Judith Weir

Judith Weir always seems to stand,

in that lovely phrase of EM Forster

about the poet Cavafy, ‘at a slight

angle to the universe’. And that

applies conspicuously to her songs,

in which vocal lines seemingly

derived from the folk ballads of the

world and familiar-sounding piano

figures never quite cohere into the

phrases and cadences and climaxes

that they imply. But this matches the

elusive fables to which she’s drawn

for many of her texts: not for nothing

does Iain Burnside in an engaging

Published: January 20, 2012 at 4:03 pm

COMPOSERS: Judith Weir
LABELS: Signum
ALBUM TITLE: Weir: On Buying a Horse
WORKS: On Buying a Horse; Songs from the

Exotic; Scotch Minstrelsy; The Voice

of Desire; King Harald’s Saga;

A Spanish Liederbooklet, etc
PERFORMER: Ailish Tynan (soprano), Susan Bickley

(mezzo-soprano), Andrew Kennedy

(tenor), Iain Burnside (piano)
CATALOGUE NO: SIGCD087

Judith Weir always seems to stand,



in that lovely phrase of EM Forster



about the poet Cavafy, ‘at a slight



angle to the universe’. And that



applies conspicuously to her songs,



in which vocal lines seemingly



derived from the folk ballads of the



world and familiar-sounding piano



figures never quite cohere into the



phrases and cadences and climaxes



that they imply. But this matches the



elusive fables to which she’s drawn



for many of her texts: not for nothing



does Iain Burnside in an engaging



note call her ‘a magic realist’.



Of the three singers on this disc



from Radio 3’s ‘Voices’ series, Susan



Bickley brings off equally well the



diverse folklore of Songs from the



Exotic, the cycle The Voice of Desire



with its various prescient birds, and



the remarkable unaccompanied



King Harald’s Saga, a three-act



opera with a cast of thousands.



Andrew Kennedy’s light tenor sails



pleasingly through the dark deeds of



Scotch Minstrelsy, but Ailish Tynan



doesn’t quite catch the Iberian



inflections implicit in the vocal



TIM TRUMBLE/CHANDOS, LEBRECHT



lines of the (delightfully named)



Spanish Liederbooklet. Iain Burnside’s



piano playing is always supportive



and characterful. The recording



occasionally affords the piano more



presence than the voice, but it’s



generally clear.

This website is owned and published by Our Media Ltd. www.ourmedia.co.uk
© Our Media 2024