Down by the Salley Gardens: Works by Vaughan Williams, Finzi, Howells & Quilter

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Mehta is a technically excellent singer; with a firm well-supported line; an unusually resonant lower range; and fine expressive diction, well equal to Julius Drake's sturdy accompaniment. And... — BBC Music Magazine, November 2011, 5 out of 5 stars More…

Release Date: 5th Sep 2011
Catalogue No: HMC902093
Label: Harmonia Mundi
Length: 66 minutes

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Howells: King David

Work length5:01

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Quilter: It was a lover and his lass

Work length2:21

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Gurney: Down by the Salley Gardens

Work length2:46

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Vaughan Williams: The House of Life: No. 2, Silent noon

Work length4:23

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Purcell: Lord, what is man?, Z192

Work length5:55

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Purcell: Let the Night Perish (Job's Curse)

Work length5:42

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Vaughan Williams: Linden Lea

Work length2:25

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Quilter: Come away, death

Work length2:53

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Quilter: O mistress mine

Work length1:31

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Quilter: Blow, blow, thou winter wind (No. 3 from Three Shakespeare Songs, Op. 6)

Work length2:32

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Finzi: At Middle-Field Gate in February (from I Said to Love)

Work length3:10

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Howells: The Widow Bird

Work length1:48

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Berkeley, L: The Horseman

Work length1:11

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Howells: The Little Boy Lost

Work length2:12

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

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

Work length6:09

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Vaughan Williams: Songs of Travel: VIII. Bright is the ring of words

Work length1:50

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Finzi: The sigh

Work length3:28

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Warlock: Jillian of Berry

Work length0:34

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Hely-Hutchinson: Set in the manner of Handel

Work length2:20

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Quilter: Take, O take those lips away

Work length1:25

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Finzi: Since we loved

Work length1:17

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Quilter: Hey, ho, the wind and the rain (No. 5 from Five Shakespeare Songs, Op. 23)

Work length1:51

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

Purcell: Music for a while, Z583

Work length3:37

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Julius Drake, Bejun Mehta

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This programme offers a vivid and varied cross-section of English song, ranging from the Edwardian aesthetic of Quilter and early Vaughan Williams to the intensely expressive style of Howells and Finzi. The Purcell realisations by Britten and Tippett, meanwhile, are products of two great 20th-century composers engaging with their musical heritage. In all these different styles, Bejun Mehta shows the same verbal and vocal mastery that won such acclaim for his debut Handel recital on harmonia mundi.

Reviews

November 2011

Mehta is a technically excellent singer; with a firm well-supported line; an unusually resonant lower range; and fine expressive diction, well equal to Julius Drake's sturdy accompaniment. And he's hardly more bloodless than genteel English tenors of the era...he exploits his thinner tone deftly for unusual, even eerie effects, especially in Stanford's chilling La belle dame snas merci

November 2011

Any suspicion that these songs might sound lukewarm or tentative in the hands of a countertenor is soon dispelled by Mehta's invigorating singing of Quilter's 'Blow, blow, thou winter wind' and the keen way he dramatises Stanford's 'La Belle Dame sans merci'. The verbal point he brings to a handful of Purcell songs in arrangements by Britten and Tippett is also appreciated.

November 2011

Mehta may not possess the most extensive of vocal paintboxes but he does gradate the shades at his disposal to good effect: pastels rather than oils. In Drake he has a partner who draws suitable sounds from the piano.

1st September 2011

Bejun Mehta certainly can't be faulted on his eclecticism in his whistle-stop tour of English song...Mehta's singing is so heart-stoppingly beautiful and musically perceptive that you wish he had recorded whole cycles rather than just representative songs.

11th September 2011

Mehta's gift for mood and atmosphere is heard in the light beauty of Quilter's "It was a lover and his lass", the sweet melancholy of Gurney's "Down by the Salley Gardens" or the veiled mystery of Lennox Berkeley's "The Horseman". Pianist Julius Drake provides customary alert, expressive accompaniment.

Down by the Salley Gardens

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