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Drop Not, Mine Eyes

Alexander Chance (counter-tenor), Toby Carr (lute)

Drop Not, Mine Eyes

Awards:

Chance’s tone is pellucid; notes fall round and clear as water drops...a recording in which Chance stakes serious claim to the title of his generation’s most exciting British countertenor.

Gramophone Magazine, July 2023

More reviews

Drop Not, Mine Eyes

Alexander Chance (counter-tenor), Toby Carr (lute)

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Awards:

Chance’s tone is pellucid; notes fall round and clear as water drops...a recording in which Chance stakes serious claim to the title of his generation’s most exciting British countertenor.

Gramophone Magazine, July 2023

More reviews

About

Named Gramophone’s One to Watch and winner of the 2022 International Handel Singing Competition, Alexander Chance makes his recording debut on Linn. Drop not, mine eyes is a recital of English lute songs that soaks up the zeitgeist of the past couple of years to create a programme full of melancholic works by Dowland, Campion, Danyel, Purcell and others. If the ever-popular Dowland was readily prone to sadness, as exemplified by the pair I saw my lady weep and Flow, my tears, or indeed In darkness let me dwell, the polymath Thomas Campion favoured a more sober style, as shown in I care not for these ladies. Thomas Ford displays his more profane side here with Fair, sweet, cruel and What then is love. When it comes to melancholy, John Danyel’s Grief, keep within and Drop not, mine eyes are every bit as good as Dowland. The programme closes with Purcell, the other English Orpheus. Toby Carr provides sympathetic accompaniment on lute and theorbo

Contents and tracklist

Dowland: Can she excuse my wrongs? (First Booke of Songes, 1597)
Work length2:56
Dowland: Praeludium
Work length1:25
  • Toby Carr (lute)
Dowland: I saw my Lady weepe
Work length5:40
Dowland: Flow my teares (Lacrimæ)
Work length4:33
Dowland: Captain Digorie Pipers Galliard
Work length2:21
  • Toby Carr (lute)
Campion: I care not for these ladies
Work length2:35
Campion: The cypress curtain of the night
Work length3:43
Campion: Never weather-beaten sail
Work length2:16
Dowland: Mignarda
Work length3:03
  • Toby Carr (lute)
Ford, T: What then is love sings Coridon
Work length3:40
Ford, T: Faire, sweet, cruell
Work length2:00
Danyel: Pavan
Work length3:57
  • Toby Carr (lute)
Danyel: Mrs M E her funeral tears for the death of her husband
Work length8:20
I. Grief, Keep Within
Track length2:46
II. Drop Not, Mine Eyes
Track length2:39
III. Have All Our Passions
Track length2:55
Danyel: He whose desires are still abroad
Work length2:14
Dowland: In darkness let me dwell
Work length4:04
Lully: Entrée d'Apollon
Work length2:13
  • Toby Carr (lute)
Purcell: O solitude, my sweetest choice, Z406
Work length5:18
Visée: Prélude
Work length0:52
  • Toby Carr (lute)
Purcell: An Evening Hymn 'Now that the sun hath veiled his light', Z193
Work length4:45

Spotlight on this release

Awards and reviews

  • Presto Editor's Choice
    April 2023
  • Gramophone Magazine
    July 2023
    Editor's Choice
  • Presto Recordings of the Year
    Finalist 2023
  • International Classical Music Awards
    2024
    Nominated - Baroque Vocal
  • Opus Klassik Awards
    2024
    Nominated - Young Talent of the Year

July 2023

Chance’s tone is pellucid; notes fall round and clear as water drops...a recording in which Chance stakes serious claim to the title of his generation’s most exciting British countertenor.

April 2023

robust, richly-coloured and beautifully even across the registers, Chance's distinctive countertenor is coupled with superb diction and a natural, unfussy way with the texts that's especially affecting in the plangent laments but also pays dividends in the racier songs (such as Campion's 'I care not for these ladies', given with a twinkle in the eye that never crosses the line into archness). Delicious.
Katherine Cooper

Pizzicato

With his pure, silky timbre and impeccable vocal line, Chance captures the sensual, melancholic and tender character of these songs quite perfectly.
5 out of 5 stars
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