This tremendously enjoyable recital provided the chance to hear two
singers at what night be termed opposite ends of their careers; Walker
must surely be into the last decade of hers, although her skill as a
recitalist remains undiminished, and Lemalu is in the first few years
of what will surely be a great one. This is the third time this season
that I have heard this 26 – year old bass – baritone, and I am even
more convinced that he will have the staying power and versatility to
equal his prodigious natural gifts. This well – planned recital also
allowed us to hear once again the ideally sympathetic accompaniment
of Vignoles, although it must have been an unfamiliar experience for
him to look out onto a hall only about one – third full.
They began with a group of Schumann duets and songs,
beautifully balanced between the lighthearted and the sombre. ‘Schon
Blümelein’ just hit that perfect note of slight naughtiness in
‘Hat’s Blümlein sich geneiget / Mit Freuden hin und her,’ with
both singers performing with delicacy and wit. Walker gave a superb
rendition of the rather macabre ‘Die Kartenlegerin,’ bringing to grim
life every nuance of the tedious reality of the narrator’s existence
and rising to dramatic heights at ‘Nein, die Karten lugen nicht.’
Lemalu had his solo chance to shine with ‘Ständchen,’
and what an ambitious choice that was; with its lilting, rolling accompaniment,
played by Vignoles with such skill and grace, and its fervent phrases,
it’s a wonderful song, but one that places great demands on the singer,
and although Lemalu did not quite rise to the ecstatic high note at
the end of ‘..drum eil’ auch du’ he still managed to fill lines like
‘Liebchen, o komm in die stille Nacht!’ with real passion. His tone
is rich and extremely beautiful, and his stage manner is very pleasing,
with the proper mixture of humility and confidence; my only concern,
from here and elsewhere in the recital, is that he should not be tempted
to do too much; the night before this concert he had been onstage as
Gianni Schicchi, with three earlier performances in the week, and the
jump from Italian opera to Lieder within 24 hours cannot be an easy
one. However, I’m sure the break in the voice at ‘du’ here was almost
entirely down to nerves, and suspect that Lemalu senior, very much in
evidence in the audience, will be able to assist in keeping the hordes
of promoters at bay – for hordes there are, and will be.
In ‘Der Schatzgräber,’ his low notes were stunning,
recalling Quasthoff in terms of security and sonorousness, but the high
ones were not quite perfectly there – a touch of understandable nerves,
again, I’m sure. ‘Abends am Strand’ and ‘Unterm Fenster’ showed both
singers at their best, with the latter an especial delight in terms
of their comic skills and timing. The Brahms group were similarly fine,
with the solemn ‘Die Nonne und der Ritter’ demonstrating Walker’s mastery
of legato and ‘Der Jäger und sein Leibchen’ providing a lusty end
to the first half.
Honegger’s ‘Saluste du Bartas’ began the recital’s
second part, superbly sung and played, with the fourth song, ‘La promenade’
showing how Walker still has the gift of evoking such things as the
atmosphere of a sultry summer’s day. Duparc’s ‘La fuite’ is not often
performed in London, and it does need that touch of the exotic which
is the preserve of very few singers, but Walker and Lemalu managed it,
drawing loud ‘Bravos’ for their wonderful singing of the final ‘Fuyons!
fuyons!’ which was sung entirely with their backs to the audience.
Ibert’s ‘Quatre chansons de Don Quichotte’ found Lemalu
in superb form; perhaps he had shed his nerves by now, or maybe this
music is just perfect for his voice, but he sang them as finely as I’ve
ever heard them sung, rising to the demanding ‘Toujours proche et toujours
lointaine’ of the second part, and giving a most moving account of the
final ‘Chanson de la mort…’ with its sighing conclusion; his French
is excellent, too, with that rare bite in the enunciation. Lemalu had
to turn away to wipe his eyes as the audience enthusiastically applauded
his singing of this; possibly moved by his own performance, or just
glad that he could make his parents so proud – both reactions entirely
proper in the circumstances.
The recital proper ended with four beautiful arrangements
of traditional songs, set with elegance and simplicity by Roger Vignoles.
Lemalu began with ‘Afton Water,’ singing with such directness and sincerity
that he could not fail to move; his phrasing, his lovely, poetic diction
in the refrain ‘Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream’ could
not help but bring Bryn Terfel to mind, and that cannot be other than
a compliment to so young a man at such an early stage of his career.
One of those almost-tangible silences took us smoothly into Sarah Walker’s
intense ‘Early One Morning,’ where she sang those hackneyed words as
though they had just been written, and then we had Lemalu’s tremendous
‘Lowlands’ and finally a most touching ‘The Wind and the Rain’ from
Walker.
A beautifully sung ‘Die Meere’ formed their envoi,
preceded by a rendition of Arne’s ‘Married to a Mermaid’ which even
I enjoyed – Lemalu really let rip with this one, singing lines like
‘Be as happy as you can with your wife, young man, at the bottom of
the deep blue sea’ with genuine relish, and what can one say about Sarah
Walker’s ‘Rule Britannia?’ This was a superb recital, giving us the
unusual combination of a great and established artist, a very young
singer who is already revealing astonishing gifts, and of course accompanying
of the very highest calibre. That it all took place in the crystalline
acoustic, convivial atmosphere and personal warmth of this marvellous
place was an added delight, and I only hope that many more lovers of
song can be (at least temporarily) seduced away from the place at no.
36…W1 to hear music – making such as this.
Melanie Eskenazi
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