First of all, hats off to Mike Dutton: these transfers are revelatory. The old favourites leap out of the speakers with amazing presence, beginning with Eva Turner’s famous “In questa reggia”, the 1928 version, which has never sounded quite as thrilling. Nor has Joan Hammond, heard in her vivid account of Rezia’s scena, ever seemed quite as lifelike or Joan Cross’s clean, clear singing been transferred so faithfully as here in the Miserere.
Praise too for the intelligent reclamation of several neglected, worthwhile items. Cross’s account of the Indian Guest’s Song from Sadko, strictly a tenor piece, catches her plangent tones at their most compelling. On another rare Decca 78, Richard Lewis’s smooth, youthfully mellifluous tone is ideal for Des Grieux’s Dream Song and Nadir’s Romance, although emotionally he sounds a shade detached, especially when compared with Nash’s impassioned account of another French aria, Jose’s Flower Song, also distinguished by Nash’s typically memorable use of the vernacular. Another piece of singing worthy of revival is John Hargreaves’s heartfelt account of Prince Igor’s homesick aria, surely the baritone’s most desirable recording.
Noble as a nimble Figaro and Papageno, Catley as a fiery Queen of Night, Coates as a haughty Carmen, Sladen as an affecting Tosca, and of course Ferrier in her best-selling “What is life?”, show the strengths of British singing in the 1940s. The version of the Rigoletto Quartet headed by Booth’s too-polite Duke might have been replaced by an earlier, Columbia version led by an exuberant Nash (with Noble as Rigoletto).
In his appreciative notes, Lyndon Jenkins wrongly states that Hammond “sang frequently [at Covent Garden] from 1948 onwards”. Quite the contrary: her fans were always complaining that she appeared all too rarely! Nor is he right in saying “Heddle Nash was recalled for Massenet’s Manon [to Covent Garden in 1947] on the strength of a popular recording he had made long before the war of Des Grieux’s principal numbers [sic].” In fact Nash recorded only the Dream (Columbia DB961) and the likely reason for his ‘recall’ was the popularity of the 1938-9 broadcasts of Manon with Nash as Des Grieux, and Teyte in the title-role. And why are the Lewis items listed in English translations when they are sung in French? These are peripheral matters. The CD is a delight; now on to Vol. 3.AB