Search - Joseph Haydn, Hugo Wolf, Ludwig van Beethoven :: Thomas Allen - Haydn · Wolf · Beethoven / Martineau

A staggering recital

Larry VanDeSande | Mason, Michigan United States | 08/25/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a staggering recital that was much loved in England when it was released there and, later, in USA. If your tastes run to outgoing British baritones blowing off all the hatches, you'll want to go to Amazon.com.UK and see if this is available.



Thomas Allen and his accompanist, Malcoln Martineau, leave just about nothing to fantasy, imagination or subtlety in this concert, taped for British radio. Allen is as outgoing as possible in the Haydn "Sailor's Song", retelling the tale of saving Britain's grace. The remainder of the Haydn songs are similarly done.



The Beethoven is highly successful although this pair lacks the sensitivity the Stephen Genz-Roger Vignoles duo find in this music on an excellent Hyperion disk of 18 Beethoven songs. That pair also find more to communicate in the music. But nobody on the planet sings with more gusto and bravado than Allen in this recital. His work in this regard is wonderful.



I am less a fan of the lieder of Hugo Wolf and the eight selections of Moricke and Goether lieder that conclude this concert were, for me, less than anticlimactic after the staggering success of the first half. Still, Allen continues to bang away at the messages hidden and not so hidden by the poets.



Even though Allen has recorded the roles of Elijah and Don Giovanni on good-selling CDs, he is not well known in this country. This recital is memorable and a tribute to Allen, who is not normally considered in the top rank of lieder practitioners. They love him in England but he never caught so well in USA, where his image lags behind dons of the past like Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Hans Hotter, more widely recorded baritones such as Wolfgang Holzmair and Andreas Schmidt, and upcoming artists like Genz and Matthias Goerne.



Those are all Germans, of course, and deliver something quite a bit different from a Brit. If you want exposure to a unique lieder voice in highly worthwhile music, try this disk."