How can one resist the combination of Marianne Crebassa’s attractive voice and a selection of French song, especially Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis and three Veraline songs? As for Ravel’s Shéhérazade, she floats to effortlessly, so evocatively that it seems possible to smell and touch this faux-Asia.

With her warm tone and often remarkable way with both vocal colour and verbal inflection, Crebassa is outstanding in this repertory, and in Fazıl Say she has an accompanist whose direct yet subtle approach matches her own.'the combination of intelligence, immediacy and subtlety is utterly compelling and marks ‘Secrets’ out as one of the finest French song recitals of recent years. I cannot recommend it too highly.

This collection of French songs celebrates a rare artistry, in which marriage of word and tone are paramount and prove hugely rewarding... In the Bilitis songs and Shéhérazade, her confiding style evokes atmospheres of nuanced suggestiveness...her diction is good and the voice itself is consistently lovely, with dark low notes...A memorable disc.

Crebassa lavishes just as much care on Say’s vocalise-like lines as she does on the songs in her native language. Every one is compelling; from the opening moments when she wraps such velvety tone around Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis, her range of tone and nuance is exquisite.

her voice is meltingly gorgeous...almost immediately, in Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis, which opens the album, we feel as if we’re inside her head. These songs can be delivered coyly, but Crebassa gives them a far more decadent edge. You surrender very quickly.