Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – A Countertenor Songbook (2018) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz]

This album brings together the works of seven very different composers in a single songbook. Most of the pieces were written specially for countertenor Andrew Watts, who has championed contemporary music for the thirty years he has been singing professionally. He has established a reputation for being one of the foremost operatic countertenors of his generation and has appeared on opera and concert platforms throughout the world.

The two most senior composers on this recording link back to Andrew at the start of his career. His school music master Neville Bower (1934-2007) set three poems from William Blake’s Songs of Innocence specially for Andrew, and when Andrew was an emerging singer, Michael Tippett (1905 1998) coached him on his song cycle Songs for Ariel, written for an Old Vic production of William Shakespeare’s The Tempest.

Colin Matthews (b1946) has long been fascinated with nineteenth-century French poets and the fi n-de-siècle sound and in his song cycle Un Colloque Sentimental uses poems by Paul Verlaine, Charles Baudelaire and Gerard de Nerval. Michael Finnissy (b1946)chooses German dramatist Georg Büchner as his inspiration, setting extracts from Woyzeck and Lenz.

Kings, knights and troubadours are the themes explored in the recent works written for Andrew by Joe Cutler (b1968), Tansy Davies (b1973) and Raymond Yiu (b1973), and there is an extra piece by Raymond Yiu; a piano and countertenor arrangement of the fourth movement of his Symphony for countertenor and orchestra.

Andrew Watts writes: ‘I am indebted to all of the composers featured on this recording for their kindness over the years and for agreeing to be a part of this journey. From a last-minute coaching session at the Royal Academy of Music with Michael Tippett in 1986 to a random drink at Dartington in 2013 with Joe Cutler, this recording also charts the incredible serendipity and bringing together of people through music.

Tracklist:
1-01. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Songs for Ariel – No. 1. Come unto these yellow sands (01:53)
1-02. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Songs for Ariel – No. 2. Full fathom five (01:44)
1-03. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Songs for Ariel – No. 3. Where the bee sucks (01:12)
1-04. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Dann nicht zu fragen – I. — (06:25)
1-05. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Dann nicht zu fragen – II. — (04:44)
1-06. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Song for Arthur – Song for Arthur (07:22)
1-07. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – FForget-Me-Not (04:39)
1-08. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Song of Pure Nothingness (13:49)
1-09. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Songs of Innocence, Op. 46 – No. 1. Infant Joy (01:36)
1-10. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Songs of Innocence, Op. 46 – No. 2. Piping Down the Valley Wild (03:37)
1-11. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Songs of Innocence, Op. 46 – No. 3. Little Lamb (03:45)
1-12. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Symphony – Intermezzo – V. — (06:02)
1-13. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Un colloque sentimental – I. Colloque sentimental, 1ere partie (01:25)
1-14. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Un colloque sentimental – II. Le jet d’eau (04:26)
1-15. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Un colloque sentimental – III. Que diras-tu ce soir (03:53)
1-16. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Un colloque sentimental – IV. Intermezzo- Une allee du Luxembourg (02:24)
1-17. Andrew Watts & Iain Burnside – Un colloque sentimental – V. Colloque sentimental, 2ere partie (04:50)