TOCC0005:
Havergal
Brian - The Soul of Steel, Legend
MP3
price
Brian
Rayner Cook, baritone
Roger Vignoles, piano
Stephen Levine, violin Songs
recorded 14 March, 13 April, 1982, Wigmore Hall, London
Legend recorded 14-15 December, 1981, Craxton Studios, London
Digitally remastered by Richard Black
Download ID: 252666
(Duration 56'39")
The
Soul of Steel
Settings
of Blake, Shakespeare and other English poets
Legend
for
Violin & Piano
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sample song:
Havergal
Brian (1876–1972) is renowned as the composer of 32 powerful
symphonies (then the largest symphonic cycle since Haydn), 21 of them
composed after his 80th birthday; his First Symphony, The Gothic, is reputed
to be the largest ever composed.
But
in the first part of his career Brian was also active on a smaller scale,
his songs attracting the advocacy of singers as prominent as John McCormack
and John Coates. The range of emotion in these songs is nonetheless vast,
from folky innocence via Shakespearean irony to deep tragedy. Brian Rayner
Cook’s performances can be taken as authoritative: he studied the
songs with the composer.
The
collection is completed by the Legend, Brian’s only surviving
piece of chamber music.
1.
When Icicles Hang by the Wall [2:11]
2. Take, O Take Those Lips Away [1:03]
3. Sorrow Song [3:52]
4. The Message [2:22]
5. Farewell [4:42]
6. Care-Charmer Sleep [4:42]
7. Since Love is Dead [2:50]
8. The Soul of Steel [4:52]
9. Why Dost Thou Wound and Break My Heart? [2:53]
10. On Parting [2:11]
11. Lady Ellayne [1:51]
12. Renunciation [3:34]
13. Love is a Merry Game [1:45]
14. Piping Down the Valleys Wild [2:03]
15. The Chimney Sweeper [2:56]
16. The Land of Dreams [4:01]
17. The Defiled Sanctuar [2:57]
18. Legend, for violin and piano [5:47]
Reviewed
in Gramphone (Guy Rickards, March 2006)
For
the first time on CD, magisterial accounts of Brian songs
Approximately
one quarter of Havergal Brian’s song output features
on this superbly remastered issue, sung vividly in the Wigmore
Hall by Brian Rayner Cook, alive to all the moods and colours
of this unfamiliar repertoire, accompanied to perfection by
Roger Vignoles. The cleverly organised programme showcases
Brian’s range as word-setter, from the relatively simple
(Why dost thou wound and break my heart?) to miniature tone-poems
such as The Soul of Steel (1920) or The Land of Dreams (1919).
Grouped
by poet, the recital opens with a brace by Shakespeare, the
toccata-like When icicles hang by the wall (1919) and Take,
oh take those lips away (1921), and two early impressive Donne
settings (Sorrow Song and The Message, 1905). Farewell and
Since love is dead (probably his final song) are two of several
with words by minor poets (in this case Bishop Heber and Fred
Bowles). Lesser texts often inspired Brian to music of power
and depth: The Soul of Steel, setting an outpouring of venom
by his landlord of the time, is a magnificent example. Care-Charmer
Sleep (1919), to an Elizabethan sonnet, is another but it
was the verses of his friend Temple Keble and Blake that prompted
his finest work. Each is represented by four songs, with bright
scherzo-like inventions (Lady Ellayne, Love is a merry game,
Piping down the valleys wild) and more serious utterances
such as Renunciation or his astonishing setting of the despairing
The Defiled Sanctuary (1919), simple-seeming but extraordinarily
subtle.
The
recordings still sound fresh and with the bonus of Stephen
Levine and Peter Lawson’s moving rendition of Brian’s
sole extant piece of chamber music, Legend (c1919-21; recorded
in a less auspicious acoustic), this disc is warmly recommended.
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