Hahn reviews

In little more than a decade Marianne Crebassa has established herself in the first rank of a new generation of mezzo-sopranos. A former Paris Opera young artist, she sings at Salzburg and Berlin as well as in Paris, and has already made her American debut in Chicago.

The British-Israeli Yaniv d’Or moves into a different repertory for his recital disc, and one that countertenors rarely explore: the music of 19th- and 20th-century French and German composers, some of whom will probably never have encountered a voice of his type. In theory, there’s no reason for the voice and the music to be held apart, though in practice the result frequently proves less than ideal. In the great Schumann cycle Dichterliebe, d’Or’s musicianship is apparent but so is a limited range of dynamics and colour.

The lambent, copper-toned voice that caught people’s ears when in 2006 Pumeza Matshikiza sang the role of Concepçion in Ravel’s L’heure espagnole at the Royal College of Music has matured without losing focus or individuality. It’s a treat to hear her reprise an excerpt here, but her second recital album lacks coherence, swerving between verismo arias, mélodies, and lollipops by Montsalvatge, Sarti and Yradier. While Matshikiza’s fresh, even, iridescent tone is ideally weighted for Puccini’s Mimi and Liù, her Suor Angelica lacks edge.

Premiered in 1923, and an instant classic of the lighter French tradition, Reynaldo Hahn’s operetta consciously references its predecessors, with a setting in Paris and the countryside in 1867 – the heyday of Jacques Offenbach. Revived at the Opéra Comique in 2013, Michel Fau’s respectful production manages simultaneously to exude plenty of theatrical life.

As stylish as only Hahn could be. And perhaps the last of the 19th-century French operetta tradition with bittersweet melodies and Finales that play as many rhythmic games as Offenbach. A fine cast with Mesplé, Van Dam and Gedda all in excellent voice. Christopher Cook

Anyone looking for an introduction to the mélodie could do a lot worse than starting with this charming collection from Yvonne Kenny and Malcolm Martineau. Traversing the highways, and a few byways, of French song from Gounod to Satie and Ravel, this collection presents several well known works without simply gorging on easy-listening favourites.

Joyce DiDonato’s lyric mezzo, with its bright top and feisty lower chest register, is the ideal guide for a musical journey through Venice – and this was a shrewd choice for her Wigmore debut recital last January, now documented on the ever-delightful Wigmore Hall Live label. Julius Drake woos us in with the dappled light of his gently seductive piano playing. But, before we know it, it’s the fears and the excitement rising with the tide which we’re experiencing in the fast, highly-charged vibrato of DiDonato for Rossini’s Le regata veneziana.

Don’t be misled by the title! By far the majority of the songs here are not chansons, but mélodies. That’s to say, they deal with profound emotions, and both Lynne Dawson and Julius Drake perform them as such. No whiff, I’m glad to say, of condescending treatment as though of the Lied’s little sister. At the same time the songs that are truly chansons, such as Chabrier’s ‘Villanelle des petits canards’ and Poulenc’s ‘Nous voulons une petite soeur’, are thrown off with delightful wit and charm.

Born in the wrong place (Venezuela) at the right time (1875), Reynaldo Hahn was transferred to Paris – which he quickly recognised as his spiritual home – at the age of three. By the turn of the century he was an ornament to the French capital’s social and musical life, and continued on until after the Second World War, as conductor, administrator, pianist, singer and composer.