The English Songbook

The recital begins with Keats and ends with Shakespeare: that can't be bad. But it also begins with Stanford and ends with Parry; what would the modernists of their time have thought about that?... — Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010 More…

Catalogue No: 5568302
Label: Warner Classics
Length: 69 minutes

Stanford: La Belle Dame sans merci (John Keats) (1877)

6:28

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 27 & 28 February 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Gurney: Sleep

3:03

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 3 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Gurney: I will go with my father a-ploughing

2:28

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 2 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Dunhill: The Cloths of Heaven, Op. 30 / 3

2:22

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 3, 4 & 6 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Browne, W D: To Gratiana dancing and singing

3:49

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 3 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Somervell: To Lucasta, on Going to the Wars

1:28

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 2 & 3 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Delius: Twilight Fancies

3:49

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 28 February 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

German: Orpheus with his lute

2:23

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 3 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Warlock: Jillian of Berry

0:35

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 2 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Warlock: Cradle Song

3:48

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 2 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Show 14 remaining works on this recording

Finzi: The dance continued

4:02

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 2 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Vaughan Williams: Linden Lea

2:26

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 27 February 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Vaughan Williams: Silent Noon

4:18

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (tenor), Julius Drake (piano), Rick Kerr (vocals)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 27 February 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

trad.: My love's an arbutus (Old Irish air)

2:19

$1.05

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Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 4 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

trad.: The Death of Queen Jane

2:47

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 6 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Parry: No longer mourn for me

3:19

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 4 & 6 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Finzi: Since we loved, Op. 13 No. 7

1:16

$1.05

$1.35

Julius Drake (piano), Ian Bostridge (vocals)
Recorded: 1999-03-04
Recording Venue: 4 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

trad.: The Salley Gardens

2:33

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 6 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Warlock: Rest, sweet nymphs

2:12

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 27 & 28 Feb and 2 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Quilter: Come away, death

3:01

$1.05

$1.35

Julius Drake (piano), Ian Bostridge (vocals)
Recorded: 1999-02-28
Recording Venue: 28 February 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Quilter: Now sleeps the crimson petal, Op. 3 No. 2 (Tennyson)

2:00

$1.05

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Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-02-28
Recording Venue: 28 February 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

trad.: Bold William Taylor

3:39

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 4 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Traditional Lincolnshire: Brigg Fair

2:34

$1.05

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Ian Bostridge (vocals), Teddy Layton (director), Julius Drake (piano), Polyphony (lead vocals), Stephen Layton (director)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 4 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

trad.: The Little Turtle Dove

2:07

$1.05

$1.35

Ian Bostridge (vocals), Julius Drake (piano)
Recorded: 1999-03-06
Recording Venue: 4 March 1999, No.1 Studio, Abbey Road, London

Hide 14 works on this recording

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2010

The recital begins with Keats and ends with Shakespeare: that can't be bad. But it also begins with Stanford and ends with Parry; what would the modernists of their time have thought about that? They would probably not have believed that those two pillars of the old musical establishment would still be standing by in 1999. And in fact how well very nearly all these composers stand! Quilter's mild drawing–room manners might have been expected to doom him, but the three songs here – the affectionate, easy grace of his Tennyson setting, the restrained passion of his 'Come away, death' and the infectious zest of 'I will go with my father a–ploughing' – endear him afresh and demonstrate once again the wisdom of artists who recognise their own small area of 'personal truth' and refuse to betray it in exchange for a more fashionable 'originality'.
Likewise Finzi, whose feeling for Hardy's poems is so modestly affirmed in 'The dance continued'.
Does that song, incidentally, make deliberate reference, at 'those songs we sang when we went gipsying', to Jillian of Berry by Warlock (whose originality speaks for itself)? Jillian of Berry itself perhaps calls for more full–bodied, less refined tones than Bostridge's. One could do with a ruddier glow and more rotund fruitiness in the voice. Yet for most of the programme he isn't merely a well–suited singer but an artist who brings complete responsiveness to words and music. The haunted desolation of Delius's Twilight Fancies is perfectly caught in the pale hue of the voice which can nevertheless give body and intensity to the frank cry of desire, calming then to pianissimo for the last phrase amid the dim echoes of hunting horns in the piano part. Julius Drake plays with strength of imagination and technical control to match Bostridge's own.

The English Songbook

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