If undertaken
sensitively the combination of poetry and music can work extremely
effectively. Such is the case with mezzo-soprano
Kitty Whately’s www.kittywhately.com debut CD from
Champs Hill Records www.champshillrecords.co.uk
entitled This other Eden with pianist Joseph Middleton www.josephmiddleton.com , the Navarra Quartet www.navarra.co.uk and speakers Kevin Whately www.imdb.com/name/nm0923610 and
Madelaine Newton www.imdb.com/name/nm0628555
CHRCD094 |
British mezzo-soprano Kitty Whately sings on concert, opera
and recital stages in the UK and internationally. She is currently a BBC Radio
3 New Generation Artist and is an HSBC Laureate for the Aix-en-Provence
Festival as well as winner of the Kathleen Ferrier Award in 2011.
She trained at Chetham’s School of Music, the Guildhall
School of Music and Drama, and the Royal College of Music International Opera
School where she was awarded the Aldama Scholarship and numerous prizes. She
won the 59th Royal Over-seas League Award for Singers in 2011 and was also a
finalist at the Les Azuriales International Singing Competition 2010.
Highlights this season include singing Kate in Britten's Owen Wingrave at Opéra National de
Lorraine; Bach’s Magnificat with the
Choir of King’s College Cambridge and the Britten Sinfonia; De Falla’s The Three-Cornered Hat with BBC National
Orchestra of Wales, Haydn’s Nelson Mass
with Britten Sinfonia on tour in Spain and the Netherlands. She also made her
City of Birmingham Symphony debut and performed at London’s Wigmore Hall with
pianist Joseph Middleton. In June 2015, she will appear in a new production of
Jonathan Dove’s Flight at Opera
Holland Park in North London.
Other recent highlights have included her Opera Holland Park
debut as Rosina in Il barbiere di
Siviglia; her BBC Proms debut in Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’ Suite from Act II of Caroline Mathilde
with BBC National Orchestra of Wales; her debut at the Aix-en-Provence Festival
in the world premiere of Vasco Mendonça’s The
House Taken Over; and her house debut at English National Opera in Vaughan
Williams’ The Pilgrim’s Progress. She
has also appeared in the prestigious Verbier Festival Academy as Cherubino in
Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro.
Kitty Whately has been invited to give recitals at the
Edinburgh International Festival, Oxford Lieder Festival, Wigmore Hall, the
Elgar Room (Royal Albert Hall), Leeds Lieder, Buxton Festival and Leighton
House. She works with internationally renowned accompanists such as Roger
Vignoles, Graham Johnson, Malcolm Martineau, Gary Matthewman and Joseph
Middleton.
A short documentary about the making of this new CD can be
found on Kitty Whately’s website www.kittywhately.com/news
Kitty Whately’s recital focuses on different aspects of the
British landscape and is grouped in sections as This Other Eden, Forests and
Gardens, Meadows and Fields, Wilds of Scotland and Coasts and Seas.
This new release opens with a reading from Shakespeare’s (1564–1616) Richard II, Act 2, Scene 1 ‘This Sceptre’d
Isle’ read by actor Kevin Whately making a fine opening before Kitty
Whately sings John Ireland’s (1879–1962)
Earth’s Call, full of a blustering feel
of the outdoors. This mezzo-soprano has a very fine voice indeed, a beautiful
tone, total security and rising to peaks brilliantly. She receives terrific
support from pianist Joseph Middleton, sensitive to Ireland’s fine
writing. This is a perfectly controlled performance
with some fine quieter moments.
Peter Warlock’s
(1894–1930) My Own Country
follows with Whately and Middleton bringing a real understanding to Warlock’s fine
song, beautifully paced and phrased.
Actor Madelaine Newton then gives a lovely reading of Walter de la Mare’s (1873–1956) England before violinist Magnus Johnston
and cellist Brian O’Kane join Kitty Whately and Joseph Middleton for I will go with my father a-ploughing by Roger Quilter (1877–1953), a beautifully fresh performance, with
a lovely rhythmic lilt, Whately showing her fine flexibility and understanding
of this setting.
Kevin Whately reads John
Clare’s (1793–1864) In Hilly-Wood
finding such a natural quality in his delivery. No collection of English song
would be complete without that fine poet and composer, Ivor Gurney (1890–1937). Kitty
Whately brings a lovely sensibility to The
Sally Gardens with sensitive accompaniment from Joseph Middleton.
Ralph Vaughan
Williams (1872–1958) is represented by two songs; firstly We’ll to the woods no more where Magnus
Johnston’s violin opens quietly and gently before
Kitty Whately joins, bringing a poignant sense of solitude. This is a wonderful performance of an
exquisite setting.
Madelaine Newton follows with a reading from Wendell Berry’s (b.1934) The Peace of Wild Things, beautifully
read with just the right nuance.
Kitty Whately builds Herbert
Howells’ (1892–1983) King David so
well, rising to some very fine moments with exquisite piano accompaniment,
limpid and sensitive with mezzo and pianist complementing each other’s textures
superbly.
After Madelaine Newton’s fine reading of Thomas Hardy’s (1840–1928) The Darkling Thrush we have a song by Charles Villiers Stanford (1852–1924),
something of an underrated song composer. Here his La belle dame sans merci has a surprisingly spare opening with Whately
finding just the right feel before the music turns brighter picking up
rhythmically and with Middleton, finely delivering all the changing moods,
tempi rhythms and dynamics.
Kitty Whately gives an exquisitely controlled performance of
Vaughan Williams’ Silent Noon finding the perfect rise and
fall of this lovely setting before Madelaine Newton reads from Christina Rossetti’s (1830–1894) The Lambs of Grasmere.
There is a lovely piano opening to Michael Head’s (1900–1976) A
Green Cornfield before Whately enters, finely shaping the lovely phrases of
Head’s setting.
Kevin Whately reads a line from A E Houseman’s Spring will
not wait before Joseph Middleton plays John
Ireland’s piano piece of the same name, a wonderful idea with this pianist
catching Ireland’s elusive sound world so well.
Another reading by Kevin Whately follows, Edward Thomas’ (1878–1917) Aldestrop, so naturally read, very
affecting in its atmosphere of a captured moment in time. Ivor Gurney’s The Fields are
Full receives a beautifully shaped performance alive to Gurney’s little
setting.
Both Kitty Whately and Joseph Middleton capture the drama
and starkness of Joseph Horovitz’s (b.1926) Lady Macbeth: A Scena. Whately is superb
against Middleton’s spare accompaniment. There is a lovely piano opening to Roger Quilter’s I wish and I wish before Whately joins with violinist Magnus Johnston
and cellist Brian O’Kane in this buoyant setting that has such a fresh
performance as well as a lovely rhythmic flow.
Kevin Whately brings a most affecting reading of A. E. Housman’s Into my heart an air that kills before we come to James MacMillan’s (b.1959) The Children where Kitty Whately brings
her beautifully pure and accurate voice before the piano enters in this most
strikingly stark setting. There are violent piano chords that disturb the
atmosphere before Whately’s stark yet strangely beautiful performance continues.
There are a series of even more violent piano chords that thunder out and are
allowed to fade to bring the end.
Kevin Whately brings a feeling of authenticity to Houseman such is his fine reading of O stay at home my lad and plough before Kitty
Whately sings the folk song Ma Bonny Lad; an object lesson in how to sing this
repertoire, beautifully nuanced, unaffected with a pure voice full of
character.
Madelaine Newton returns to read from Louis Untermeyer (1885–1977) The
Swimmers with a real sense of atmosphere.
Benjamin Britten’s (1913–1976)
piano piece Early Morning Bathe is a
light skittish piece to which Joseph Middleton brings a lovely rippling
quality, full of forward motion and richness of tone. The calm is palpable as
Kitty Whately and Joseph Middleton bring us Michael Head’s The Estuary,
slowly rising in power and strength with Whately in superb voice in this fine
setting.
Kevin Whately gives a most natural and unaffected reading
from John Masefield’s (1878–1967) well known poem Sea Fever before the final
song, Samuel Barber’s (1910–1981) Dover Beach where Kitty Whately is joined by
the Navarra Quartet. The
Quartet open before Whately enters full of intensity as the
quartet blend beautifully. It is not
often one hears such exquisite blends of textures of strings and voice. The Quartet is on lovely form here, as is
Kitty Whately with beautiful textures and harmonies. This is an absolutely
superb performance to treasure.
This is a terrific debut disc from Kitty Whately, a wonderfully
satisfying recital, beautifully sung and with poetry readings that are very fine.
The recording is absolutely first rate and there are interesting
booklet notes as well as full English texts.
Kitty Whately is a rising star in superb voice.
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