SOMM Recordings announces an important new recording of two classic English song cycles by Sir Arthur Somervell - Maud and A Shropshire Lad - from the acclaimed partnership of baritone Roderick Williams and pianist Susie Allan. Hailed as "the English Schumann" for his mastery of song setting, song cycles in particular, Somervell's music is marked by a distinctive blend of lyricism and harmony that makes itself indelibly felt in these two seminal works of the English song repertoire. His first cycle, Maud, setting 13 poems from Alfred, Lord Tennyson's dark monodrama, was first performed in 1899 at the height of a fashion for recitals of songs sung in English. An intense, impassioned portrayal of infatuation, it is marked by remarkably eloquent and revealing relationships between voice and text, and voice and piano. Composed in 1904, the 10 poems from A.E. Housman's A Shropshire Lad portray a young man wistfully contemplating nature, life and love at the age of 20 before following him through a life full of incident, the horror of the First World War and growing self-awareness. It prompted from Somervell texturally rich and varied music shot through with an aching lyricism all the more powerful and potent for it's folk song-like simplicity and directness. Completing the recital are the enchanting, ever-popular lullaby Shepherd's Cradle Song and wistful tale of childhood sweethearts with texts by Edgar Allan Poe, A Kingdom by the Sea. British music authority Jeremy Dibble provides informative booklet notes and Roderick Williams a revealing take on Somervell's music from a singer's perspective.

Tracklist:

Maud: No. 1, I Hate The Dreadful Hollow
Maud: No. 2, A Voice By The Cedar Tree
Maud: No. 3, She Came To The Village Church
Maud: No. 4, O Let The Solid Ground
Maud: No. 5, Birds In The High Hall Garden
Maud: No. 6, Maud Has A Garden
Maud: No. 7, Go Not, Happy Day
Maud: No. 8, I Have Led Her Home
Maud: No. 9, Come Into The Garden, Maud
Maud: No. 10, The Fault Was Mine
Maud: No. 11, Dead, Long Dead
Maud: No. 12, O That 'twere Possible
Maud: No. 13, My Life Has Crept So Long
A Kingdom By The Sea
A Shropshire Lad: No. 1, Loveliest Of Trees
A Shropshire Lad: No. 2, When I Was One-And-Twenty
A Shropshire Lad: No. 3, There Pass The Careless People
A Shropshire Lad: No. 4, In Summer-Time On Bredon
A Shropshire Lad: No. 5, The Street Sounds To A Soldier's Tread
A Shropshire Lad: No. 6, On The Idle Hill Of Summer
A Shropshire Lad: No. 7, White In The Moon The Long Road Lies
A Shropshire Lad: No. 8, Think No More, Lad
A Shropshire Lad: No. 9, Into My Heart An Air That Kills
A Shropshire Lad: No. 10, The Lads In Their Hundreds, To Ludlow Come In For The Fair
Shepherd's Cradle Song

UPC: 748871061521
Label: Somm Recordings
Release Date: 5.15.20
Format: CD

Somervell / Williams / Allan - Maud / Shropshire Lad (CD)