Prices shown exclude VAT. (UK tax is not payable for deliveries to United States.)
See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | A Song For AnythingSongs by Charles Ives
“These songs, drawn from Ives's 200, can encourage at one extreme a rough declamatory style and at the other an almost voiceless intimacy.
Without in any way underplaying, Finlay is always essentially a singer – his tone and command of the singing line are a pleasure in themselves. But he also has the absolute mastery of the composer's idioms and, with Julius Drake, his fearless and totally committed pianist, the technical, virtuosic skills to realise his intentions with (amid all the quirks) complete conviction of naturalness.
This is a selection that very satisfactorily balances early and late, rumbustious and contemplative.
Several of the early German settings are included, always beautiful and always develop- ing with some touch that is entirely personal. Of a quite distinctive beauty are those like Remembrance, Berceuse, and The Housatonic at Stockbridge where voice and piano work a dreamy, misty spell. And still more characteristic are the settings of his own verses evoking memories of childhood. The 'character' songs (such as Charlie Rutlage) and the 'big' numbers (GeneralWilliam Booth Enters into Heaven) become less prominent than they commonly seem in a recital group where they are programmed as an effective tour de force. The total impression is of an astonishing individuality and, more importantly, of a completely honest, dauntless and increasingly to be valued musical identity.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010 “The Canadian baritone Gerald Finley has a voice of great beauty, but it's always under the control of his penetrating intelligence: he risks bending pitches for expressive effect, and he adapts his golden timbre and almost English diction to the childlike tones of The Greatest Man and the cowboy drawl of Charlie Rutlage. Julius Drake is an equally versatile pianist, adept alike in simplicity and complexity.” BBC Music Magazine, September 2005 ***** | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Ives - Songs Volume 2
Janna Baty, Lielle Berman, Heather Buck, Jennifer Casey Cabot, Michael Cavalieri, Robert Gardner, Sara Jakubiak, Sumi Kittelberger, Tamara Mumford, Mary Phillips, David Pittsinger, Matthew Plenk, Kenneth Tarver, Tenor, Leah Wool, Frederick Teardo, Eric Trudel, Laura Garritson, J.J. Penna & Douglas Dickson Charles Ives wrote almost two hundred songs. Although his reputation rests on orchestral, chamber and piano music, it is Ives's songs that represent the heart of his creative thinking. The expressive variety encountered is accordingly vast: indeed, the gradual evolution of Ives’s songwriting is analogous to the wider evolution of American music during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This new edition includes all the songs that Ives completed. The alphabetic approach ensures that each volume (of which this disc is the first of six) contains a representative cross-section “Tackling the huge Ives songbook alphabetically gives us welcome variety. Anyone seriously interested in Ives warts-and-all will want to be on board for this series.” Gramophone Magazine, October 2008 “These songs, with all their quirks and flights of fantasy, [are] among the most important of the 20th century in any language.” The Guardian | | | (also available to download from $6.00) | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. (Available now to download.) |
|
|
| |
|
