Soprano Claire Booth and pianist Christopher Glynn follow their critically acclaimed collaborations Percy Grainger: Folk Music and Edvard Grieg: Lyric Music with Modest Mussorgsky: Unorthodox Music, interspersing a selection of the Russian composer's under-represented songs with solo piano works.

First Percy Grainger: Folk Music, then Edvard Grieg: Lyric Music, and now Modest Mussorgsky: Unorthodox Music a logical sequence in soprano Claire Booth's and pianist Christopher Glynn's growing AVIE discography, interspersing a selection of under-represented songs with solo piano works by this most individual and idiosyncratic of all Russian composers.

Claire and Chris approach Modest Mussorgsky: Unorthodox Music in the spirit of a storyteller, tracing an arc of life from innocence to experience that is arranged across a prologue and four "scenes" Nursery, Youthful Years, Marriage and Loneliness taking their cue from the colourful tableaux of the composer's operas. Individual numbers from the great song cycles Youthful Years, Nursery, Sunless, and Songs and Dances of Death are juxtaposed with works from Mussorgsky's more unorthodox output, all delivered by Claire and Chris with disarming affect.

CLAIRE BOOTH

"An actor-singer who can raise the dramatic heat as soon as she enters the stage" (Opera Now), "that most questing, resourceful and intelligent of sopranos" (Daily Telegraph), British soprano Claire Booth has been widely acclaimed for her "radiant, rapturous, wonderfully nuanced performances" and voice of "piercing purity [and] luscious richness" (The Scotsman). She is renowned for her breadth of repertoire, and for the vitality and musicianship that she brings to the operatic stage and concert platform, with a versatility that encompasses repertoire spanning from Monteverdi and Handel, through Rossini, Berg and Britten, to a fearless commitment to the music of the present day.

CHRISTOPHER GLYNN

Chris is a Grammy award-winning pianist and accompanist, praised for his 'breathtaking sensitivity' (Gramophone), 'irrepressible energy, wit and finesse' (The Guardian), 'perfect fusion of voice and piano' (BBC Music Magazine) and as 'an inspired programmer' (The Times). He is also Artistic Director of the Ryedale Festival, programming around sixty events each year in beautiful and historic venues across North Yorkshire.

CRITICAL ACCLAIM

"Few singers alive can spin a yarn like Booth can, especially with her regular pianist Christopher Glynn. (Her) voice is a character that transfixes all by itself, presenting a bright, beguilingly androgynous, ageless image of the protagonist". - Gramophone, February 2021 (Edvard Grieg: Lyric Music AV2403)