Handel: Semele: Where'er you walk

“Beyond a forgivable desire to rehabilitate the Handel tenor, I have tried in this recording to represent one essential but fugitive quality of Handel’s - his protean nature, his ability to recreate himself while remaining essentially the same.” Ian Bostridge

A dramatic collection of solo arias and scenes for tenor drawn for oratorio and opera - some of Handel's most lovely music, brilliantly performed by Mark Padmore and The English Concert, led by Andrew Manze. The concluding duet As steals the morn with soprano Lucy Crowe is an added bonus.

Throughout much of the first half of the previous century, entertainer Harry Lauder was, in the words of Winston Churchill, ‘Scotland’s greatest ever ambassador!’ In the following years, Scotland’s next ‘greatest ever ambassador’ (if not Sean Connery!) must have been Kenneth McKellar, who was born in 1927, the son of a grocer, in the Scottish town of Paisley.

From 1959–60 he recorded a series of Handel arias for Decca, with the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, conducted by Sir Adrian Boult. Some were issued on an EP and later the entire collection was brought out on an LP. In 1961 he went into the recording studios, again with Boult, for more Handel, this time with the LSO and Chorus, to sing the tenor part in Messiah alongside Joan Sutherland, Grace Bumbry and David Ward.

Collected here are all the arias from the first record, supplemented with additional arias from Messiah. ‘Thy rebuke … Behold and see’ was recorded during the Messiah sessions as an alternative take to the soprano version (Joan Sutherland eventually sang it in the complete recording) and never issued on LP (it first appeared as an appendix to the Decca Eloquence reissue of this complete Boult Messiah). ‘Comfort ye … Ev’ry valley’ comes from the earlier Handel Arias sessions, and receives its first international release on CD.

McKellar died, shortly after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, in 2010, while visiting his daughter Jane in the United States. He is buried in Paisley. It is gratifying that his artistry is being rediscovered by a new generation of listeners.

"The most wonderful natural soprano voice you will ever hear." Do not miss it.

Lynda has been singing since she was a young girl and today she has won many prizes and awards in Northern Ireland. She studied music at Queen's University, Belfast where she studied with the late great Irene Sandford. Much in demand as a soloist, Lynda also has been involved with Castleward Opera where she has sung a number of leading roles. She has also featured as guest soprano with the Ulster Orchestra in their series of Christmas Concerts as well as on television in different programmes for the BBC.

I first came across Lynda Barrett when she was singing as part of a choir that I was recording in St.Anne's Cathedral, Belfast. Suddenly in the solo section of an anthem a solo voice shone through that was something rather special and that nearly made me fall off my seat in amazement! It was a wonderful mixture of purity, clarity and beauty that was far removed from the average solo soprano. Not only was this a voice of rare quality but Lynda sang from the heart and not from the head. Here was a God given gift from a very modest lady, which i felt should be heard by a far wider audience. A CD was therefore born...

Lynda has recorded a programme of music that is delightful on the earand one that I feel best conveys the qualities of this superb voice captured for posterity.