Sir William Walton (1902-1983)
Complete Song Collection
Siân Dicker (soprano)
Krystal Tunnicliffe (piano), Saki Gato (guitar)
rec. 2024, St Mary’s Parish Church, Haddington, UK
Delphian DCD34328 [54]
What a wonderful disc! Let me start by echoing accompanist Gerald Moore’s comment: “Walton’s songs are really terrific, everything WW does is impressive – why the devil doesn’t he write more songs?” Before reviewing this disc, I checked up on Stewart Craggs’s Thematic Catalogue to remind myself what songs Walton wrote, and to see if any were missing from this disc. None were. That said, the score for The Passionate Shepherd for tenor voice and ten instruments (1920) is missing. Tell me where is fancy bred (1916) for soprano and tenor voices, three violins and piano remains unpublished. The Three Arias from Troilus and Cressida (1947-1954) are an arrangement for singer and full orchestra. Finally, three further songs from Façade – Long Steel Grass, Tango Pasodoble and Popular Song – were arranged for high voice and chamber ensemble.
The earliest examples of the genre are the Four Early Songs, the settings of poems by Algernon Swinburne, composed shortly before the iconic Façade. I guess that the final number, The Winds, is well known, but the first three, new to me, get premiere recordings. The Child’s Song is a gentle unchildlike rumination on the autumn of life. Song: Love laid his sleepless head is attractive and delicate, with an enigmatic final cadence. The Lyke-Wake song is a remarkable achievement for a sixteen-year-old lad. This meditation on death and purgatory gets the lightest possible accompaniment. This contrasts with the vivacious piano part for The Winds. The cod-Scots language of this poem is not overplayed.
Another early song is Tritons to verse by the seventeenth-century Scottish poet William Drummond of Hawthornden. One would swear that Walton had created a tone-row for this modernist work.
The chronologically next Under the Greenwood Tree is one of numerous pieces of incidental music for the 1936 film production of As You Like It. There have been several incarnations of the music; the present version was published in 1937. It is conceived as a charming Elizabethan pastiche.
Walton provided another score of incidental music for Louis MacNeice’s play celebrating the 450th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s [re]discovery of the Americas. It was broadcast on the BBC Home Service on 12 October 1942, the same date as Columbus had (probably) landed on what is now San Salvador in the Bahamas. Beatriz’s Song was originally scored for orchestra with lots of percussion. Christopher Palmer arranged it for voice and piano. It is a beautifully wrought meditation by Columbus’s mistress Beatriz Enríquez de Arana; she fears that exploration meant more to him than she did. A little gem. There are other versions of this song: by Steuart Bedford, and one for singer and guitar by Hector Quine.
The Three Façade Settings are remarkable. They are far removed from the “recited” performance of the original “Entertainment”, first heard in private in 1922. Daphne is a deeply felt meditation on the myth of the Naiad and her metamorphosis into a laurel bush. Unusually for Edith Sitwell’s poetry collection Façade, this is a straightforward lyric, no verbal gymnastics. It is subtitled “In stile inglese” [in the English style], but Christopher Palmer has suggested that its texture is more French than English neo-pastoralist. Through Gilded Terraces has an Iberian feel to it that mirrors the text’s allusions to “mantillas, capes” and [Dancing] the “Quadrille from Hell’s Towers to Seville”. It simply oozes Spanish sunshine. The final song, Old Sir Faulk, a real foxtrot, makes a wonderful cabaret number.
It is hard to believe that William Walton had not written for guitar before composing Anon in Love. In fact, he relied on advice of the legendary Julian Bream. The set of six songs, an Aldeburgh Festival commission, were first performed at Ipswich on 21 June 1960. The poems, all about love, were assembled by the author and actor Christopher Hassall from a collection of 16th and 17th century lyrics.
This cycle is not an Elizabethan parody. Walton, who was clearly aware of the techniques of those Renaissance composers, brought contemporary procedures such as wide-ranging melodic lines and the percussive use of the guitar. A wide variety of moods are explored here. There is amorousness (Fain would I change that note and Lady, when I behold the roses), flirtation (O stay, sweet love), naughty humour (My love in her attire), a drinking song (I gave her cakes and I gave her ale), and a kind of Rabelaisian wit (To Couple is a custom). One commentator has described these songs “sweetness and spicy, [displaying] salty energy.”
Siân Dicker and Saki Gato give first-rate performance, consistently capturing the diverse moods of this vocal masterpiece. In 1971, Walton arranged Anon in Love for tenor and small orchestra. Christopher Palmer transcribed them for voice and piano in 1989.
I heard Walton’s A Song for the Lord Mayor’s Table long before any of his more popular and oft-recorded works. It was during the Last Night Promenade Concert broadcast on BBC TV on 16 September 1972. The soloist was Elizabeth Bainbridge accompanied by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Colin Davis. I cannot recall what I thought about it then.
This is another cycle where Christopher Hassall chose the texts. In this case, they all highlight various facets of London. The original 1962 version heard here was for soprano solo and piano. Walton orchestrated it in 1970.
The opening number The Lord Mayor’s Table (Thomas Jordan) is in full pomp-and-circumstance mode. There follows William Wordsworth’s Glide gently, sophisticated and lyrical. Wapping Old Stairs (Anon) is boisterous, with just a hint of jazz, as it unfolds a jilted girl’s complaint to her Jack Tar “with a girl in every port”. William Blake’s Holy Thursday is dark and serious, as it sets out a scathing critique of an England that neglects and impoverishes its children, only to congratulate itself for offering meagre acts of charity. Siân Dicker excels with her performance of The Contrast (Charles Morris) which compares city living with the peace of rural life; there is such a variety of vocal technique. Equally exhilarating is the final song, Rhyme (Anon), really a vocal reminiscence of Oranges and Lemons, with a hugely ambitious vocal line.
Siân Dicker is a talented British singer known for her rich, full-bodied voice and dramatic flair. As a spinto soprano, she is equally at home in the opera house and the recital room. Her CV includes performances with the English National Opera, Garsington Opera and Guildhall Opera. She has won several awards, including the Singers Prize in the 2020 Royal Over-Seas League Annual Music Competition and the Oxford Lieder Young Artist Platform.
Choral conductor and writer David Wordsworth supplies most useful liner notes. The texts of all the songs are provided. There are photographs of the recording sessions and a great cover illustration which William Coates-Gibson created of an unidentified artwork. There are résumés of the three artists.
I cannot fault Siân Dicker’s imaginative and sympathetic performances of these songs, and her wide-ranging vocal accomplishments. She is an ideal interpreter of Walton’s music. Equally wonderful is the outstanding accompaniment by pianist Krystal Tunnicliffe and guitarist Saki Kato. The recital is aided and abetted by the perfect recording conditions in the beautiful St Mary’s Parish Church, Haddington.
John France
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Contents
A Song for the Lord Mayor’s Table (1962)
Anon in Love (1959)
Four Early Song (1918-1921)
Tritons (1920)
Under the Greenwood Tree (1936, 1937)
Beatriz’s Song (from Christopher Colombus) (1942)
Three Façade Settings (1931-1932)
