. Premiered as a TV commission, Wingrave enjoyed unmerited Cinderella status among Britten's stage works until the recent TV film conducted by Kent Nagano (with Gerald Finley in the title- role – see below) and an innovative stage production by Tim Hopkins at Covent Garden's Linbury Studio in 2007.
Over the years Richard Hickox has used his studio skills to telling effect in the vocal works of Britten. In this new recording following concert performances, Peter Coleman-Wright is most adept at conveying Owen's pain and troubled conscience, the while never giving way to an over-emotionalism untrue to anyone brought up in a soldier's family. Alan Opie, in what is in many ways the beau role of the military tutor Spencer Coyle, achieves both a superb neutrality and an evident empathy with Owen's decision to quit the military life. Robin Leggate avoids caricature (or simple Peter Pears homage) in the small but essential role of the family termagant, General Sir Philip Wingrave. The women are no less characterful, with an especially sympathetic reading of Coyle's wife from Janice Watson.
Throughout Wingrave, Britten's cunning reworking of rhythmic structures and harmonic devices pioneered as early as Peter Grimes reaches a new level of plasticity and sophistication.
The shimmer of orchestral sound – sometimes impressionistic, sometimes Gamelaninfluenced, sometimes wholly percussive – is a still insufficiently appreciated wonder of 1970s operatic writing. The core duets of Coyle/Wingrave, Wingrave/Lechmere and Wingrave/Kate (in which she sets the reluctant soldier the challenge of spending a night alone in the haunted room) are anchored on a sophisticated version of the tonal atonal structures on which Britten had once based The Turn of the Screw. It lends the drama an amazing tensile strength, closely parallel to the Berg operas which Britten wanted to get to know better in the 1930s but was discouraged by his teachers from approaching too closely.
The new set, in Chandos's customary natural comfortable sound, becomes the first recording in any medium to do the work full musical and dramatic justice. It should also satisfy the curiosity of those who wonder why its devotees hail Wingrave as Britten's greatest completed opera.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“this recording advances as a good a case for the opera as anyone could reasonably expect. The cast, headed by Peter Coleman-Wright as the haunted, compromised Owen Wingrave, is strong, and the gallery of English eccentrics/grotesques that make up the extended Wingrave family is vividly depicted.” The Guardian, 6th June 2008 ***

“First-rate atmospheric sound, apt in a ghost story” Penguin Guide, 2010 edition ***

‘A fascinating CD’ (The Recorder)