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Volume 27 Issue 4 - February 2022

Gould's Wall -- Philip Akin's "breadcrumb trail; orchestras buying into hope; silver linings to the music theatre lockdown blues; Charlotte Siegel's watershed moments; Deep Wireless at 20; and guess who is Back in Focus. All this and more, now online for your reading pleasure.

Gould's Wall -- Philip Akin's "breadcrumb trail; orchestras buying into hope; silver linings to the music theatre lockdown blues; Charlotte Siegel's watershed moments; Deep Wireless at 20; and guess who is Back in Focus. All this and more, now online for your reading pleasure.

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varied and convincing as an entire orchestra.<br />

If the above review sounds almost too good<br />

to be true, that is because this recording is as<br />

well. This project demonstrates the human<br />

potential to persevere, and the spiritual<br />

capacity to grow together and bring to light<br />

beauty in isolation, regardless of external<br />

factors and influences. It is highly recommended<br />

to anyone whose spirit needs<br />

uplifting, or who simply wants to bathe in the<br />

glorious sounds of Cassidy’s Mass.<br />

Matthew Whitfield<br />

Hans Thomalla – Dark Spring: Opera in 11<br />

Scenes<br />

Shachar Lavi; Anna Hybiner; Christopher<br />

Diffey; Magid El-Bushra; Nationaltheater-<br />

Orchester Mannheim; Alan Pierson<br />

Oehms Classics OC 994 (oehmsclassics.de)<br />

! The whole idea<br />

of Dark Spring as<br />

being born of both<br />

song and opera is a<br />

considerable philosophical<br />

and stylistic<br />

leap. But what<br />

its creator Hans<br />

Thomalla achieves in this work is a lofty<br />

Singspiel recast as musical meta-theatre.<br />

Happily the 11 scenes are acted and/or sung<br />

by a fine cast who interact with each other<br />

in a deeply emotional manner as this avowed<br />

song-opera goes like a bolted arrow directly<br />

into the listener’s heart.<br />

Thematically this is a cautionary tale (the<br />

word “narrative” is technically more appropriate),<br />

one whose four characters we meet<br />

at an existential 21st-century crossroad<br />

where the theatre of Brecht and the angst of<br />

Jean-Paul Sartre collide. The playwright and<br />

novelist appear to have inspired Thomalla’s<br />

work, an operatic adaptation of Frank<br />

Wedekind’s Spring Awakening (1891). Dark<br />

Spring roars with the socio-political demons<br />

that drive our digital media world. Song lyrics<br />

by Joshua Clover reflect the shattered mirror<br />

of violence, while peer and parental pressures<br />

hover dangerously close at hand.<br />

Relationships crumble in overwrought<br />

romanticism and roiling sexuality leading to<br />

the climactic suicide of one of the four characters,<br />

Moritz, played with explosive combustion<br />

by countertenor, Magid El-Bushra.<br />

Tenor Christopher Diffey, contralto Anna<br />

Hybiner and mezzo-soprano Shachar Lavi<br />

sing their respective ways through the storyline<br />

that exudes visceral energy throughout<br />

Dark Spring. The Nationaltheater-Orchester<br />

Mannheim conducted by Alan Pierson shines<br />

as it navigates this difficult score.<br />

Raul da Gama<br />

Brian Field – Vocal Works<br />

Various Artists<br />

Navona Records nv6360<br />

(navonarecords.com/catalog/nv6360)<br />

! Reactions to<br />

Brian Field’s Vocal<br />

Works – as well<br />

as the red-whiteand-blue<br />

graphic<br />

evocative of the<br />

forbidding spires<br />

on a US/Mexican<br />

border wall – can<br />

be predicted: it’s<br />

an important disc, no doubt, often dripping<br />

with sardonicism and bitterness, shrouded<br />

in the music’s frequent dissonance. Gorgeous<br />

songs complemented by great choral and solo<br />

singing, however, triumph over these feelings,<br />

in a program selected and sequenced<br />

with uncommon care, with Field drawing<br />

on his consummate musicianship fuelled by<br />

hopefulness.<br />

Field’s extraordinary lyricism is deeply<br />

attuned to human emotion. Even when<br />

his music is immersed in feelings of fear,<br />

disappointment or even sarcasm – as in his<br />

adaptation of Charles Albert Tindley’s poem<br />

on By and By, in the swirling music accompanying<br />

Pablo Neruda’s bittersweet love<br />

poems, Tres Canciones de Amor and his own<br />

uniquely American satirical commentary in<br />

Let’s Build a Wall. In those works as well as<br />

elsewhere, Field shows that he isn’t afraid<br />

to wear his emotions on his sleeve, nor does<br />

he shrink away from the bitterness of social<br />

commentary.<br />

He is also a master of atonal turbulence<br />

and semi-spoken lines describing both political<br />

and intimate interactions. Field’s music in<br />

the song cycle Chimneys, Sonnets-Realities,<br />

dramatically reinvigorates the poetry of e.e.<br />

cummings with masterfully applied dissonant<br />

harmonies. The pinnacle of the recording,<br />

however, comes when Field pours his spirituality<br />

into the intense, gospel-soaked Let the<br />

Light Shine on Me.<br />

Raul da Gama<br />

Why do the Nations<br />

Stephen Powell<br />

Acis APL51200 (acisproductions.com)<br />

! American baritone<br />

Stephen<br />

Powell’s album Why<br />

do the Nations is a<br />

personal, vibrant<br />

and thoughtfully<br />

curated collection<br />

of <strong>27</strong> art songs<br />

from 11 nations in<br />

ten different languages, written between 1839<br />

and 1965.<br />

Dictated by world pandemic isolation<br />

requirements and in part as a personal challenge,<br />

Powell takes on the musical task of<br />

both singing and accompanying himself<br />

on the piano. Powell’s artistry imprints the<br />

album and flows via his warm and capable<br />

voice. His skillful accompaniment is especially<br />

on display in the songs of de Falla, Ives<br />

and Rachmaninoff. Even more compelling<br />

is the album's depth of introspection, based<br />

equally on the minutiae of his research and<br />

his interpretation of text.<br />

Why do the Nations takes its title from a<br />

bass aria in Handel’s Messiah, Why do the<br />

Nations so furiously rage together? (Psalm 2).<br />

This question ultimately guides the album’s<br />

What we're listening to this month:<br />

thewholenote.com/listening<br />

Inner Landscapes<br />

Xander Simmons, Collectif Novart<br />

Music for your inner cinema. An<br />

album of postminimalist chamber<br />

music inspired by the visual arts<br />

combining acoustic and electronic<br />

instruments.<br />

Pozgarria da<br />

Petar Klanac & ensemble 0<br />

Musical setting of four Basque<br />

poems by Father Bitoriano<br />

Gandiaga delving into gratitude,<br />

wonder and joy.<br />

Fire & Grace<br />

Alma<br />

Fire & Grace brings “a stunningly<br />

contemporary sound to classical<br />

string music” with Alma, their<br />

entrancing collection of Folk and<br />

Baroque music from Spanish<br />

traditions.<br />

The Sound and the Fury<br />

The Shea - Kim Duo<br />

The majesty of Grieg, the<br />

turbulence of Janáček, and<br />

absolute joy of Dvořák; the<br />

Shea-Kim duo brings the listener<br />

through a spectrum of emotion.<br />

thewholenote.com <strong>February</strong> <strong>2022</strong> | 39

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