BAXTER Ask the Moon
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Genre:
Vocal
Label: Navona
Magazine Review Date: 05/2018
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 0
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: NV6133
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Nights Without Sleep |
Andrew Stewart, Piano
Peter Scott Drackley, Tenor |
Three Madrigals |
Andrew Stewart, Piano
Jessica Satava, Soprano |
Is this the cost? |
Andrew Stewart, Piano
Katherine Keem, Soprano |
Four Views of Love |
Andrew Stewart, Piano
Peter Scott Drackley, Tenor |
Grandmother, Think not I Forget |
Andrew Stewart, Piano
Jessica Satava, Soprano |
Three Poems from Edna St Vincent Millay |
Andrew Stewart, Piano
Jessica Satava, Soprano |
Two Last Songs |
Andrew Stewart, Piano
Annie Gill, Soprano |
April Twilight |
Andrew Stewart, Piano
Annie Gill, Soprano |
Skywriting |
Andrew Stewart, Piano
Jessica Satava, Soprano |
Author: Laurence Vittes
At the smaller end of the scale Baxter’s setting of Sara Teasdale’s exquisite Nights Without Sleep, with its ending line ‘my life will live on in music after me’, gives tenor Peter Scott Drackley, who sings with remarkably clear diction, an opportunity to be full-throated and ardent before giving way to 40 seconds of a gorgeous piano coda. Baxter does again and even more effectively at the end of ‘Let it be forgotten’. The most poignant is ‘Is this the cost?’ from his opera Lily, sung beautifully by Baxter’s wife Katherine Keem.
The best is the longest, ‘Grandmother, think not I forget’, a sweet love song set to a text Baxter co-wrote with his wife, drawing forth from Jessica Satava her best work, at times unforgettably. There is also clear, bright singing from Annie Gill in two songs set to poems by Linda Pastan and Christina Rossetti. And throughout, Andrew Stewart at the piano is a singer’s dream.
The songs were recorded between 2013 and 2017 at different venues in and around Baltimore and yet the sound always seems consistent and true. Brief notes and complete texts are provided.
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