Finzi: I Said to Love / Let Us Garlands Bring / Before and After Summer

"A lovely rich, velvety tone, gorgeous in the lower register, great sensitivity to both text and music, enunciation excellent, and good pacing. Strongly recommended ... "
(MusicWeb July 2005)

"This CD can be confidently recommended on two counts. For the newcomer to Finzi's songs it offers an excellent and inexpensive introduction. The Finzi enthusiast will want to hear this exciting singer in some of the composer's finest songs. So I'm happy to commend this disc."
(MusicWeb Aug 2005)

" I said to Love is a collection of five settings assembled after the composer's death by his widow and son, three dating from the 1930s when he was at his most creative, and two, far darker, dating from his last months before he died in 1956. Let us garlands bring, better known, consists of five Shakespeare settings, dedicated to Vaughan Williams, which bring refreshing illumination to texts set many times before, with Come away Death and Fear no more the Heat of the Sun among the finest of all Finzi songs. Firm, even tone from Roderick Williams and beautifully clear diction, with immaculate playing from Iain Burnside." Penguin Guide

"Roderick Williams is easily one of the finest young baritones working in this country at the moment. Yet he remains relatively unknown, hidden in the ghetto of English song, occasionally venturing into mainstream non-English opera. Nonetheless in his niche he is hard to surpass. He sings the entire range, from Purcell to new music, excelling in Britten, Vaughan Williams, Tippett, Turnage and his own compositions, which are very good. Few singers inhabit the English genre so perfectly.

Nonetheless, like all truly good artists, Williams brings something innovative to what he does. Not for him the preciousness of the quintessential "English tenor" - he's a baritone, anyway. Nor does he sound like a voice from the past, frozen in performance styles redolent of the past; no Old Fogey he! English song isn't merely rosy-hued nostalgia: Williams brings out its strength of character. In recital, he is wonderful. His rapport with the audience seems to inspire him to sing with real, personal vivacity - something that is hard to replicate in studio recordings.

Finzi's songs have had a renaissance in the last few years and it is interesting to hear how interpretations have evolved from their last wave of popularity in the early 1980s. Finzi had a poet's soul, choosing his texts with great care. His settings interpret the poems without overwhelming them. Alas, some Hardy poems don't always lend themselves naturally to melody. Nonetheless, they evoke vivid images whose impact is perhaps greater than the words alone. Therein lies the challenge for a Finzi singer. For example, in The Self-unseeing, you don't realise the song is about ghosts until the final line "Yet we were looking away!" This gives a singer the chance to contrast the understated music with a shock ending, though in fairness to Williams, Finzi simply scored the notes downward. For whatever reason, Williams plays down the drama, even in songs like Channel Firing where there's plenty of licence to go for emphasis. Even when God says "No!" to the dead rising from the grave, it's more polite than forceful. Stephen Varcoe may not have as much colour in his voice, but his Hyperion version is more vivid. Perhaps Williams, in this showcase recording, is playing safe, taking no chances. Again, though, Williams is being faithful to Finzi's writing, whose beauties lie in understatement, and in quixotic breaking of melodic lines within lines of text. But I'm being picky, remembering Williams in recital. This is an excellent recording, superbly sung.

Williams, however, is artist enough that he can impress without obvious dramatic devices. He deftly navigates the tricky phrasing in I need not go, making the song flow naturally, yet enough for a listener to appreciate Finzi's artful setting. Again, in For Life I had never cared greatly, he shapes the lyrical lilting lines, so they sound as unforced as in normal, but melodious conversation. Even the Shakespeare cycle Let us garlands bring, sounds fresh and modern. Williams here is authoritative - no need for mannerisms or affectation. He brings out the timeless quality in these songs which Finzi sought. This is a more refined, elegant performance than the version by Bryn Terfel, whose ventures into the territory have brought new audiences to the genre.

Williams' gift for direct communication shows in songs like Childhood among the ferns. His subtle, rolling way with the text is exquisite, evoking the atmosphere of a balmy summer day, ferns, swaying in the gentle breeze. Ian Burnside's playing here is particularly delicate and lovely. So are you drawn into the reverie that the final words, "this afar-noised World perambulate" cause a shudder. Similarly, in Overlooking the River, he expresses how "the swallows flew in the curves of an eight / above the river-gleam / In the wet Junes's last beam" by stressing the upward pattern : "flew", "curves" "eight", and marking the slight gap between "wet" and "June's". His attack on certain high notes, such as "dripped" is cautious, yet strangely, reflects the underlying tone of the song as a whole. He also illustrates accurately the quirky phrasing of lines like "where the footstep falls / with a pit-pat wearisome / in its cadency / on the flagstones drearisome" in Epeisodia. The grammar may be convoluted, but Williams makes it sound perfectly natural.

A wonderful recording showing how English song can be performed with freshness and musical intelligence."
-- Anne Ozorio, MusicWeb International, May 2005