I’ve heard and admired James Rutherford in concert a couple
of times in recent months, most recently as an eloquent soloist
in Sea Drift (review)
so the opportunity to hear him in some of the finest English
songs was not to be missed. It’s a little surprising to
see that these recordings have been “in the can”
for nearly four years. Their release now is most welcome.
Rutherford opens his account with the less well-known of George
Butterworth’s sets of Housman songs. Bredon Hill
is the first item on the disc and immediately we hear a firm,
well-focused baritone voice. The tone is full and very pleasing
and the diction is excellent. In fact, these characteristics
will prove to be constants throughout the entire recital. I
particularly appreciated the clarity with which Rutherford enunciates
the words. BIS provide all the texts but, in all honesty, I
found little need to refer to them while listening. Rutherford
displays a keen understanding of the words he is singing and
I liked, for example, the excellent legato that he deploys for
the more melancholy stanzas of this song (stanzas 5 and 6, from
2:13). At the end, the words “I hear you, I will come”
are delivered, quite rightly, as a cry of despair but the emotion
is not overdone.
The remainder of this collection of five songs is equally well
done. The singer’s voice is beautifully controlled and
weighted in the melancholic ‘When the lad for longing
sighs’ to which Eugene Asti contributes some sensitive
piano playing. I admired the control - both technical and emotional
- that James Rutherford brings to ‘With rue my heart is
laden’.
Butterworth’s Six Songs from ‘A Shropshire Lad’,
which are roughly contemporaneous with the Bredon Hill
set are better known and, perhaps, a bit more approachable.
In his useful notes Malcolm MacDonald comments that Butterworth
“perfected a distinctive idiom which suggested folk song
without quotation and scrupulously observed the accentuation
of the poetry.” That’s especially true of Six
Songs from ‘A Shropshire Lad’, I think. I enjoyed
Rutherford’s account of these wonderful, quintessentially
English songs very much, right from the exquisite opening to
‘Loveliest of trees’, which shows off his top register
to fine effect. Though his voice is a large one he can use it
nimbly, as he does in a well-articulated performance of ‘Think
no more, lad’. In ‘The lads in their hundreds’
he shows us how well he understands and can put across the text;
every word is weighted to perfection. As an example of his perceptive
artistry sample - and relish - the wonderful soft head voice
that he employs for the line “And there with the rest
are the lads that will never be old”. The last song, ‘Is
my team ploughing’, presents a real challenge to the singer,
not least from the need to present two very different personalities.
Rutherford uses a marvellously controlled mezza voce
for the dead man’s verses - perhaps he overdoes it very
slightly in stanzas 5 and 7? - in a performance that is technically
superb and which I found very convincing.
During his tragic life Ivor Gurney composed some of the greatest
songs ever penned by an English composer and James Rutherford
has selected some of the very finest from Gurney’s output.
He communicates the aching melancholy of ‘In Flanders’
very well and follows this with ‘Severn Meadows’.
This magnificent song, simple yet sophisticated, is one of the
very few in which Gurney set his own poetry and it’s intensely
moving. Rutherford’s reading of it is very fine, made
all the better by the restraint that he brings to his delivery.
‘By a bierside’, which includes the words that give
this album its title, is one of Gurney’s most ambitious
songs. Rutherford’s account of it is commanding. The last
word in the programme is given to Gurney. His wonderful song,
‘Sleep’, benefits from yet more expertly controlled
singing. Equally admirable is the pianism of Eugene Asti who
demonstrates here, and throughout the programme, fine tone and
a most sensitive touch.
Songs of Travel is a conspicuous success. Rutherford
begins ‘The vagabond’ in an appropriately resolute,
confident frame of mind. However, at the second hearing of the
words “Let the blow fall soon or late” one notices
how accurately he observes the instruction pp parlante.
In the rapturous ‘Let Beauty awake’ Rutherford’s
splendidly even tone and seamless legato give great pleasure
and I love the expressive rubato through which he enhances the
words “Let her wake to the kiss of a tender friend”.
To ‘The roadside fire’ he brings the necessary urgency
yet this is never at the expense of the line and I like the
rhapsodic way he delivers the passage beginning “And this
shall be for music…” However, the success of the
performance is attributable to both artists. One notes,
for example, the excellent rubato in Asti’s playing during
‘Youth and love’; here, and elsewhere, he shapes
the music persuasively and with imagination. Asti excels also
in ‘The infinite shining heaven’, another song where
Rutherford’s excellent vocal control is on display.
I enjoyed every minute of this disc. The standards of performance
and interpretation are consistently high and though most collectors
will have at least one version of most of these songs I’d
urge you to make room on your shelves for James Rutherford’s
stylish and idiomatic performances. The production values are
up to the usual high BIS standards, not least the first rate
sound - I listened to this disc as a conventional CD. The documentation
is also very good - I noticed just one tiny slip in the notes
where a slip of the pen means that the date of RVW’s death
is given as 1957. That apart, this release is blemish-free and
the title of the disc is highly appropriate: it is indeed “most
grand”!
John Quinn
Vaughan Williams
review index
James Rutherford (baritone); Eugene Asti (piano) 
[70:07] 