Since you are interested in Songs (Incls 'Five Poems by Thomas Hardy'), here is a list of other items that you may find interesting.
EDWARD ELGAR
Elgar: Part-Songs Cambridge University Chamber Choir / Christopher Robinson / with Iain Farrington (piano) [ Naxos English Choral Music / CD - released 10/Apr/2008 ] "Highly recommended!" (ClassicsToday.com 9/9 April 2008) |
GERALD FINZI
Finzi: Young Man's Exhortation (A) / Till Earth Outwears / Oh Fair to See (English Song, Vol. 16) John Mark Ainsley (tenor) / Iain Burnside (piano) [ Naxos / CD - released 3/Jul/2007 ] "For lovers of English song, this is an indispensable disc, especially with this thoughtfully compiled programme." (MusicWeb Feb 2008) |
JOHN IRELAND
Ireland: My Song is Love Unknown Lincoln Cathedral Choir, Aric Prentice [ Naxos / CD - released 20/Dec/2012 ] "Here's an excellent idea: a whole CD of John Ireland's church music, which tends to be scattered piecemeal in anthologies. The impression it makes is very positive...the tutti singing is convincingly uninhibited." (BBC Music) |
RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
Vaughan Williams: Piano Concerto / The Wasps / English Folk Song Suite / The Running Set Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra / James Judd (conductor) [ Naxos / CD - released 1/Dec/2009 ] "The Piano Concerto of Vaughan Williams has been seriously undervalued...a performance as fine as this one from Ashley Wass will simply have one marvelling at the originality of the piece and its distinctive slant on the idea of a piano concerto."... |
PETER WARLOCK
The Curlew / Lillygay / Peterisms Sets 1 & 2 / Saudades Adrian Thompson (Tenor) Christopher Maltman (Baritone) John Constable (Piano) / The Duke Quartet [ Naxos English Song Series / CD - released 30/Apr/2008 ] "The performance competes with the best, with sensitive playing from the Duke and finely shaded singing from Adrian Thompson." --Robert Cockroft, Yorkshire Post |
QUILTER
Folk-Song Arrangements / Part-Songs for Women's Voices (Complete) Amanda Pitt (soprano) Joanne Thomas (mezzo-soprano) Philip Langridge (tenor) David Wilson-Johnson (bass-baritone) David Owen Norris (piano) [ Naxos English Song Series Vol 11 / CD - released 29/May/2005 ] "A worthy addition to British song history. Quilter enhances traditional tunes with understated, self effacing arrangements" (MusicWeb June 2005) |
IAN VENABLES
On the Wings of Love / Venetian Songs Andrew Kennedy (tenor) / Richard Hosford (clarinet) / Iain Burnside (piano) [ Naxos English Song Series Vol 21 / CD - released 1/Dec/2010 ] "[Venables] manages to create worthwhile new artefacts within his conservative idiom. Expertly crafted, the results offer something genuinely personal and at times profound." (BBC Music Choral & Song Choice - December 2010) |
RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
Vaughan Williams: Five Mystical Songs / On Wenlock Edge (Chamber version) / English Folksongs Anthony Rolfe Johnson (tenor) / Graham Johnson (piano) / Simon Keenlyside (baritone) / Duke Quartet [ Naxos English Song Series / CD - released 16/Mar/2003 ] Ralph Vaughan Williams was born in the Gloucestershire village of Down Ampney in 1872, the son of a clergyman. His ancestry on both his father's and mother's side was of some intellectual distinction. |
ARTHUR SOMERVELL
The Shropshire Lad / James Lee's Wife / Songs of Innocence Catherine Wyn-Rogers (Mezzo-soprano) Christopher Maltmann (Baritone) Graham Johnson (Piano) [ Naxos English Song Series / CD - released 30/Apr/2006 ] For his songs Somervell chose a wide variety of texts, with settings of poems from Shakespeare to Browning and Housman. |
WILLIAM WALTON
Anon in Love / A Song for the Lord Mayor's Table / etc Felicity Lott (soprano) Martyn Hill (tenor) Craig Ogden (guitar) Graham Johnson (piano) [ Naxos English Song Series / CD - released 30/Apr/2008 ] "for a super-budget recording this, as with any of the British song series formerly with Collins and now with Naxos, is a must-have." -- Musicweb.uk.net |
BENJAMIN BRITTEN
Canticles Nos. 1-5 / The Heart of the Matter Judi Dench (narrator) Philip Langridge (tenor) Jean Rigby (contralto) Steuart Bedford (piano) Osian Ellis (harp) and various Artists [ Naxos English Song Series Vol 9 / CD - released 14/Dec/2004 ] "This is a very fine recording of some of the most exquisite vocal music of the past century, and enshrines the work of so many fine artists. Impossible to recommend it too highly." Bargain of the Month MusicWeb Jan 2005 |
ROGER QUILTER
O Mistress Mine / To Daisies / Julia's Hair / Go, Lovely Rose and other songs Lisa Milne (mezzo-soprano) Anthony Rolfe Johnson (tenor) Graham Johnson (piano) Duke Quartet [ Naxos The English Song Series / CD - released 25/Aug/2003 ] 1001 Classical recordings you must hear before you die (1901-1950) - Roger Quilter was born in Hove in 1877 into comfortable family circumstances. His father was Sir Cuthbert Quilter, who in 1881 founded the National Telephone Company and was for... |
VAUGHAN WILLIAMS / WALTON / HOLST / STANFORD / QUILTER / BRITTEN / etc
An Anthology of English Song (2 CDs) Neal Davies (baritone) Richard Edgar-Wilson (tenor) Bernadette Greevy (mezzo-soprano) Susan Gritton (soprano) Nik Hancock-Child (baritone) etc [ Naxos English Song Series / 2 CD - released 30/Apr/2008 ] Song, the combination of words and music, has taken highly characteristic forms in the various countries of the world, with the music shaped by the sounds of words, the particular linguistic patterns of vowels and consonants, and of grammar. |
BENJAMIN BRITTEN
Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo / The Holy Sonnets of John Donne / Winter Words Philip Langridge (tenor) / Steuart Bedford (piano) [ Naxos English Song Series Vol 7 / CD - released 2/Apr/2004 ] The three cycles on this recording span the years 1940 to 1953, an astonishingly productive and fertile period for Britten that saw the completion of no fewer than eight operas, as well as several other by no means insubstantial scores such as the... |
GEORGE BUTTERWORTH
Butterworth: Songs from A Shropshire Lad / Folk Songs from Sussex (English Song, Vol. 20) Roderick Williams (baritone) / Iain Burnside (piano) [ Naxos English Song Series / CD - released 1/Aug/2010 ] "Williams's engagingly fresh delivery, secure technique, eloquent turn of phrase and variety of tone are a joy throughout, as is his crystal-clear diction. Burnside, too, is at his customarily unmannered, attentive best, the crispness and poise of... |
RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
Vaughan Williams: Songs of Travel / The House of Life / etc Roderick Williams (Baritone) / Iain Burnside (Piano) [ Naxos / CD - released 30/Apr/2006 ] The early songs of Vaughan Williams reflect the contemporary interest in a form to which Parry and Stanford had given much encouragement. |
HOLST / PURCELL / SAINSBURY / LEWIS
English String Miniatures, Vol. 6 Royal Ballet Sinfonia / Gavin Sutherland (Conductor) [ Naxos / CD - released 13/Oct/2006 ] "A mixture of contemporary and classical. I question the mixing of styles. Modern recording of high calibre and readings that are alert and intuitive" (MusicWeb Nov 2006) |
Steuart Bedford, piano / Louisa Fuller, violin / Susan Gritton, soprano / Christopher Maltman, baritone
Holst - Vedic Hymns / Four Songs / Humbert Wolfe Settings [ Naxos English Song Series / CD - released 28/Nov/2003 ] The English composer Gustav Holst was the son of a musician and descended from a family of mixed Scandinavian, German and Russian origin that had settled in England in the early nineteenth century. |
IVOR GURNEY
EnIvor Gurney Songs Susan Bickley (mezzo-soprano) Ian Burnside (piano) [ Naxos English Song Series Vol 19 / 2 CD - released 1/Sep/2009 ] Comedy, desolation and lovelorn longing all touch the music of this 'lover and maker of beauty', whose songs find ideal interpreters in Susan Bickley and Iain Burnside... |
STANFORD / FINZI / WALTON / BRITTEN / TAVENER / etc
English Choral Music (Incls the Coronation te Deum & Song for Athene) Choir of St John's College, Cambridge / Christopher Robinson [ Naxos / 2 CD - released 30/Nov/2007 ] "At Naxos's bargain price these performances should be snapped up and relished. Better still, get yourself to Cambridge during Advent or Easter and hear the choir for yourself...All texts are provided." -- Gary Higginson, MusicWeb |