The Complete Vanguard Deller Recordings - Volume 4 Vanguard Classics MC 195 [EM] : Classical Music Reviews

I should begin by reiterating a point I made in a review for another CD set featuring Alfred Deller and his Consort. The level of scholarship surrounding the music of Bach and Handel - and of other composers of this period - has made considerable advances since the 1950s: a plethora of ‘early-music’ ensembles has sprung up, and performances of various degrees of quality, with scholarly understanding applied at a range of points on the gamut from the objectively rigorous to the subjectively selective, has been the result. It would be grossly unfair, therefore, to assess a recording of the 1950s in the light of the musicological advances made since that time, as to do so would be to consider it using a false basis of comparison. The only fair basis for the consideration of such a recording must be its musicality and the extent to which its interpretations serve the composers’ intentions in terms of their emotional impact upon a listener.

Bearing the above points entirely in mind, it grieves me that this set fails convincingly to advocate the music it presents. Leaving aside the carelessness on the part of Vanguard in allowing the set to be issued with the first disc mislabelled (no fault of the artists), many of the performances suffer from a self-conscious worthiness that precludes the sense of life or drama. It is a glaring truism to state that that this was contemporary music at the time of its composition; but one that, nevertheless, bears statement in this context, as these works were, first and foremost, a means of emotional expression, designed to communicate with a listener, whether in a religious or a secular environment. The solemnity and the sense of divinely endowed responsibility that should be inextricably linked to the first part of Handel’s best-known Coronation Anthem, Zadok the Priest (CD 1); the ebullient rejoicing that follows the anointing of Solomon; and the heartfelt acclamation that ensues: these are lacking; in their stead, weak ensemble and a limp sound from the chorus are larded with heavy, earthbound bow-strokes and too-shapeless phrases – there is no sense of lingering, anticipatory excitement as Zadok and Nathan approach the royal throne.

Alexander’s Feast (CD 3 and CD 4) suffers from similar problems. Max Worthley, the tenor soloist, has an exaggerated enunciation that irritates; also, there is no shape afforded to the bass-line, which is, as a result, lacking in direction. The sense of drama, too, is deficient: “Bacchus, ever fair”, for example, is hardly suitably triumphant and heraldic, especially given the text of the preceding recitative.

Certain items of the set, however, are more successful: the voice and lute songs of CD 4 have much more variety of tone-colour, with Deller’s beautiful voice being appropriately modulated with much sympathy shown to the meaning of the text; the organ voluntaries by Matthew Locke of CD 6, too, are executed by Gustav Leonhardt with sensitivity and with appropriate, though never intrusive decoration. The Wenziger Consort of Viols, featured on CD 5, also distinguishes itself with some rhythmically-incisive playing, accurate ensemble, and impressive depth of sound.

Overall, however, this is not an especially good advocate for the music of Bach, Handel and their contemporaries. I can only commend the commitment and devotion of Deller and his colleagues to this music: it is unfortunate that this sense of commitment is not adequately enough conveyed by the manner of its execution throughout the set.

Em Marshall-Luck

Track-listing

CD 1
George Frideric HANDEL
Jephtha – ‘Tis Heaven’s all-ruling pow’r; O spare your daughter; Laud her all ye virgin train
Serse – Ombra mai fù
Orlando – Ah! Stigie larve
L’Allegro, il Pensoroso ed il Moderato – Let me wander
Orlando – Cielo se tu il consenti
Rinaldo – Lascia ch’io pianga
Theodora – Kind Heav’n, if Virtue be thy care; Wide spread his name; Sweet Rose, and Lilly, flow’r Form; To thee thou glorious son of worth
Coronation Anthems – Zadok the Priest; The King shall rejoice; Let thy hand be strengthened

CD 2
George Frideric HANDEL
Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne
Johann Sebastian BACH
Cantata no.170: Vergnügte Ruh’ beliebte Seelenlust

CD 3
George Frideric HANDEL
Alexander’s Feast

CD 4
George Frideric HANDEL
Alexander’s Feast
John DOWLAND
Book of Airs (1597) – Can she excuse my wrongs?
Thomas MORLEY
A Plaine and Easie Introduction to Practicall Musicke – Air for three viols
John BARTLETT
A Book of Ayres (1606) – Of all the birds that I do know
Robert JOHNSON
Fitzwilliam Virginal Book – Alman for Harpsichord
John DOWLAND
Book of Airs (1597) – If my complaints could passions move
John JENKINS
Pavan for four viols
Thomas CAMPION
Rosseter’s Book of Ayres (1601) – I care not for these ladies
John DOWLAND
Air for lute solo: My Lady Hunsdon’s Puffe
Robert PARSONS
Air: Pandolpho
John JENKINS
Fantasia in C for four viols
John DOWLAND
A Pilgrim’s Solace – Air: From silent night
Giles FARNABY
Fitzwilliam Virginal Book – Variations for Harpsichord on ‘Up Tails All’

CD 5
Thomas TALLIS
The Lamentations of Jeremiah the Prophet
ANON (arr. Edmund FELLOWES)
My sweet little darling
ANON (arr. Peter WARLOCK)
Guichardo
William CORKINE (arr. Thurston DART)
What Bootheth Love?
ANON (arr. Peter WARLOCK)
Ah, Silly Poor Joas
Thomas WHYTHORNE (arr. Peter WARLOCK)
Buy New Broom
William BYRD (arr. Edmund FELLOWES)
Elegy on the Death of Thomas Tallis (1585) – Ye Sacred Muses
Psalms, Sonnets and Songs of Sadness and Piety, made into Five Parts (1588) – Lullaby, my sweet little baby
Richard NICHOLSON (arr. Peter WARLOCK)
In a Merry May Morn
Robert PARSONS (arr. Peter WARLOCK)
Pandolpho
William BYRD (arr. Peter LE HURAY and Thurston DART)
Come, Pretty Babe
ANON (arr. Peter WARLOCK)
O Death, Rock me Asleep

CD 6
John BLOW
The Self-Banished
John WELDON
The Nightingale
Johann Sebastian BACH
Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach – Bist du bei mir, BWV508
Matthew LOCKE
Melothsia, 1673 – Voluntary in G
Henry PURCELL
Elegy on the death of Queen Mary, 1695 – The Queen’s Epicedium
Matthew LOCKE
Melothsia, 1673 – Voluntary in F
Pelham HUMFREY
Harmonia Sacra, Book I, 1688 – A Hymn to God the Father
Thomas MORLEY
The First Book of Canzonets to Two Voices, 1595 – Sweet Nymph, Come to thy Lover
Henry PURCELL
Love’s Goddess
Birthday Song for Queen Mary, 1692 – Sweetness of Nature
Robert JONES
A Musicall Dreame or 4^th Book of Airs – Sweet Kate
Thomas MORLEY
Canzonets for Two Voices – Miraculous love’s wounding
I go before, my darling
John BLOW
Amphion Anglicus (London, 1600) – If my Celia could persuade
Ah Heav’n! What is it I hear?
Richard DEERING
Cantica Sacra (London, 1662) – O bone Jesu
Gaudent in coelis
ANON
Fayrfax Manuscript – Ah, My Dear Son

The Deller Vanguard series – An Overview

Volume 1 - Folk Songs and Ballads - 7 CDs + CD-ROM. Includes Tavern songs, Cries of London, English Lute Songs, Folk Songs arr. Vaughan Williams - (Vanguard Classics MC 193)

Volume 2 - Music of Purcell - 6 CDs + CD-ROM - Dido and Aeneas, Saint Cecilia's Day Music, Dioclesian, Come Ye Sons of Art - (Vanguard Classics MC 194)

Volume 3 - Christmas Carols and Motets - 4 CDs + CD-ROM - Motets and Carols from Medieval Europe, Traditional Carols - (Vanguard Classics MC 192)

Volume 4 - Music of Handel, Bach and the Renaissance - 6 CDs + CD-ROM - Alexander's Feast, Coronation Anthems, Bach Cantatas 54 / 170, Elizabethan Music, Tallis Lamentations, William Byrd and his Age (Vanguard Classics MC 195)

Volume 5 - English, French and Italian Madrigals - 6 CDs + CD-ROM - Morley, Wilbye, Weelkes, Gibbons, Guillaume, Jannequin, Di Lasso, Monteverdi (Vanguard Classics MC 196)

Volume 6 - French and Italian Discoveries - 6 CDs + CD-ROM - Sacred and Secular Works By Machaut, Couperin, Lalande, Monteverdi, Scarletti, Schutz. This includes duets with Mark Deller not previously issued (Vanguard Classics MC 197)

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