Arthur Sullivan

This exceptional recording gathers the finest young vocal talents in a unique program of songs by Sullivan, many of them very rarely recorded. Currently widely acclaimed for key operatic title roles in the UK and abroad, the ""deeply touching, outstanding"" (The Guardian)soprano Mary Bevan, the ""elegant yet intense, impeccable"" (The Guardian) tenor Ben Johnson, and the ""increasingly impressive"" (The Financial Times) bass-baritone Ashley Riches - who here appears on Chandos for the first time - span fifty years of Arthur Sullivan's large non-operatic vocal output. They are accompanied by the UK pianist David Owen Norris, who regularly appears in highly praised concerto performances at the BBC Proms. This album continues to celebrate the Shakespeare anniversary but also presents a wide variety of poets, drawing on texts from a vast range of sources, through the voices of today's greatest rising stars.

Sir Charles Groves’s sturdy yet affectionate reading of Arthur Sullivan’s wholly charming Irish Symphony was always one of the best of his EMI offerings with the RLPO and the 1968 recording remains vivid. In the sparkling Overture di hallo, again, Groves conducts with plenty of character. There are also first-rate performances of Sullivan’s undemanding Cello Concerto from 1866 (in a fine reconstruction by Sir Charles Mackerras – the manuscript was destroyed in Chappell’s fire of 1964) as well as Elgar’s wistful little Romance (originally for bassoon). This is a thoroughly attractive mid-price reissue.

Conductor Sir Charles Mackerras has always been a champion of the music of Arthur Sullivan. In the early '90's, he began to record the Gilbert & Sullivan operettas with Telarc. Like the Sargent recordings of the '50's, Mackerras uses mostly opera singers–veterans of Covent Garden and of the English and Welsh National Operas but he secured the services of two veteran Savoyards, Richard Suart and the late Donald Adams. Mackerras planned to record at least seven of the Savoy operas, perhaps more, but was forced to suspend the series due to lack of funding as I understand. This fine recording of The Mikado, fortunately, was one of the four he was able to complete.

“IVANHOE is a romantic opera in three acts based on the novel by Sir Walter Scott, with music by Sir Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by Julian Sturgis. It premiered at the Royal English Opera House on 31 January 1891 for a consecutive run of 155 performances, unheard of for a grand opera. Later that year it was performed six more times, making a total of 161 performances.

Arthur Sullivan always wanted to be known more as a serious composer than one of comic opera, and his Symphony in E minor ("Irish") and his grand opera Ivanhoe, immensely popular in its own time, have been revived in recent decades. The same cannot be said of his songs, which are all but unknown except for The Lost Chord. That chestnut is not even included on this expansive two-disc survey, a highly worthwhile look into Sullivan the song composer.

This 1986 recording with the London Symphony Orchestra and Julian Lloyd Webber as soloist is the best recording of the Sullivan I have ever come across. The three movements, which are played without a break, climb from a brief formal opening, to soar like an operatic aria in the second movement before culminating in a very powerful and melodic finale. The Herbert Cello Concerto n 2 is one of the composer’s most notable instrumental works (although he was a cellist himself, Herbert remains well known primarily for his operettas and musicals). Lloyd Webber’s interpretation of the concerto is flawless.

The D’Oyly Carte Company began its association with Decca after World War II, embarking on a series of recordings in the late 1940s and early 50s of the major Savoy Operas. A subsequent stereo-era cycle, begun in 1957, was followed in turn by a new series of which the present 1974 recording of Iolanthe is part of; in many respects, it is superior to its 1960 predecessor. Whereas the former set had used an ad-hoc orchestra, one of the glories of this remake is the contribution of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra – immediately apparent from the atmospheric strings at the start of the overture (one of the few which Sullivan composed himself) and the brilliant woodwind playing in its fleet-footed dancing passages.