Aaron COPLAND (1900-1990)
Quiet City (1939-40) [10:21]
Eight Poems of Emily Dickinson (1970) [23:09]
Samuel BARBER (1910-1981)
Knoxville: Summer of 1915 (1947) [17:51]
Capricorn Concerto (1944) [15:05]
George GERSHWIN (1898-1937)
Summertime (Porgy and Bess) (1934-5) [3:45]
April Fredrick (soprano)
David Curtis (conductor)
Orchestra of the Swan
Recorded live at Civic Hall, Stratford-upon-Avon,
on 29 May 2011 for SOMM CD0118 [70:20]
One of the main attractions of this album is the intelligent and imaginative planning selecting and juxtaposing these American works. Buyers should however be aware that this is
not the first time that at least three of these items have been presented together - EMI’s 1994
recording 5 55358 2 (see below) also links Barber (Knoxville) and Copland (Eight Poems of
Emily Dickinson and Quiet City). All the items on this recording share the same sort of
atmosphere and often the same weight of instrumentation even down to the highlighting of
certain instruments - the trumpet for instance - playing a prominent part in Copland’s Quiet
City, as a short solo in Barber’s Knoxville and more prominently in his Capricorn Concerto.
Conductor David Curtis is an established figure working in the USA as well as Europe and the
Far East. Moreover the Orchestra of the Swan (OOTS) has welcomed visiting composers,
soloists and conductors from America.
Copland’s Quiet City - for a psychological drama by Irwin Shaw - evokes, as in so many
Copland works, a comfortable, comforting picture of small town Americana. It’s a smallscale nocturne beginning quietly, mistily as the city settles down to sleep. The music is serene,
the mood calm and nostalgic until a broad hint of discord invades the peace. Copland
explained that the piece was "an attempt to mirror the troubled main character of Irwin
Shaw's play" - eschewing his Jewishness and his ambitions to write poetry, for marriage to a
rich girl and the chance to become president of a department store. His conscience troubles
him as he recalls the haunting sound of his brother's trumpet playing. Copland’s writing for
the solo instrument is impressive: so plaintive and plangent.
Barber’s atmospheric portrait of a 1915 Knoxville summer evening is another warmly
evocative piece and it has received several recordings. My personal favourite is with the
more mellow tones of Barbara Hendricks delivering what sounds like authentic American
inflexions, with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas. This
was recorded in 1994 as EMI 5 55358 2 - and was later reissued in an all-Barber programme.
This new recording is meritorious too: April Frederick is a lighter-toned soprano with a most
pleasing timbre and impressive projection - she can certainly hold a long-sustained note with
supreme artistry and confidence. Just listen to her doing just that in the final Gershwin Porgy
and Bess ‘Summertime’. Listen also to how she and the OOTS touch the heart-strings in
Knoxville’s final prayer section - ‘May God bless my people…’ Again the trumpet is there in a
solo role in the louder brilliant mechanical evocation of the passing streetcar - all clangings
and sparkings.
Copland’s Capricorn Concerto blends Bach and Stravinsky. It is named after the house
Barber shared with his partner Gian-Carlo Menotti. The piece has the same scoring as Bach’s
Second Brandenburg Concerto and the Stravinsky influence reminds one of Pulcinella and
Petrushka. This is a nicely witty and acerbic reading.
Copland’s idiomatic writing illuminates the Eight Poems of Emily Dickinson. The lullaby-like
‘Nature, the gentlest mother’ is a lovely pastoral evocation. ‘Heart, we will forget him’, sad
and forlorn, is nonetheless gorgeously, warmly scored for the strings with haunting brass
figures. Themes of loss, death and eternity are prominent. The grand profundity of ‘Sleep is
supposed to be’ contrasts with the child-like visions of ‘Going to Heaven’ with those heartfelt
lines, ‘… If you should get there first, Save just a little place for me, Close to the two I lost!...’;
and of ‘The Chariot’ where the singer rides with Death to eternity. April Fredericks empathises
so well with these songs and the OOTS reveal all the subtleties of Copland’s sympathetic
settings.
A very satisfying concert of American music.
By Ian Lace
Dickinson songs:
‘Nature, the gentlest Mother’ [4:25]
‘There came a wind like a bugle’ [1:39]
‘The world feels dusty’ [2:01]
‘Heart, we will forget him’ [2:32]
‘Dear March, come in’ [2:27]
‘Sleep is supposed to be’ [3:07]
‘Going to Heaven!’ [2:57]
‘The Chariot’ [4:02])