Licht in der Nacht

St Michael’s Church - 16/09/22

When Hugh Kerr, founder of the Edinburgh Music Review, sent me a message to say that he was unable to review this recital, by Beth  Taylor and Hamish Brown, in St Michael’s Church in the Ardmillan district of Edinburgh on Friday 16th September,, and could I do it, I immediately refused. I am a good friend of Beth’s, I am singing a recital myself with her in the same venue on the 17th, she and I sang here last year and made a CD together, so how could I possibly write an objective review for the EMR. Then I thought, well, why not? What sort of reviewer am I, that can only write an objective review if I don’t know the performers? Full time critics have likes and dislikes, but have to be objective nonetheless. Therefore, dear reader, here we are, with me reviewing this concert after all, and my God, it was wonderful! Er no, it was terrible! Oh, read on, and see for yourselves! 

It was actually rather splendid, with one or two minor caveats. The idea for the programme was to focus on the astonishing burst of creativity that centred on the year1900, particularly in the cities of Paris and Vienna. The concert programme, designed by Beth, has several pictures of works by Gustav Klimt, and it is his erotic and provocative art that provided the framework for many of the songs we heard. Three of the composers were women, and if Klimt was the framework, Alma Mahler was the glue that held everything together. 

This extraordinary woman, born in Vienna as Alma Schindler in 1879, had an amazing, and frankly outrageous life, only dying in New York in 1964, the year of ‘Can’t buy me love’, ‘Oh pretty woman’ and ‘Walk on by’! She had an affair with Klimt, then Zemlinsky, married Gustav Mahler, then Walter Gropius, the founder of Bauhaus, then married the poet and novelist, Franz Werfel. Her writings about her time with Mahler were, for a long time, considered primary biographical detail but are now thought to be largely imaginary! And, she was a fine composer, illustrated in this recital by her ‘Four Songs from 1915’, which Beth sang at the end of the concert. 

Beth Taylor was born in Glasgow and is on the cusp of a huge international career. Still only in her late 20s, she has already had personal successes at the Deutsche Oper, Berlin, Oper Frankfurt, Opéra de Lorraine and Glyndebourne, and has an active concert and recital career. Her voice is unique in that she possesses fantastic low notes, but without the gravelly tones often heard in contraltos, and a fluid, easy top moving through the registers like the gears of a very expensive sports car. Married to this wonderful voice is an artistry well beyond her years, and a sensitivity to words and phrases which is rare amongst her peers. You see, I told you I’d be objective! 

The wonderful thing is that I was being objective. I defy anyone to disagree with what I have just written, from an objective point of view. She is lucky in her accompanist, as Hamish Brown, similarly young and talented, is the perfect partner on stage, supportive and sensitive when needed, but full toned and robust when required. 

There was a small but appreciative audience in St Michael’s Church for this concert, and I feel that it was perhaps a programme for a more cosmopolitan venue than a large church in the suburbs of Edinburgh in September. Beth and Hamish performed songs by Cécile Chaminade, Berg, Debussy, Boulanger, Schoenberg, Gustav and Alma Mahler and Zemlinsky, and, of the 26 songs, I, a professional singer, knew just two. With the best will in the world, that programme is not going to fill many halls, regardless of the quality of music or performer. Similarly, the concert programme, which, as I said, looked lovely, could have told us much more about the songs. One page of very small print notes was hardly adequate for a programme of 26 unknown songs, although I applaud the decision to print all the texts and translations. If the budget will allow, I do like to see all the words in a programme, as, even with the best diction, many words are lost in performance. 

I suppose it was inevitable with a programme such as this one, and with these composers, that laughs, or even slight smiles, were in short supply, but I think a bit more variety would have been nice. Even the cheeky ‘Sombrero’ by Chaminade ended with more than a hint of menace.  

I had never come across Cécile Chaminade before, but her songs, along with those by Nadia Boulanger, were excellent and well worth hearing. I knew of Boulanger’s work as a teacher, with star pupils like Daniel Barenboim, Lennox Berkeley, Burt Bacharach and Quincy Jones, but of her songs, I knew nothing. Beth and Hamish sang two, and I particularly enjoyed ‘Versailles’, a nostalgic look at a once vibrant palace, now a historical monument. I have never been able to find enjoyment in Schoenberg’s music after he plunged into serialism, and I’m afraid, despite wonderful performances by Beth and Hamish, his three songs tonight left me cold, as usual. 

I would love to have heard more Debussy – we got three of the ‘Fêtes Galantes’, Book One – as I think Beth’s voice works very well in French, and Debussy was a master of word setting, here with texts by the poet, Verlaine.  

It was a delight to hear the six songs that Alexander Zemlinsky wrote to German translations of poems by Maurice Maeterlinck, the Belgian writer whose play, ‘Pelléas et Mélisande’ had been so wonderfully set to music by Debussy in 1902. Zemlinsky, one of Alma Mahler’s first lovers, was inspired by Maeterlinck’s weird and creepy/sexy texts to write some fascinating songs, and Beth and Hamish were alive to all the nuances lurking in both text and score. 

So, it is clear that we were privileged to hear potentially one of the finest voices that Scotland has produced (indeed, we are awash with top Scottish mezzos at the moment), and I am only sorry that there were not more of us to hear her. Look out for her name, and you won’t be disappointed!