Roderick Williams baritone; Christopher Glynn piano. Songs by Vaughan Williams, Quilter, Dring, Finzi, Bridge, Parry, Gurney, Boyle, Britten, Williams, Weir, Tippett, Maconchy, Carwithen, Procter-Gregg, Wallen.
I hadn’t appreciated that the reference in the programme to Winterreise wasn’t just a slightly fluffed up way of describing a gloomy set of English songs with a wintery theme, but very precisely described a set of songs established by Roddy Williams to not only to have the same number of lyrics as the Schubert cycle but also for each English song to be an equivalent in some way or other to the Schubert song at the same position in the cycle. Thus the last song in this cycle – Errolyn Wallen’s Peace on Earth – in its eerie stillness and wide open-eyed brightness (it’s a fine song) elegantly matches Schubert’s Der Leiermann. Mr Williams explained that he first had the idea of putting songs together in this way when he was learning the Schubert cycle in German. I guess some of the songs you’d choose are fairly obvious – gloomy Hardy poems comprise 7 out of the 24, and Vaughan Williams Songs of Travel are another predictable choice, but there’s also RL Stevenson, Shakespeare Yeats, de la Mare and others. And although the likes of RVW, Finzi, Gurney, Quilter etc provide 14 of the songs, there are also contemporary / non-cowpat songs by the likes of Machonchy, Weir, Wallen and Williams himself. And some composers I’ve never heard of – Ina Boyle, Humphrey Procter-Gregg…… So what’s notable – as you can see from the list of composers – is the sheer variety of works Roddy Williams is drawing from, and that he includes some well-known pieces – the Britten Winter Words song, for example – alongside works completely unknown to me.
All the songs were superbly delivered by Mr Williams, each song well characterised, and with both clear diction and sensitive phrasing. He has a very easy manner on stage, fairly still, expressive hands, which helps you to focus on the music. His voice has just the right volume range for the Wigmore Hall.
Songs I found I enjoyed particularly, in addition to the Wallen ending, were Williams’ setting of Blake’s The Angel, Ina Boyle’ A Song of Enchantment, RVW’s Linden Lea (parallel to Der Lindenbaum) and two Finzi/Hardy settings – In a Churchyard and Waiting Both.
There was a brief encore – a Schubert setting of Goethe, with a sense of final peace. This was a very fine evening – a great musical start to the New Year….It was a full and very enthusiastic house, too. Williams always has lots of very vocal fans!
John's musical journey 