Been listening to Royal Mezzo and was hit up-side the head by one word: Utterly. She cries this on the first track, Barber’s Andromache’s Farewell. The line is “now the Gods have destroyed us utterly” (11:05). This one word totally blew me away. It’s meant to. It’s that good! So, this got me thinking of other words she sings and I end up obsessing about. Barber’s Sure on this Shining Night (from her My Native Land cd) has the line “all is healed, all is health”. I’m brought to tears when I hear this. A few years later she sings the same song on a cd tribute to Lotte Lehmann but this time changes the emphasis on the words “healed” and “health” and I’m blown away, yet again. I’m not sure which version I prefer, but lately the Lehmann cd seems to be winning. She and Barber seem to be a perfect fit and I’ve mentioned before how I’d love to hear her do Knoxville: Summer of 1915.
For now, I’m thrilled she had the keen intelligence to put Barber, Berlioz, Britten and Ravel on one kick-ass cd (Hello, second Grammy award?). I’ll get to the Britten piece at some point, because I think she has broken new Larmore ground here. Britten? Lamore? Who knew?
Oh, and come to think of it, listen to the line “come close, embrace me” (7:59) on Andromache’s Farewell. It’s utterly breathtaking.
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