Members of the British
Music Society may well remember Brian
Daubney who was for some time Chairman
of the Society and Editor of the newsletter.
He was and remains a dedicated champion
of the music of Benjamin Burrows with
whom he studied. Long-standing members
of the Society may also know him as
a composer since a handful of his songs
had been recorded during the early pioneering
years of the BMS (BMS 403 - cassette
only). Since the time of his professional
retirement in 1997, Brian Daubney resumed
his composing career and composed a
huge quantity of songs with remarkable
regularity and consistency. Incidentally,
the Society’s archives hold a considerable
number of volumes of his songs, no less
than twelve at the time of writing,
as well as other material.
This brand new release
includes seventeen songs written between
1999 and 2004, which give a good idea
of Daubney’s "late flowering",
to quote Stan Meares’ phrase. Incidentally
I am much indebted to Stan for providing
me with some factual information concerning
Brian’s songs. The thirty songs recorded
here are all fairly recent, composed
between 1992 and 2004, with the exception
of John Anderson, my Jo
(words by Robert Burns) and She
hath an Art (words by Thomas
Campion) that date from the late 1950s.
His literary sources are quite varied,
from fairly well-known to some less
familiar writers and poems. Over recent
years, he has composed quite a number
of songs to words by the American writer
Theodora Goss (born 1968) and by John
Alan Davis (born 1929); but a quick
glance at the names of the writers reveals
wide-ranging interest with settings
to words by Keats, Yeats, Hardy, Betjeman,
Charlotte Brontë and Randall Swingler
to name but a few. The variety of literary
sources ensures a remarkable variety
in musical settings avoiding any monotony
which may often be the main shortcoming
of song recitals.
The comparatively early
She hath an Art delightfully
nods towards Warlock. I can imagine
Brian’s eyes blinking with malice when
writing this, whereas The
Lent Lily and March
(both to Housman’s words) bring John
Ireland to mind, and none the worse
for that. Other songs have an appropriately
folk-like tone, such as John Anderson,
my Jo and The Fiddler
of Dooney (to words by Yeats)
or the very beautiful Yeats setting
The Lake Isle of
Innisfree that sometimes brings
Moeran to mind. Theodora Goss’s words,
by turns deeply-felt and mildly ironic,
find Daubney responding with equally
vivid and eloquent tones. His setting
of The Singer is one of
finest here, very contrasted: declamatory,
at times overtly dramatic and beautifully
lyrical.
John Alan Davis’s poems,
too, obviously mean a great deal to
Daubney, and some of the Davis settings
are among the finest things in this
recital. I particularly like I
must go and sleep,
the mildly ironic October Roses
and Resurrection Spiritual,
the latter alluding – both in text and
music – to some exalted American Allelujah-shouting
preachers, again with tongue-in-cheek
irony.
Brian Daubney is not
afraid to set words that have been regularly
used by generations of composers, such
as poems by Housman (The Lent Lily)
and Hardy, including Lyonnesse
set by Gerald Finzi and by the Irish-born
Gerard Victory, or Yeats (e.g. The
Cloths of Heaven). However,
settings of lesser-known poems also
feature here, such as the deceptively
simple but deeply moving On the
Death of Anne Brontë (words
by Charlotte Brontë) and the very
fine Absence to words
by Charlotte Mew, a name new to me.
I was very happy to hear A Rose
for Lidice to
Swingler’s words again. This song was
among the finalists of the 2002 Golden
Jubilee Song Composers’ Competition.
I suppose that some know Rawsthorne’s
beautiful choral setting of this utterly
moving text, but Daubney’s own setting
is equally moving for all its apparent
simplicity.
It would be idle on
my part to go into detail about each
of these thirty songs. They are all
very fine, each one bringing off some
facet of Daubney’s music-making. At
the risk of repeating myself, I will
say again that there is much variety
here as far as literary sources and
settings are concerned and much to relish.
Daubney’s songs may not add anything
new to the long British tradition of
song-writing, to which they clearly
belong, but they certainly breathe fresh
air into it.
Both singers obviously
enjoy these songs and are superbly partnered
by John Talbot, who again proves a very
attentive accompanist. The recorded
sound is very fine too, with some nicely
natural piano sound and the voices not
too close. In short, a most welcome
release.
Hubert Culot
Anna Dennis (soprano)b; William
Berger (baritone)a; John Talbot (piano)
for
details
