This compilation was last available domestically on
Belart with an identical catalogue number. The Alto Rhapsody and Nanie
were themselves first issued on Decca in 1967 and Shirley-Quirk’s songs
on Argo in 1971. Their longevity and continued appearance in the catalogue
is entirely due to the unostentatious excellence of the performances
and recordings and to the well balanced and modulated programme, which
makes renewed claims on the attention of the collector in this latest
incarnation in the Australian Eloquence series.
All the performances retain a freshness of inspiration
that are impossible to resist. Maybe the strings are a touch metallic
in the Alto Rhapsody – a fault of the recording I think rather than
the Suisse Romande – but there is rich compensation in the shape of
Ansermet’s acute Brahmsian instincts (both here and in the still undervalued
Nanie he displays a rich palette of gifts). Helen Watts is at all times
technically eloquent and elegantly expressive. The Alto Rhapsody strikes
me as maintaining an inherently honest balance between the exterior
and interior elements of the score. The recital is shared with Shirley-Quirk
and Isepp’s Songs, Opp 121 and 94. The baritone is in splendid voice,
his interpretive skills profoundly impressive in the Four Serious Songs.
In Ich wandte mich he floats his half voice to magical effect,
broadening elsewhere in acts of unselfconscious musicality. In O
Tod, wie bitter bist du there is nothing of the speciously
declamatory or rhetorical about his singing. This is singing from the
inside, from the sinew of the text and score, an art some more pugnacious
singers seldom approach. His baritone is projected with evenness and
with clarity.
A re-release of this kind doesn’t need much reviewing;
this is another opportunity to acquire a recital of integrity, musical
wisdom and deep understanding.
Jonathan Woolf
AVAILABLILITY www.buywell.com
Helen Watts, contralto
with the Choirs of Suisse Romande and Pro Arte de Lausanne and the Orchestre
de la Suisse Romande conducted by Ernest Ansermet (Alto Rhapsody, Nanie)
Recorded 1967