RECORDING OF THE MONTH     CHOPIN Waltzes and Impromptus Vladimir Feltsman £11 post free World-wide VIVALDI The four seasons London Mozart Players/Juritz £12 post free World-wide BEETHOVEN Symphonies 4 and 5 LSO/Yondani Butt £12 post free World-wide

BUY NOW  Crotchet   AmazonUK   AmazonUS

Gerald FINZI (1901-1956) Song Cycles Farewell to Arms (mid 1920s and 1944) A Young Man’s Exhortation Op.14 (1926-29) Till Earth Outwears Op.19a (1927-56) Oh Fair To See (1929-56) Richard Brunner (tenor) Laurene Lisovich (piano) Recorded Rutgers University Camden NJ (1998?) GASPARO GSCD 335 [72.50]

AVAILABILITY www.gasparo.com It’s good to see a Finzi disc in Gasparo’s catalogue. The song cycles seem fated always to be sung by British singers so Richard Brunner’s disc adds a welcomingly international slant on things – and high time too. In many ways his operatic background and musical inclinations are rather more robust than his British contemporaries, say Martyn Hill. His tone sharpens to a steely core at such moments and he is quite interventionist when it comes to vocal colouration. The piano-accompanied Farewell to Arms for instance sees him harden and toughen his tone in the Aria to mirror the textual implications. I find his interpretation too restless and never quiet enough and also somewhat at variance from his pianist’s playing – though the volume may be partially due to the rather resonant acoustic at Rutgers (there’s some negligible ambient noise as well). So Brunner is a forceful and strong interpreter. The voice is powerful, not honeyed or in a conventional sense beautiful, but a resilient tool, well deployed, though often stretched when going up. There are numerous points of interest - the coda of A Young Man’s Exhortation is really splendid, though Budmouth Dears lacks wit and a bark is no substitute for evenness. I’d never quite appreciated the ghostly impression of Linden Lea behind Finzi’s setting of The Sigh, but here it is unmistakably in Brunner and Lisovich’s interpretation. Let Me Enjoy The Earth is quite slow and reverential but In Years Defaced tends to speed up – and is one of the less convincingly sung songs, one I think to which Brunner doesn’t really respond favourably. He’s iron voiced and the yielding sections sound mechanical. Brunner has an acute ear but there are times when he lacks the last ounce of characterisation – listen to The Market-Girl for example which is nowhere near cocksure enough. But plaudits for As I Lay In The Early Sun from Oh Fair To See which is splendidly lyric and only let down by Brunner’s forcing his tone. I don’t want to overemphasise the operatic nature of Brunner’s voice too much; this is not a case of John Vickers Sings Roger Quilter or some programming nightmare of that kind. But it is inevitably a constituent element of his approach to word setting, emphasis and over stressing as much as to vocal production. But for those who appreciate a little more pepper and less honey in their Finzi Brunner and (first class) Lisovich will prove diverting. Jonathan Woolf   Advertising Rates Visitor stats MusicWeb International has over 40,000 Classical CD reviews on offer Discs received Having a problem Donating? Gerard Hoffnung Concerts & The Bricklayer Story   New Releases New Releases   MusicWeb sells the Polish catalogue CDAccord £10.50 post free W-W MusicWeb sells the Arcodiva catalogue £12.00 post free W-W £11.75 post-free world- wide MusicWeb can now offer you discs from the following catalogues: Prices include postage [Acte Préalable £13.50] [Arcodiva £12.00] [Avie from £6.25] [British Music Society £12.00] [CDACCORD from £13.50 ] [ClassicO £12.50] [Hallé from £11] [Heritage £10] [Hortus £14.99 ] [Lyrita ONLY £11.75 ] [Nimbus Special prices] [Northern Flowers £13.50] [REDCLIFFE £11 ] [Sheva £11] [Tactus £11.50 ] [Talent from £12.00 ] [Toccata Classics £10.50 ] Musicweb Special Offers Monthly Best Buys     Google Ads - for information about privacy matters, click here.  Amazon Musicweb International is a participant in the Amazon EU Associates Programme, an affiliate advertising programme designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com

Return to Index

Reviews from previous months Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.