STARS OF ENGLISH ORATORIO
Various artists
Recorded 1928-1949 (Vol.1), 1926-1949 (Vol.2)
DUTTON CDLX 7025 (Vol.1) [77' 05"] CDLX 7029 (Vol.2) [76' 07"]
Crotchet
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Crotchet
Amazon
UK
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Dutton Laboratories are performing a fine service in remastering 78rpm discs
to a consistently high standard (they are not alone but they are among the
leaders). Quality is superb, a minimum of (if any) hiss in this post-acoustic
recording era, the standard of singing revelatory and a reminder of what
and how it was done and what is often sadly lacking today. Diction is of
the highest order, authenticity virtually non-existent. If composers from
the past could collect copyright fees Handel would have made a pretty packet
from these two discs, the rest featured to a far lesser degree are Bach,
Haydn, Mendelssohn, Rossini, Elgar, Sullivan, Dvorak and Verdi (though only
single examples of the last five). But that pretty well sums up the performance
of practice in the field of oratorio in the 1930s and 1940s, Handel continuing
to predominate as he had since the mid 19th century.
This reviewer is currently writing a history of the music agents Ibbs and
Tillett, a firm who for the greater part of the 20th century provided
choral societies and music clubs up and down the country with soloists for
their song recitals or performances of oratorios. On a Friday night at Crewe
station you might well have spotted Isobel Baillie, Muriel Brunskill, Heddle
Nash and Norman Allin meeting up with Elsie Suddaby, Mary Jarred, Walter
Widdop and Harold Williams as one quartet changed trains on their way to
Liverpool or Manchester whilst the other one did so on their journey southbound
to Birminhgham or Bristol for performances say of Elijah or
Messiah. It might sound fanciful but it illustrates the quality around
and their lifestyles as performers. On these CDs Baillie gets deserved prominence
for her wonderful, bright singing, so does Heddle Nash for his heroic timbre,
even if Maurice Miles proves a rather unhelpful accompanist by taking a tempo
in 'Ev'ry valley' from Messiah, which Nash's florid singing cannot
sustain. But all falls into place when the sublime sounds of Kathleen Ferrier
creep in with Mendelssohn's Elijah. Her pianissimo will set the hairs
on your neck a-tingling in the recitative 'Woe unto them', and that's before
she even begins her divine singing of 'O rest in the Lord'.
Sargent's conducting and his choice of edition of Handel's Judas
Maccabaeus show how long 19th century orchestrations lasted
well into the second half of the 20th, but neither Baillie nor
Nash has trouble riding the thick orchestral textures which result. Pronunciation
will probably appear mannered to listeners today, some examples include words
ending in '-ed' treated as a syllable, '-tion' becomes very '-shon', '-ious'
is '-ioss' as in 'glorious' (listen out for some of these in the superb baritone
of Keith Falkner's singing), 'r's are often 'rr's and also sounded at ended
of words such as 'valour' or in the middle as in 'alarm'. Close miking tends
to exaggerate all such details as well as emphasising the sheer physical
effort involved in singing, but none of this detracts from any of the
performances. Appoggiaturas and ornamentationare absent, the result rather
bald compared to present day practice, portamento (some would describe it
as scooping) abounds, continuo is often assigned to piano or harp rather
than harpsichord.
Florence Austral (the only artist with choral as well as orchestral support)
bridges oratorio and opera with her superb rendition of the 'Inflammatus'
from Rossini's Stabat Mater under Barbirolli (ROH 1928), while her
sense of line, breath control and top notes make compelling listening in
'The night is calm' from Sullivan's Golden Legend, a work in need
of revival. But speaking of top notes (but in this next instance ones which,
having soared, then float) Vol.1 ends with the renownedly memorable 'Sun
goeth down' from Elgar's The Kingdom in an unforgettable rendition
(in 1947) by, once again Baillie, who sang it with the authority of one who
did so under the composer. In the same extract Sargent reminds us he is not
an Elgarian to be forgotten.
Baillie also begins the
second volume, this time accompanied by the
organist Bertram Harrison at London's Kingsway
Hall in October 1943 singing a flawless 'Be
thou with me' and followed by the mezzo Marjorie
Thomas in a warm account (1949) of 'Slumber
beloved' from the Christmas Oratorio
(complete with harp). After more from the
excellent Heddle Nash, Baillie's great rival
Elsie Suddaby is represented by a chirpily
sung 'Rejoice' from Messiah (Handel
continues to dominate this cd in nine of the
fourteen tracks), whilst Gladys Ripley, like
Ferrier doomed to an early death from cancer,
excels in 'He shall feed his flock' from the
same work. The Northern (Darlington)soprano
Ada Alsop (another Ibbs and Tillett artist)
did not have a long career, a hard fact to
grasp judging by the purity of her sound in
'I know that my Redeemer liveth'. Between
1930 and 1949 there was a quantum leap in
both sound quality and the standard of orchestral
playing. While either might not have been
so good in the particular choice of a 1930
recording of Norman Allin's singing of an
aria from Samson, his performance is
nevertheless both robust and the words crystal
clear. Curiously this is billed on the box's
contents list as accompanied by W T Best at
the piano, whereas the version heard is orchestral
and therefore uncredited.
One assumes that Schwarzkopf earns a place among 'Stars of English Oratorio'
in view of her singing in English (more Handel in the shape of 'Sweet bird'
from L'Allegro ed il Penseroso) accompanied by Josef Krips and the
Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. It is interesting for being early (1946)
Schwarzkopf and for the opportunity to compare her style with those of Baillie,
Suddaby and Alsop. She sings an accomplished duo with the bird-flute, but
the tempo is rather laboured (on the whole tempi are not so vastly different
on both discs from what we are used to today, leaving aside the Norringtons,
Gardiners and Hogwoods of this world). The final bars remain in the memory
for sheer power and intensity. For a smooth legato line and controlled placement
of top notes you cannot do better than listen to Heddle Nash once again,
this time in a lusciously sensual account of 'Love in her eyes' from Acis
and Galatea. At the top his uniquely identifiable voice often threatens
to slip into falsetto, but never quite does so in a way which is always
captivating.
Peter Dawson, whose staggering recording career of fifty years spanned acoustic,
electric, LP mono and stereo records, is another model of diction in a sparkling
1927 account (with plenty of 'rr's) in 'O ruddier than the cherry' despite
rather rough and ready orchestral accompaniment in which a distant piccolo
has rather a good time of it. A year earlier and the imposing Robert Radford,
with a voice of immense power and dark quality akin to the Russian Chaliapin,
excels on and below the stave but there are signs of strain both in controlling
descending scales and sustaining Ds above the stave, but it's worth it for
his D two octaves lower at the end of the recitative to depict the crawling
worm, which, though not written, all those basses who can, go down to. As
with the Austral excerpt in the first volume, there's a quasi-operatic extract
from the choral repertoire, in this case the little-known but Italianate
and virile sounding tenor John McHugh in the 'Ingemisco' from Verdi's Requiem.
Like a bookend, Isobel Baillie who began with Bach now concludes the cd with
an unusual choice, an aria from Dvorak's The Spectre's Bride, hauntingly
beautiful to the last.
For those interested in the rich heritage of British oratorio singing, and
even more so for those who know nothing about it yet, these revelatory discs
are vital to own.
Christopher Fifield
Performance 
Recording
