So much unreserved praise has already been afforded to this
CD that more seems almost redundant. Nevertheless, it is so
fully deserved that perhaps a little more wouldn’t go amiss.
In years to come, this recording may well be seen as a milestone
marking the halfway point in Keenlyside’s recording career.
It captures his voice and his artistry at an ideal moment, his
voice still supple and rich but with the burnished tones of
maturity, his expression personal and immediate but also benefiting
from a clear knowledge of his forebears.
He is well served by his companion, the recording team and the
acoustic. Malcolm Martineau is an accompanist with a long pedigree
of sensitive yet engaging lieder accompaniment, and his playing
here is exemplary. The way he matches Keenlyside’s phrasing
and rubato speaks of close artistic empathy, and his masterly
stylistic transition from the Germanic repertoire on the first
half of the disc to the French in the second matches that of
Keenlyside himself.
The technical side of the recording was overseen by Tony Faulkner,
who opts for a very bright sound. This could seem out of place
in a recording of such intimate chamber music, but for a release
on the Wigmore Hall Live label it is ideal. The generous acoustic
is such a distinctive feature of the venue, that to lose it
in such a project would risk diluting one of the key features
of the label’s identity. The generous sound also works to the
piano’s favour, giving the instrument a warmth commensurate
with Simon Keenlyside’s rich baritone.
Keenlyside is in the habit of rearranging the order of works
after recital programmes are in print, and I understand that
he reorganised this concert, but that the original order was
reinstated for the recording. The first work on the disc, Schubert’s
An Silvia certainly sounds like an ideal opener: fresh,
forthright and exuberant. The six Schubert lieder are performed
with a balance of emotion and restraint, passionate yes, but
never operatic. In fact, and as Hilary Finch observes in her
liner-notes, Keenlyside creates variety of expression by exploring
the opposite extreme, his rich tone occasionally giving way
to a vocal timbre drained of colour.
A selection from Wolf’s “Mörike Lieder” follows. They are a
little more angular than the Schubert, and Wolf struggles to
match his predecessor’s natural instinct for melody. Texturally
though, the selection complements the Schubert, the voice is
often in a higher register - where Keenlyside also excels, albeit
with a lighter tone. The wider ranging piano figurations are
clearly from a later date in the instrument’s history.
The Fauré songs are lighter fare. Keenlyside’s pronunciation
of the French texts is a delight, and he’s not above leaning
on the nasal vowel sounds for added French colour. But it is
the intimacy instilled by both performers into these mélodies
that makes the performances really special. This allows even
Fauré’s more dramatic moments - the conclusion of Fleur jetée,
for example - a sense of freshness and immediacy.
So too with Ravel, whose Histoires naturelles is surely
the ideal repertoire for a zoology graduate like Keenlyside.
More significantly perhaps, the range of these songs is lower;
they’re in real baritone territory, and to my ear that is where
he sings best. Not that his upper register is deficient, but
the complex, richness of his sound lower down is perhaps his
most satisfying and distinctive vocal trait.
Poulenc’s Hôtel closes the disc by way of an encore,
a nice touch for those approaching the disc as a surrogate for
the live experience. It is however a shame for those of us who
would rather have heard one of the other Schubert lieder from
the recital that was cut for the sake of space. But that is
a minor grumble about what is otherwise an excellent disc, both
a fine recording on its own terms, and an elegant document of
the sort of world-class recital for which the Wigmore Hall is
justifiably famous.
Gavin Dixon
see also review by John
Quinn
Track listing:
Franz SCHUBERT (1797-1828)
An Sylvia D891 (1826) [2:47]
Die Einsiedelei D393 (1816) [1:33]
Verklärung D59 (1813) [3:36]
Die Sterne D939 (1828) [3:35]
Himmelsfunken D651 (1819) [3:03]
Ständchen D957 No. 4 (1828) [4:25]
Hugo WOLF (1860-1903)
Der Knabe und das Immlein [2:56]
Gesang Weylas [1:37]
An die Geliebte [3:20]
Auf eine Christblume II [2:12]
Lied eines Verliebten [1:44]
Lied vom Winde [3:10]
Gabriel FAURÉ (1845-1924)
Aubade Op. 6 No. 1 (1873) [2:10]
En sourdine Op. 58 No. 2 (1891) [3:09]
Green Op. 58 No. 3 (1891) [1:58]
Notre amour Op. 23 No. 2 (c 1879) [1:58]
Fleur jetée Op. 39 No. 2 (1884) [1:35]
Spleen Op. 51 No. 3 (1888) [2:29]
Madrigal de Shylock Op. 57 No. 2 (1889) [1:32]
Le papillon et la fleur Op. 1 No. 1 (1861) [2:49]
Maurice RAVEL (1875-1937)
Histoires naturelles (1906) [18:51]
Francis POULENC (1899 – 1963)
Hôtel (1940) [2:35]
Simon Keenlyside (baritone); Malcolm Martineau (piano) 
