Spring Series - McKail/Spence/Yamada/Kynoch
10 April 2010, 8:00pm
Songs and works works for violin and piano by Debussy, Messeian, Saint-Saens and Schubert as featured on 'Fantasy', the new CD released by Stone Records.
This programme features several works and all the performers from the disc "Fantasy", recently released on Stone Records.Rhona McKail is well known to Oxford Lieder audiences, not least for having stepped in at short notice for an indisposed Lisa Milne in 2008. Nicky Spence is forging an exceptional reputation - he and Rhona starred opposite one another in the recent British Youth Opera production of The Rake's Progress.
Messiaen's early work La Mort du nombre, for soprano, tenor violin and piano, is very rarely performed but is a stunning piece of music, a dialogue between two "souls", physically separated but with a love so strong it overcomes this. This is followed by a selection of French songs, including Saint-Saëns' Violons dans le soir for soprano, violin and piano, another rarity and also a gem.
After the interval, we hear Schubert's settings of the poet Friedrich Rückert, the last of which is the song Sei mir gegrüsst. This song provides the theme for the central set of variations in Schubert's magnificent Fantasy, which concludes the concert.
Some interesting links:
Series
30 January 2010 | 9:00am