Brindley Sherratt: Fear No More

BRINDLEY SHERRATT JULIUS DRAKE

1 Franz Schubert (1797–1828)

Fahrt zum Hades, D 526

[5:14]

2 Franz Schubert

Der Schiffer, D 536

[1:56]

3 Franz Schubert

L’incanto degli occhi, D 902/1

[3:34]

4 Franz Schubert

Auf der Donau, D 553

[3:24]

5 Franz Schubert

Der Tod und das Mädchen, D 531

[2:39]

6 Richard Strauss (1864–1949)

Im Spätboot

[4:34]

(No 3 from Sechs Lieder, Op. 56)

FEAR NO MORE

Modest Mussorgsky (1839–1881)

10

[4:50] [4:24] [5:02] [5:31]

11 John Ireland (1879–1962)

Sea-Fever

[2:24]

12 Gerald Finzi (1901–1956)

Fear no more the heat o’ the sun

[5:36]

8 9

With huge thanks to: Mark & Sarah Holford Peter & Fiona Espenhahn Malcolm & Alison Thwaites Gini & Richard Gabbertas Malcolm Herring Lorna & Chris Bown Kate & Jeremy Wright Oscar & Margaret Lewisohn

Julius for your extraordinary playing, patience and perseverance Language coaches Sergei Rybyn and Katja Parmar for trying not to raise your eyebrows and shake your heads too often during the recordings Paul and Will at Delphian for your skill and passion for this project Steinway pianos and the team at Henry Wood Hall Matt Sherratt and Sue Devereux for your encouragement and being an honest set of ears, and Amy Sherratt for your enthusiasm Chris Sherratt for the flapjack and everything else

(No 3 from Let Us Garlands Bring, Op. 18) 13 Ivor Gurney (1890–1937)

By a Bierside

14 Michael Head (1900–1976)

Limehouse Reach [2:36]

Cover photography © Benjamin Ealovega Session photography: foxbrushfilms.com Booklet & traycard design: Eliot Garcia Booklet editor: John Fallas Delphian Records Ltd – Edinburgh – UK www.delphianrecords.com

@ delphianrecords @ delphianrecords @ delphian_records

[4:28]

(No 2 from Six Sea Songs) 15 Peter Warlock (1894–1930)

Recorded on 26-28 March 2023 at Henry Wood Hall, London Producer/Engineer: Paul Baxter 24-bit digital editing: Jack Davis 24-bit digital mixing & mastering: Paul Baxter Piano: Steinway model D, serial no 607138 (2017) Piano technicians: Marcus Dods & Nigel Polmear

Songs and Dances of Death 1. Lullaby 2. Serenade 3. Trepak (Russian Dance) 4. Field Marshal

7

Total playing time

Captain Stratton’s Fancy

[1:59] [58:20]

Notes on the music Not many singers record their first recital album two decades into a successful international career. But from the start, Brindley Sherratt’s career has been far from conventional. Originally trained as a trumpeter, he switched to singing after winning an opera arias competition he had entered almost for fun, but then chose the professional security of a position in the BBC Singers for 13 years, and entered the field in which he is now best known – that of opera – only in his late thirties. ‘Everything after that,’ according to Sherratt, ‘has been a huge surprise.’

In recent years, at first hesitantly and then with mounting enthusiasm, Sherratt has expanded his skillset with a further new departure. For some time, colleagues – notably the mezzo-soprano Alice Coote – had been urging him to give song recitals.

Eventually, he took the plunge and began to try out repertoire with the pianist Julius Drake; Covid intervened to cause a further delay, but in March 2022 he gave two solo recitals on consecutive evenings with Drake, at Oxford Lieder Festival and at Middle Temple, London. ‘I was extremely nervous,’ admits Sherratt. ‘I usually like my audiences in the dark, about a hundred feet away with an orchestra between us!’ But to his surprise and relief both recitals were packed out.

And in the end, he says, ‘actually I loved the experience. I really loved having the flexibility

of just the two of us, rather than these huge forces which I normally sing with …’.

Song recitals by a bass are rarer than those by other voice types; and for a singer to start performing and recording the recital repertoire in his late fifties is rare indeed.

What advantages does a greater age bring to the task? Sherratt points out that ‘a lot of the cycles and the serious songs are for people who’ve lived a little. If you think of Winterreise, if you think of Schwanengesang […] you ideally need to have experienced some amount of loss, of joy, of grief’.

The ideal, he suggests, is for the voice to be ‘lived in’ yet to retain the technical control that enables that accumulated life experience to be reliably communicated.

(Sherratt explains that technique for him is not about virtuosity or perfection but about ‘digging deep and finding a way to produce the goods time and time again’.)

That said, the programme at which Sherratt arrived for the present album initially centres on two composers who themselves barely reached middle age. The vivid, almost cartoonish portraits of Mussorgsky’s Songs and Dances of Death make an unforgettable centrepiece, while Schubert’s preternatural awareness of death and distinctive mixing of lyrical and uncanny elements sets the opening tone.

Of the five songs by Schubert included here, the three to poems by Johann Mayrhofer were all composed in early 1817. As the musicologist Laura Tunbridge observes: Only ‘Der Schiffer’ was published in the year of its composition. It appeared in what Graham Johnson describes as ‘a type of Boys’ Own Paper’, Beiträge zur Bildung für Jünglinge, edited by Mayrhofer.

Schubert was only twenty at the time, Mayrhofer thirty. The relative youth of the two artists is belied by the current of dread beneath the surface of these watery songs. Schubert takes advantage of the submerged meanings to introduce surprising harmonic shifts, and to play with pianistic figuration in a far more varied way than in the rippling accompaniments of ‘Die Forelle’ or Die schöne Müllerin.

A boat glides on the mirror-like surface of the Danube (Auf der Donau), its passengers fearful that the ruined castle and rustling pine trees harbour their doom. The boatman in Der Schiffer, by contrast, defies the storm, though it seems likely that his journey is over the Styx. Whereas that strophic song speeds through its repeated verses, Fahrt zum Hades wends a longer, slower and more varied route. The protagonist eschews lyricism for a recitative-like declamation as he contemplates the prospect of oblivion in the poem’s final verse. Schubert then returns to the music and poetry of the opening stanza, heard now with even greater portent.

Although ‘Der Schiffer’ was printed again in Schubert’s lifetime, alongside ‘Auf der Donau’ in Schubert’s Op. 21 collection dedicated to Mayrhofer, the mammoth ‘Fahrt zum Hades’ only appeared posthumously, in 1832. In the decades after his death, Schubert’s reputation transformed from that of a sociable tunesmith to someone burdened by illness and – like the passengers in ‘Auf der Donau’ – frightened of death. Der Tod und das Mädchen (to a text by Matthias Claudius), a brief dialogue in which a young woman is confronted by the figure of death, is more in keeping with the latter image of Schubert, but it was not a ‘late’ work; it was composed alongside the Mayrhofer settings in early 1817.

If one of Sherratt’s wishes in assembling this programme was that it should demonstrate to the full the capacities of a bass voice, then this is not simply a question of register but also of the voice’s particular expressive qualities – qualities, indeed, that may deepen with age. ‘I think all of these songs really suit having a dark voice. It’s not just about showing off low notes, [but about] a colour.

And what is also great, certainly with [the Mayrhofer settings], is that that’s the colour Schubert had in mind when he wrote them.’

Sherratt is keen to point out that the voice parts of the three Mayrhofer songs are all notated in the bass clef, even if it is ‘Der Tod und das Mädchen’ that takes the singer down into his very lowest register. (This song was

Notes on the music originally written for a higher voice, male or female, and thus is often performed from the point of view of the maiden, but Sherratt takes the optional low D – out of the range of all but the lowest of female altos, and similarly unreachable for tenors or most baritones – that Schubert writes for Death’s final note.)

L’incanto degli occhi, too, was written specifically for bass voice. The text, Tunbridge explains, is an aria from Metastasio’s libretto Attilio Regolo [1740; first put to music in 1750 by Johann Adolph Hasse] which Schubert had set as a compositional exercise while he was studying with Antonio Salieri.

In 1827, he returned to the same text to pay homage to one of the most celebrated basses in Vienna (indeed, in Europe), Luigi Lablache. Lablache’s influence and popularity explain the use of an Italian text, the genial melodic writing and the operatic flourishes, tempered for Germanic audiences.

Published in 1906 as the third of a set of six songs for different voice types with piano accompaniment, Richard Strauss’s Im Spätboot was likewise written for a particular singer – Paul Knüpfer, later a noted Baron Ochs in Strauss’s opera Der Rosenkavalier.

Knüpfer was also the dedicatee of Strauss’s two songs for basso profondo with orchestra, ‘Das Thal’ and ‘Der Einsame’, which Sherratt had performed before coming to the more

intimate medium of voice and piano. If the music of ‘Im Spätboot’ follows the Schubert group in offering opportunities – most notably with its final low D flat – to display a true bass register, the ‘late ferry’ or last boat home of the text suggests an allegorical interpretation as another ‘journey to Hades’.

Thus the song maintains that association, so dear to Sherratt, between vocal colour and subject matter: again, fusing technique and content in a potent expressive alloy which is still further enhanced when taken on by an older singer.

For his final, posthumously published song cycle, Mussorgsky selected four poems from his near-contemporary Arseny Golenishchev-Kutuzov’s collection Songs and Dances of Death (Pesni i plyaski smerti), which the poet – to quote Laura Tunbridge again – envisioned [as] a panorama of Russian deaths, from peasant to Tsar, poet to priest, child to aristocratic lady. Mussorgsky composed the first three songs in 1875 and the last in 1877. Each takes a familiar and often affirmative genre – lullaby, serenade, peasant dance, march – and makes it grotesque. Death’s tunes are memorable and his harmonies are often sweet, but these are not songs about death, or sung from the safe distance of recollection. This is death in its moment of execution – as the composer put

it, ‘death taking pleasure in death’. Death sings a fatal ‘Lullaby’; is the suitor of the ‘Serenade’; dances a ‘Trepak’ with a drunk peasant, leaving him to freeze in a blizzard; and finally surveys the battlefield, a triumphant ‘Field Marshal’.

Sherratt has performed the work several times in Dmitri Shostakovich’s orchestration; the present album’s launch concert, at Wigmore Hall in February 2024, will be his first public performance of the voice-andpiano original. In approaching the recording, Sherratt was keenly aware of existing recorded versions by Yevgeny Nesterenko, Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Feodor Chaliapin and George London, providing him with examples of interpretative commitment, drama and beauty of tone as well as, sometimes, of approaches that he felt differed in important respects from his own.

He had fewer precedents in mind in the case of the closing group of songs by English composers. Here, it was a question – in all but one case – of transposing the songs into a lower key to fit his range, but Sherratt insists that such a move is only appropriate when the character of the song fits his voice: colour, again, is more important than registral considerations alone. Thus it was after much thought, and advice from valued colleagues such as the pianist Iain Burnside and the baritone Roderick Williams, that Sherratt

ultimately identified a group of five songs to balance out the opening Schubert group – this time with five different composers, but (like the Schubert group) again with three songs setting the same poet. John Masefield’s poem Sea-Fever appeared in his first collection, Salt-Water Ballads (1902), and was set to music by John Ireland in 1913. Three years later, while serving in the trenches of the First World War, Ivor Gurney took the verse refrains which close each act of Masefield’s 1910 play The Tragedy of Pompey the Great, in which four centurions lament the death of a young Roman soldier, and set them as the song By a Bierside – a stoic meditation on beauty and death which Sherratt places alongside Gerald Finzi’s setting of verses from Shakespeare’s Cymbeline, Fear no more the heat o’ the sun, composed in 1942 amid another world war. Michael Head’s 1949 setting of Cicely Fox Smith’s Limehouse Reach and a final Masefield number – Captain Stratton’s Fancy, as set by Peter Warlock in 1920 – return us to the sea with, respectively, a sailor’s song of regret and lost love and a more upbeat, light-hearted take on mariners and their desires.

Lugubrious yet with a hint of consolation in the way its brief piano postlude turns to a closing D major, ‘Der Tod und das Mädchen’ suggests that death is not always, or only, to be feared. There, though, the suggestion

Notes on the music is of a supernatural presence. In this concluding group of songs death is made fully human; the ability of an older bass voice to communicate both experience and acceptance comes to the fore, and the songs convey a broad experience of life and love within which death takes its place as a natural conclusion – as the last line of Sea-Fever has it, ‘quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over’.

Ultimately, the theme of making peace with death makes this an album about life, and hope. Sherratt’s career remains a voyage of discovery, and the surprises continue. ‘In doing the recitals I discovered a different vocal colour, that I’d not had the chance to use in opera […] which was to sing much, much softer than I would normally do.’ This extra colour then became part of the range of tools available to him at the all-important preparation stage – which in song as in opera is, Sherratt emphasises, not just a question

of ‘hours and hours spent memorising text. If I’m learning song, or a new opera role, it’s looking at it and doing your prep, staring at the page and thinking: what can I do with this line? What can I do with that phrase? And then the opportunities for spontaneity come from that. You have to do the preparation before you can go and create something in the studio or on the stage.’

His closing thought, typically, is an opening and an encouragement, to himself and to others: ‘I would encourage any singer to do songs, because it’s incredibly good vocal discipline. You have to make the text “live”.

You have to squeeze everything you can out of the phrase. In opera so much of it is being in the right place and in your light and being heard, and on a much larger scale. But in the almost naked intimacy of a song recital, you really have to be very disciplined about your vocal production. And sometimes that’s quite harrowing for a singer – you think my God, do I really sound like that close up? […] I think it’s been an incredibly good vocal discipline, and I intend to do it as long as I possibly can.’ © 2024 John Fallas Inset quotations © 2024 Laura Tunbridge

Texts & translations 1 Fahrt zum Hades (Voyage to Hades)

2 Der Schiffer (The Boatman)

Der Nachen dröhnt, Cypressen flüstern, Horch, Geister reden schaurig drein; Bald werd’ ich am Gestad’, dem düstern, Weit von der schönen Erde sein.

The ship booms, cypresses whisper, Hark the eerie spirits talking; Soon I shall reach the gloomy shore, Far from lovely Earth.

Im Winde, im Sturme befahr’ ich den Fluss, Die Kleider durchweichet der Regen im Guss; Ich peitsche die Wellen mit mächtigem Schlag, Erhoffend mir heiteren Tag.

In the wind and the storm I ride the river, My clothes soaked by the pouring rain; I whip the waves with mighty strokes In hope of a fair day.

Da leuchten Sonne nicht, noch Sterne, Da tönt kein Lied, da ist kein Freund.

Empfang die letzte Träne, o Ferne, Die dieses müde Auge weint.

There shine neither sun nor stars, There sounds no song, there is no friend.

O distant one, receive the last tear That this weary eye weeps.

Die Wellen, sie jagen das ächzende Schiff, Es drohet der Strudel, es drohet der Riff, Gesteine entkollern den felsigen Höh’n, Und Tannen erseufzen wie Geistergestöh’n.

The waves, they chase the creaking boat, The whirlpool threatens, the reef looms, Rocks tumble from the craggy heights, Firs sigh like ghostly moans.

Schon schau’ ich die blassen Danaiden, Den fluchbeladnen Tantalus; Es murmelt todesschwangern Frieden, Vergessenheit, dein alter Fluss.

Already I see the pale Danaïdes, The cursed Tantalus; Your ancient river, oblivion, Murmurs a deathly peace.

So musste es kommen, ich hab’ es gewollt, Ich hasse ein Leben behaglich entrollt; Und schlängen die Wellen den ächzenden Kahn, Ich priese doch immer die eigene Bahn.

It had to come to this, I wished it so; I hate a life that unfurls cosily.

And if the waves sway the creaking vessel, I honour still my chosen course.

Vergessen nenn’ ich zwiefach Sterben, Was ich mit höchster Kraft gewann, Verlieren, wieder es erwerben – Wann enden diese Qualen? Wann?

Forgetting I call dying twice.

To lose that which I won with supreme strength, To obtain it once more – When, O when will these torments end?

Drum tose des Wassers ohnmächtige Zorn, Dem Herzen entquillet ein seliger Born, Die Nerven erfrischend, o himmlische Lust, Dem Sturme zu trotzen mit männlicher Brust!

Thus let the water’s impotent fury roar; From my heart springs a blissful fountain, Refreshing my nerves, O heavenly delight, To brave the storm with a manly heart!

Johann Mayrhofer (1787–1836)

Johann Mayrhofer

Texts & translations 3 L’incanto degli occhi (The Wonder of the Eyes)

Da voi, cari lumi, Dipende il mio stato; Voi siete i miei Numi, Voi siete il mio fato.

A vostro talento Mi sento cangiar.

Ardir m’inspirate, Se lieti splendete; Se torbidi siete, Mi fate tremar.

5 Der Tod und das Mädchen (Death and the Maiden)

On you, beloved lights, Depends my state; You are my gods, You are my fate.

At your command I feel myself changing.

When you shine brightly You inspire me with daring; When you are cloudy, You make me tremble.

Pietro Metastasio (1698–1782)

DAS MÄDCHEN

THE MAIDEN

Vorüber, ach, vorüber!

Geh, wilder Knochenmann!

Ich bin noch jung, geh, Lieber!

Und rühre mich nicht an.

Pass me by, ah, pass me by!

Away, wild bone man!

I am still young – go, dear one, And lay on me no hand.

DER TOD

DEATH

Gib deine Hand, du schön und zart Gebild!

Bin Freund und komme nicht zu strafen.

Sei gutes Muts! Ich bin nicht wild, Sollst sanft in meinen Armen schlafen!

Give me your hand, you fair and gentle creature!

I am a friend and do not come to chasten.

Have courage! I am not fierce, You shall sleep softly in my arms.

Matthias Claudius (1740–1815) 4 Auf der Donau (On the Danube)

6 Im Spätboot (On the Late Ferry)

Auf der Wellen Spiegel schwimmt der Kahn, Alte Burgen ragen himmelan, Tannenwälder rauschen geistergleich, Und das Herz im Busen wird uns weich.

The barge floats on the mirror of the waves, Ancient castles soar heavenwards, Pine forests rustle like ghosts, And our hearts grow soft in our breasts.

Denn der Menschen Werke sinken all’, Wo ist Turm, wo Pforte, wo der Wall, Wo sie selbst, die Starken, erzgeschirmt, Die in Krieg und Jagden hingestürmt?

For the works of men all perish.

Where is the tower, the gate, the rampart?

Where the mighty themselves, Who stormed in their armour into wars and hunts?

Trauriges Gestrüppe wuchert fort, Während frommer Sage Kraft verdorrt: Und im kleinen Kahne wird uns bang, Wellen drohn wie Zeiten Untergang.

Sorrowful thickets grow wild While pious legends wither away, And in the little barge we grow fearful.

Waves threaten like times of doom.

Johann Mayrhofer

Aus der Schiffsbank mach ich meinen Pfühl.

Endlich wird die heiße Stirne kühl!

O wie süß erkaltet mir das Herz!

O wie weich verstummen Lust und Schmerz! Über mir des Rohres schwarzer Rauch Wiegt und biegt sich in des Windes Hauch.

Hüben hier und drüben wieder dort Hält das Boot an manchem kleinen Port: Bei der Schiffslaterne kargem Schein Steigt ein Schatten aus und niemand ein.

Nur der Steurer noch, der wacht und steht!

Nur der Wind, der mir im Haare weht!

Schmerz und Lust erleiden sanften Tod. Einen Schlummrer trägt das dunkle Boot.

From the ship’s bench I make my pillow.

At last my hot brow is soothed.

O, how sweetly does my heart grow cold; How softly joys and pains are stilled!

Above me the funnel’s black smoke Sways and curls in the breath of the wind.

Over here and then over there The boat puts in at many a small port.

In the dim glow of the ship’s lantern A shadow disembarks and no one comes on board.

Only the helmsman now, standing and watching; Only the wind blowing through my hair; Pains and joys die a gentle death.

The dark boat bears away a slumbering man.

Conrad Ferdinand Meyer (1825–1898)

Translations for tracks 1–6: Delphian Records

Texts & translations Songs and Dances of Death [Pesni i plyaski smerti]

[Death] ‘No, I will take him and peace will possess him!

Hush-a-bye, baby, my own.’

[Mother] ‘Mercy, he’s mine, and you shall not take him!

Chant no more, leave him alone!’

[Death] ‘See him, he sleeps and no one can wake him.

Hush-a-bye, baby, my own.’

7 Kolybelnaya (Lullaby)

Stonet rebyonok… Svecha, nagoraya, Tusklo mertsayet krugom.

Tseluyu noch kolybelku kachaya, Mat ne zabylasya snom.

Ranym-ranyokhonko v dver ostorozhno Smert serdobolnaya stuk!

Vzdrognula mat, oglyanulas trevozhno… „Polno pugatsya, moy drug!

Blednoye utro uzh smotrit v okoshko…

Placha, toskuya, lyublya, Ty utomilas, vzdremni-ka nemnozhko, Ya posizhu za tebya.

Ugomonit ty ditya ne sumela.

Slashche tebya ya spoyu.“ – „Tishe! rebyonok moy mechetsya, byotsya, Dushu terzaya moyu!“ „Nu, da so mnoyu on skoro uymyotsya.

Bayushki, bayu, bayu.“ – „Shchyochki bledneyut, slabeyet dykhanye…

Da zamolchi-zhe, molyu!“ – „Dobroye znamenye, stikhnet stradanye, Bayushki, bayu, bayu.“ „Proch ty, proklyataya!

Laskoy svoyeyu sgubish ty radost moyu!“ „Net, mirny son ya mladentsu naveyu.

Bayushki, bayu, bayu.“ – „Szhalsya, pozhdi dopevat khot mgnovenye, Strashnuyu pesnyu tvoyu!“ „Vidish, usnul on pod tikhoye penye.

Bayushki, bayu, bayu.“

Moaning and restless, the child, flushed and ailing, Lies in the dim candlelight.

Near him, his mother, her love unavailing, Waits through the long, sleepless night.

Death, the deliverer, silently stealing, Taps at the outer door – tchock!

Desperate, she turns to him, mute and appealing.

[Death] ‘Don’t be afraid when I knock!

Dawn is returning, the night light is paling, Watching and weeping so long, You must be weary. Your vigil is failing, Sleep, I will sing him my song.

Your voice is tense with fear, see, he is crying, Mine is more soothing in tone.’

[Mother] ‘Quiet! He breaks my heart, helpless there, dying!

Such despair I never have known!’

[Death] ‘Leave him to me, I will silence his crying; Hush-a-bye, baby, my own.’

[Mother] ‘Now he is whiter no longer complaining, So still, not even a moan.’

[Death] ‘That is a sign that his fever is waning, Hush-a-bye, baby, my own.’

[Mother] ‘Stop! You are damnable! If you caress him, All joy for me will be gone!’

8 Serenada (Serenade)

Nega volshebnaya, noch golubaya, Trepetny sumrak vesny.

Vnemlet, poniknuv golovkoy, bolnaya Shopot nochnoy tishiny.

Son ne smykayet blestyashchiye ochi, Zhizn k naslazhdenyu zovyot, A pod okoshkom v molchanyi polnochi Smert serenadu poyot: „V mrake nevoli surovoy i tesnoy Molodost vyanet tvoya; Rytsar nevedomy, siloy chudesnoy Osvobozhu ya tebya.

Vstan, posmotri na sebya: krasotoyu Lik tvoy prozrachny blestit, Shchyoki rumyany, volnistoy kosoyu Stan tvoy, kak tuchey obvit.

Pristalnykh glaz goluboye siyanye, Yarche nebes i ognya; Znoyem poludennym veyet dykhanye…

Ty obolstila menya.

Slukh tvoy plenilsya moyey serenadoy,

Evening of amethyst, stars all aglisten, Tender spring, breathing delight!

Trembling, the invalid leans out to listen, Hearing the whisper of night.

Sleep does not cover her eyes, wide and burning, Youth pleads with joy not to fade; But at the midnight, to answer her yearning, Death sings his soft serenade: ‘Held here in prison so dark and confining, Soon you will fade quite alone.

Trust, then, your Knight, unnamed, doubt resigning.

I come to free you my own.

Rise, see how lovely you are! Your reflection Mirrors a face all alight, Rosy with pleasure, your curls, soft perfection Veiling a form, milky white; Eyes, sapphire blue, fixed and bright as the moon is, Shine now with radiant fire,

Texts & translations Rytsarya shopot tvoy zval, Rytsar prishyol za posledney nagradoy: Chas upoyenya nastal.

Nezhen tvoy stan, upoitelen trepet…

O, zadushu ya tebya V krepkikh obyatyakh: lyubovny moy lepet Slushay!… molchi!… Ty moya!“

Sweet is your breath and warm, warm as the noon is.

How you awake my desire!

My ardent pleading will not be denied, Your desire summoned me here; Thus I claim my reward, and the prize my bride.

Rapture at last is near!

Fragile your body, and your tremor, enthralling.

Come, my embrace, how divine, Stifles your breathing! Your lover is calling, Listen … Be still … You are mine!’

Chtob pyanchuge krepko pod neyo zasnulos!

Oy, vy lesa, nebesa, da tuchi, Tem, veterok, da snezhok letuchy!

Sveytes pelenoyu, snezhnoy, pukhovoyu; Yeyu, kak mladentsa, starichka prikroyu…

Spi, moy druzhok, muzhichok schastlivy, Leto prishlo, rastsvelo!

Nad nivoy solnyshko smeyotsya da serpy glyayut, Pesenka nesyotsya, golubki letayut…

9 Trepak (Russian Dance)

Les da polyany, bezlyudye krugom.

Vyuga i plachet i stonet, Chuyetsya, budto vo mrake nochnom, Zlaya, kogo-to khoronit; Glyad, tak i yest! V temnote muzhika Smert obnimayet, laskayet, S pyanenkim plyashet vdvoyom trepaka, Na ukho pesn napevayet: Oy, muzhichok, starichok ubogoy, Pyan napilsya, poplyolsya dorogoy, A myatel-to, vedma, podnyalas, vzygrala.

S polya v les dremuchy nevznachay zagnala.

Gorem, toskoy da nuzhdoy tomimy, Lyag, prikorni, da usni, rodimy!

Ya tebya, golubchik moy, snezhkom sogreyu, Vkrug tebya velikuyu igru zateyu.

Vzbey-ka postel, ty myatel-lebyodka!

Gey, nachinay, zapevay pogodka!

Skazku, da takuyu, chtob vsyu noch tyanulas,

Fields and the woodland, with no one in sight!

Wailing low, the wind storm is eerie And it seems as if snow rides through the night Hunting the lost and the weary.

Look, over there in the dark, Death approaches, Holding a serf, to caress him.

Death with the drunkard now dances and chants, Weaving a spell to possess him: ‘Oh, you are cold, you are old, defenceless; Drink made you gay till you lay there senseless, Then the Witch of Blizzards played with you to charm you, Pushed you to the forest, seeming not to harm you.

Poor serf, distressed and oppressed and friendless; Rest, here your sleep will be deep and endless.

See, I will warm and bed you down in soft snow lying

And I will start a mighty reel around you flying.

Snowy and light, fluff the bed, oh my beauty!

Come dance along, make a song, oh my beauty!

Sing all night to soothe him, till the break of day; Sing till the drowsy drunkard sleeps his life away.

Hear me, you darkness, you wind and forest, Snowflake and cloud and the sky combining.

Out of downy morn make a winding sheet, Like the newly born, wrap him head to feet.

Sweet dreams, my friend! Leafy boughs are twining, Summer has come full in bloom.

The grain is ripe, the sun is shining. Scythes are swinging, now vying.

Reapers all are singing and the birds are flying …’

10 Polkovodets (Field Marshal)

Grokhochet bitva, bleshut broni, Orudya zhadnye revut, Begut polki, nesutsya koni I reki krasnye tekut.

Pylayet polden, lyudi byutsya; Sklonilos solntse, boy silney; Zakat bledneyet, no derutsya Vragi vse yarostney i zley.

I pala noch na pole brani.

Druzhiny v mrake razoshlis…

Vsyo stikhlo, i v nochnom tumane Stenanya k nebu podnyalis.

Togda, ozarena lunoyu,

The battle thunders, flashing, searing, The greedy cannon roar and glow, Battalions turn, their horses rearing And red with blood the rivers flow!

The day is burning, men are straining, Destructive fury sets the pace: The combat rages, light is waning And still they fight and grant no grace.

As darkness falls, the field is lonely; The troops, withdrawing, cease to fight.

All’s quiet, moans of wounded only Disturb the silence and the night.

Beneath the moon’s unearthly light,

Texts & translations Na boyevom svoyom kone, Kostey sverkaya beliznoyu, Yavilas smert; i v tishine, Vnimaya vopli i molitvy, Dovolstva gordogo polna, Kak polkovodets mesto bitvy Krugom obyekhala ona.

Na kholm podnyavshis, oglyanulas, Ostanovilas, ulybnulas…

I nad ravninoy boyevoy Razdalsya golos rokovoy: „Konchena bitva! ya vsekh pobedila!

Vse predo mnoy vy smirilis, boytsy!

Zhizn vas possorila, ya pomirila!

Druzhno vstavayte na smotr, mertvetsy!

Marshem torzhestvennym mimo proydite, Voysko moyo ya khochu soschitat; V zemlyu potom svoi kosti slozhite, Sladko ot zhizni v zemle otdykhat!

Gody nezrimo proydut za godami, V lyudyakh ischeznet i pamyat o vas.

Ya ne zabudu i gromko nad vami Pir budu pravit v polunochny chas!

Plyaskoy tyazhyoloyu zemlyu syruyu Ya pritopchu, chtoby sen grobovuyu Kosti pokinut vovek ne mogli, Chtob nikogda vam ne vstat iz zemli!“

His mighty battle-horse astride, His bones all shining smooth and white, Appears grim Death! There, close beside, The dying groan and join in prayer.

He listens, proud and satisfied.

Noting the carnage, all appraising, Now he circles his domain, A hill ascending, downward gazing, He smiles and, pausing, smiles again.

And like a fateful bugle call His voice is heard to summon all …

‘Strife is here ended, for I am triumphant now!

Victor and vanquished alike I subdue.

Life made you enemies, Death has united you, Rise up together and pass in review.

March at a solemn pace, halt and surrender, All of my troops I record as they pass, Then your bones to the earth you will tender, Slumber is sweet under soft-growing grass.

Year after year after year will pass by, Men will forget, none will know where you lie.

But I will not forget! I the undying Feasting at midnight will visit your bed.

You will stay, sleeping there, where you are lying.

Thus I command it, all defying.

Dancing, I’ll tread down the earth overhead, So that you never can rise from the dead.’

Arseny Golenishchev-Kutuzov (1848–1913)

Translation: Marion Farquhar

11 Sea-Fever

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by, And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking, And a grey mist on the sea’s face and a grey dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, And the flung spray and the blown spume and the seagulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life, To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife; And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover, And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.

John Masefield (1878–1967)

12 Fear no more the heat o’ the sun

Fear no more the heat o’ the sun, Nor the furious winter’s rages; Thou thy worldly task hast done, Home art gone, and ta’en thy wages: Golden lads and girls all must, As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.

Fear no more the frown o’ the great; Thou art past the tyrant’s stroke; Care no more to clothe and eat; To thee the reed is as the oak: The sceptre, learning, physic, must All follow this, and come to dust.

Fear no more the lightning flash, Nor the all-dreaded thunder stone; Fear not slander, censure rash; Thou hast finished joy and moan: All lovers young, all lovers must Consign to thee, and come to dust.

No exorciser harm thee!

Nor no witchcraft charm thee!

Ghost unlaid forbear thee!

Nothing ill come near thee!

Quiet consummation have; And renownèd be thy grave!

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) [from Cymbeline, Act IV, Sc 2]

The texts for tracks 11, 13 & 15 are reprinted by permission of the Society of Authors as the literary representative of the Estate of John Masefield.

Texts 13 By a Bierside

This is a sacred city, built of marvellous earth.

Life was lived nobly there to give such Beauty birth.

Beauty was in that heart and in that eager hand.

Death is so blind and dumb, death does not understand.

Death drifts the brain with dust and soils the young limbs’ glory.

Death makes justice a dream and strength a traveller’s story.

Death makes the lovely soul to wander under the sky.

Death opens unknown doors. It is most grand to die.

John Masefield

14 Limehouse Reach

I fell in love with a Limehouse lass, But she has proved untrue; She looked as fresh as a figurehead That’s just been painted new, But she’s took and married a lighterman, So it’s time for me to go: But I would have loved you so, my dear, I would have loved you so!

Oh, a shake o’ the foresheet pays for all That a sailor leaves behind, For an alehouse shot, and a friend forgot, And a sweetheart false or kind.

And the bloomin’ mudhook’s off the ground, For it’s time for us to go: But I would have loved you so, my dear, I would have loved you so!

Now a long goodbye to Limehouse Reach, And a last goodbye to you; A feller’s a fool to die for love, Which I don’t mean to do.

There are girls as smart in every port From here to Callao – But I would have loved you so, my dear, I would have loved you so!

Cicely Fox Smith (1882–1954)

15 Captain Stratton’s Fancy

Oh, some are fond of red wine and some are fond of white, And some are all for dancing by the pale moonlight: But rum alone’s the tipple and the heart’s delight Of the old, bold mate of Henry Morgan.

Oh, some are fond of Spanish wine and some are fond of French, And some’ll swallow tay and stuff fit only for a wench; But I’m for right Jamaica till I roll beneath the bench, Says the old, bold mate of Henry Morgan.

Oh, some are for the lily and some are for the rose, But I am for the sugar-cane that in Jamaica grows; For it’s that that makes the bonny drink to warm my copper nose, Says the old, bold mate of Henry Morgan.

Oh, some are fond of fiddles and a song well sung, And some are all for music for to lilt upon the tongue; But mouths were made for tankards and for sucking at the bung, Says the old, bold mate of Henry Morgan.

Oh, some that’s good and godly ones they hold that it’s a sin To troll the jolly bowl around and let the dollars spin; But I’m for toleration and for drinking at an inn, Says the old, bold mate of Henry Morgan.

John Masefield

Biographies The British bass Brindley Sherratt is one of today’s most respected singers. Revered for his extraordinary vocal and stage presence, he is noted all over the world for roles such as Claggart Billy Budd, Gurnemanz Parsifal, Hunding Die Walküre and Sarastro Die Zauberflöte, a role he has performed over a hundred times.

Highlights of his 2023/24 season include a double appearance at the Bayerische Stataosper as Rocco Fidelio and as Astradamors in a new production of Le Grand Macabre by Krzysztof Warlikowski; Zebul in Oliver Mears’ new production of Jephtha at the Royal Opera House; a highly anticipated return to the Metropolitan Opera as Sarastro; and his role debut as Hagen Götterdämmerung (London Philharmonic Orchestra / Vladimir Jurowski).

He can also be heard in Mussorgsky Songs and Dances of Death with the Orquesta y Coro Nacionales de España in Madrid, and in recital at Wigmore Hall with the pianist Julius Drake.

Last season, Sherratt made his Opéra National de Paris debut as Sarastro, and appeared as the Doktor Wozzeck (Royal Opera House and Festival d’Aix-en-Provence) and as Swallow in Stefan Herheim’s acclaimed production of Peter Grimes (Bayerische Staatsoper). On the concert platform, he

was seen as Gurnemanz Parsifal with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra; as Harapha in Handel Samson at the BBC Proms with the Academy of Ancient Music; and in Beethoven Missa Solemnis at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence. Other recent engagements include a hugely acclaimed role debut as Gurnemanz in semi-staged performances of Parsifal with the Orchestra of Opera North conducted by Richard Farnes; Hunding in Richard Jones’ new production of The Valkyrie (English National Opera); Ochs Der Rosenkavalier for the Glyndebourne Festival and Welsh National Opera; Marke Tristan und Isolde for the Glyndebourne Festival; and roles at the Wiener Staatsoper, Hamburgische Staatsoper, Dutch National Opera, Teatro Réal in Madrid, Opernhaus Zürich, Oper Frankfurt and Lyric Opera of Chicago.

Highly in demand on the concert platform, he has appeared at the Bregenz, Edinburgh, Lucerne, Salzburg and Three Choirs festivals and at the BBC Proms. He works regularly with leading orchestras and conductors, including recently with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, the Philharmonia Orchestra, the Hallé, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestre des ChampsElysées and Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie

Bremen, under conductors such as Fabio Luisi, Sir Antonio Pappano, Sir Andrew Davis, Sir Mark Elder, Daniel Harding, Harry Bicket, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Yannick Nézet-Séguin and Louis Langrée.

Born in Lancashire into a family of strong singers, Brindley Sherratt initially studied trumpet at the Royal Academy of Music, and is now a Visiting Professor at both the Royal Academy and the Royal College of Music.

The pianist Julius Drake lives in London and enjoys an international reputation as one of the finest instrumentalists in his field, collaborating with many of the world’s leading artists both in recital and on disc.

His passionate interest in song has led to invitations to devise song series for Wigmore Hall, London; the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam; 92nd Street Y, New York; and the Pierre Boulez Saal, Berlin. He curates ‘Julius Drake and Friends’, an annual series of song recitals in the historic Middle Temple Hall in London. Julius holds a Professorship at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz, Austria, where he leads a class for song pianists, and is also a Professor of Collaborative Piano at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama in London. He is regularly invited to give masterclasses worldwide.

His many recordings include a widely acclaimed series with Gerald Finley for Hyperion Records (from which Samuel Barber: Songs, Schumann: Dichterliebe & other Heine settings and Britten: Songs and Proverbs of William Blake won Gramophone Awards in 2007, 2009 and 2011 respectively); recordings with Ian Bostridge and Alice Coote for EMI; with Joyce DiDonato, Lorraine Hunt Lieberson and Matthew Polenzani for Wigmore Hall Live; and with Anna Prohaska for Alpha. Julius’s recording for Hyperion of Janáček’s The Diary of One Who Disappeared, with tenor Nicky Spence and mezzo-soprano Václava Housková, won both Gramophone and BBC Music Magazine Awards in 2020.

Concerts in the 2023/24 season include three recitals in the series ‘Lied und Lyrik’ in the Boulez Saal Berlin, and recital tours in the USA with Matthew Polenzani, Japan with Ian Bostridge, and Europe with Gerald Finley and Anna Prohaska. Other highlights include Oxford International Lieder Festival with Christine Rice; Middle Temple Hall, London with Jamie Barton; the Aldeburgh Festival with Andrè Schuen; Wigmore Hall, London with Brindley Sherratt; Théâtre de l’Athénée, Paris with Allan Clayton; Staatsgalerie Stuttgart with Günther Groissböck; and performances in Bath, Brugg, Basel and Rome with Ian Bostridge.

Also available on Delphian James MacMillan: Since it was the day of Preparation …

Brindley Sherratt bass, Synergy Vocals, Hebrides Ensemble

Der Wanderer: Schubert Lieder Roderick Williams baritone, Iain Burnside piano

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The first release from a new recording partnership between Hebrides Ensemble and Delphian Records presents Sir James MacMillan’s extraordinary setting – by turns intimate and dramatic – of the Resurrection story as told in St John’s Gospel. The Ensemble and its director William Conway (the work’s dedicatee) are joined by bass Brindley Sherratt in the role of Christ, and by a pristine quartet of singers from Synergy Vocals. A significant landmark in MacMillan’s career, Since it was the day of Preparation … now inaugurates a series of recordings set to document Hebrides Ensemble’s outstanding contribution to Scottish cultural life.

Following the critical acclaim for Iain Burnside’s partnership with soprano Ailish Tynan in the first volume of Burnside’s Schubert song series on Delphian, this second release sees him partnered by another friend and long-term collaborator, baritone Roderick Williams.

Their lovingly designed programme takes its tone from the strand of journeying and farewell that threads through Schubert’s song output.

Burnside’s pianism is as masterful and vivid as ever, while Roderick Williams combines drama and intellect and shows the qualities that continue to endear him both to critics and to audiences.

PRESTO Recordings of the Year 2016 –Finalist

‘Williams is an unfailingly intelligent singer and is matched every step of the way by Burnside. Interpretatively they barely put a foot wrong’ — Gramophone, October 2016

‘Hebrides Ensemble provide eloquent testimony to the sustained impact of MacMillan’s writing’ — Gramophone, October 2016, EDITOR’S CHOICE COLOURS CYAN MAGENTA YELLOW BLACK

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Schubert Lieder: Love’s Lasting Power Harriet Burns soprano, Ian Tindale piano

Our Indifferent Century: Britten | Finzi | Marsey | Ward Francesca Chiejina soprano, Fleur Barron mezzo-soprano, Natalie Burch piano

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28/06/2023 12:33

In 1914 Thomas Hardy wrote of ‘our indifferent century’; a generation later, W.H. Auden urgently sought to fuse the political with the creative. Today, profoundly unsettled by the turn of the world’s politics, three artists respond with a programme that explores the changes and challenges we face presently, but one that also offers hope, levity and even a degree of irreverence, and never loses sight of the joy and beauty of nature. Hardy and Auden found their ideal musical counterparts in the songwriting of Finzi and Britten; contemporary composers William Marsey and Joanna Ward add their own musical voices of political urgency and wistful yearning.

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New in October 2023

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12/10/2023 12:39

Love – from many-splendoured and joyous to tragic and rejected, homo- and heterosexual, light-hearted and broken-hearted, heavenly and earthly, innocent and anything but … In their first joint recording, long-term performing partners Harriet Burns and Ian Tindale make a deeply personal choice from Schubert’s lieder, exploring the theme of love, but also the friendships and relationships between poets and the composer out of which he crafted songs of astonishing empathy.

Former winners of the Contemporary Song Prize in the International Vocal Competition at ’s-Hertogenbosch, Ian and Harriet bring an outstanding empathy of their own to songs in which we hear, in Ian’s words, ‘young artists being creative together and exploring things’.

New in January 2024

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