Feed The Hound - Doggy Tails for Narrator and Basset Horn
Jon Iles (narrator)
Sarah Watts (basset horn)
rec. 2020, Plymouth and Nottingham.
CUILLIN SOUND MUSIC CUILL1007 [63:38]
This album of new works came about as the result of a call for scores written for narrator and basset horn, sent out for and worked on during the Covid19 pandemic. Sarah Watts, well known for her clarinet and bass clarinet activities, had been performing on basset horn in Mozart’s Requiem when lockdown saw a halt to all concert activities. Affectionately known by players as ‘the hound’, the idea arose to add this instrument to an ongoing series of projects, this one having been preceded by Feed the Beast for new music for contrabass clarinet. Money raised by these projects is reserved for charity, and in the case of Feed the Hound £3 from each album sale will go to The Kit Wilson Trust for Animal Welfare.
You might know Sarah Watts’ playing on the Hyperion release The Princess & the Bear (review), and she and John Iles have worked together before on Once Upon A Time There Was A Piece Of Wood (review). Recorded in isolation, Sarah painstakingly edited her solo playing on Feed the Hound with the texts from experienced actor and expert narrator John Iles, and the results literally speak for themselves. There is a bit of everything here, with all kinds of approaches to integrating text with music. You’ll find enigmatic gruffness from the dog in Mike Brown’s A Basset’s Bad Day, and instructive poetry in Núria Bonet’s Ode To The Sausage (Dog). Many, but by no means all, of the texts were written by the composers, and the quality of this content is very high indeed. We have the poignant encounter between Ulysses and his dog Argos in Árgos by Maria Radeschi, and Lauren Redhead’s Þe Cane draws on medieval manuscripts such as Bartholomaeus Anglicus’s ‘De Proprietibus Rerum’. Humour is rarely far away, even with the wistfully unrequited expectations of A Dog Waits for Her Human by Blair Whittington, though Greg Caffrey’s Three Sonnets for Wes defies us not to shed a tear at its conclusion. The composers represented here form a truly international bunch, and a range of accents is demanded of the narrator in David Ward’s Bob. There is even some science fiction in Universe to Universe Report #74 by Colin Johnson. I’m not going to go through each and every track, but there are no weak links anywhere. The music ranges from the lyrical to the dramatic, and while there are some special effects from the basset horn there is nothing to scare off sensitive ears, not even those of our four-legged listeners.
The recordings were made under lockdown conditions so don’t expect spectacular concert-hall acoustics. The balance and matching of the two remotely recorded parts is however very good indeed, with some final mastering done by Simon Paterson. Artwork is by Paula Caffrey, and you get a full track listing and notes from each composer with the download. This is not just an album for dog lovers, though if you have known dogs of one kind or another then you will no doubt find smiles of recognition being raised along the way. As a seasoned reviewer and even more seasoned musician it’s easy for me to say that such imaginative projects are very rare indeed, and of course,
this one is entirely unique. Embrace the feel-good factor of donating to The Kit Wilson Trust, but enjoy even more immersing yourself in the canine menagerie that is Feed the Hound.
Dominy Clements
Contents
Florence Anna MAUNDERS
Your Dog [3:50]
Lauren REDHEAD
Þe Cane [3:19]
Dominy CLEMENTS
Alfie’s Ear [3:35]
Dan DI MAGGIO
An Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog [2:47]
Sarah WATTS
B is for … [2:52]
Núria BONET
Ode To The Sausage (Dog) [3:16]
Blair WHITTINGTON
A Dog Waits For Her Human [2:44]
Sean QUINN
Droop [3:02]
Erin THOMPSON
The Puppy [3:44]
Darragh KELLY
Ms Justine [2:28]
Colin JOHNSON
UNIVERSE TO UNIVERSE REPORT #74 [3:34]
Mike BROWN
A Basset’s Bad Day [2:13]
Janet OATES
Can’t Live With Cats [3:49]
Liz SHARMA
Hounds [3:07]
Maria RADESCHI
Árgos [4:34]
Nick REDFERN
Autumn Encounter [3:54]
David WARD
Bob [4:52]
José Jesus de Azevedo SOUZA
The Basset Hound [3:04]
Greg CAFFREY
Three Sonnets for Wes [4:01]
