Roderick Williams, Mary Bevan, Nicky Spence – Ralph Vaughan Williams: Folk Songs, Vol. 4 (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Roderick Williams, Mary Bevan, Nicky Spence - Ralph Vaughan Williams: Folk Songs, Vol. 4 (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download

Roderick Williams, Mary Bevan, Nicky Spence – Ralph Vaughan Williams: Folk Songs, Vol. 4 (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:00:38 minutes | 992 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Albion

This is the fourth and final volume in a series of albums recording all 81 of the folk songs in English that Ralph Vaughan Williams arranged for voice and piano or violin. 57 songs have not previously been recorded in these arrangements. This album has 19 tracks including 13 world premières.All but four of the songs were collected by Maud Karpeles in Newfoundland in 1929 and 1930. When she got back, she and Vaughan Williams spent some hours going through everything that she had found, selecting the 15 songs presented here – with an emphasis, it seems, on the sadder songs. As a result, many people will find this the most enjoyable album of the set. Maud Karpeles said that her life would have been worthwhile if collecting She’s Like the Swallow had been all that she had done.
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Mary Bevan, Nicky Spence, Joseph Middleton – A Most Marvellous Party: Noel Coward and Friends (2023) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Mary Bevan, Nicky Spence, Joseph Middleton – A Most Marvellous Party: Noel Coward and Friends (2023)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:17:24 minutes | 1,32 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Signum Records

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Noel Coward,celebrated musicians and regular Signum artists Mary Bevan, Nicky Spence and Joseph Middleton join forces for this album of works by Noel Cowardand his contemporaries.Featuring songs such as ‘Parisian Pierrot’ and ‘The Man I Love’, the album comprises of a collection ofsolos, duets and instrumental songs by composerssuch as Ned Rorem, Liza Lehmann, William Walton and Benjamin Britten.

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Sacconi Quartet, Mary Bevan, Charles Owen, Roderick Williams – Roxanna Panufnik: Heartfelt (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Sacconi Quartet, Mary Bevan, Charles Owen, Roderick Williams – Roxanna Panufnik: Heartfelt (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:21:21 minutes | 1,43 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Signum Records

Since Westminster Mass (2000) established Roxanna Panufnik’s firm place among today’sleading British composers, she has often been celebrated for her choral music. Her instrumental and chamber works, however, are equally striking, filled with dazzling imagination and poetic lightness of touch. Her latest album Heartfelt encompasses compassion, tragedy and irresistible humour, while demonstrating her passion for exploring diverse musical cultures, from East Sussex to Myanmar.

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Nicky Spence, Mary Bevan, Fleur Barron, William Thomas, Dylan Perez, Joseph Middleton – Brahms: Liebeslieder, Op. 52 & 65 (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Nicky Spence, Mary Bevan, Fleur Barron, William Thomas, Dylan Perez, Joseph Middleton – Brahms: Liebeslieder, Op. 52 & 65 (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:07:01 minutes | 1,05 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Resonus Classics

Johannes Brahms’ Liebeslieder-Walzer (1869, 1875), Op. 52 and Op. 65, are a cheerful, short, witty set of songs full of anger, joy and rejection. These part-songs are accompanied by one piano, with four hands and any number of voices can perform any selection. These enchanting works are performed as part of Barbara Hannigan’s Momentum project, which teams up new talent with more established performers. Here, tenor Nicky Spence, soprano Mary Bevan and pianist Joseph Middleton are joined by three rising stars (mezzo-soprano Fleur Barron, bass William Thomas and pianist Dylan Perez) in these love songs said to have been motivated by Brahms’s unrequited love for Clara Schumann.

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Mary Bevan, Nicky Spence, Roderick Williams, William Vann – Ralph Vaughan Williams: Folk Songs, Vol. 3 (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Mary Bevan, Nicky Spence, Roderick Williams, William Vann – Ralph Vaughan Williams: Folk Songs, Vol. 3 (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:00:41 minutes | 983 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Albion

This is the third in a series of four albums recording all 81 of the folk songs in English that Ralph Vaughan Williams arranged for voice and piano or violin. 57 of the 81 songs have not previously been recorded in these arrangements.

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Mary Bevan, Lucy Crowe & Bridget Cunningham – Handel’s Queens (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Mary Bevan, Lucy Crowe & Bridget Cunningham – Handel’s Queens (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 02:07:53 minutes | 2,34 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Signum Records

“Handel’s Queens” features some of the most exquisite pieces of music written by Georg Friedrich Handel and his contemporaries for the two finest singers of the eighteenth century, Faustina Bordoni and Francesca Cuzzoni. Often wrongfully framed as rivals, these dazzling new recordings with Mary Bevan and Lucy Crowe reveal the distinctive yet versatile talent of the Italian vocalists. Conductor Bridget Cunningham continues her research and created “Handel’s Queens” and directs London Early Opera from the harpsichord.

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Mary Bevan & Joseph Middleton – Voyages (2017) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Mary Bevan & Joseph Middleton – Voyages (2017)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:20:19 minutes | 1,27 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Signum Records

Soprano Mary Bevan and pianist Jopseph Middleton perform a programme exploring the genius of Baudelaire and Goethe, and how texts by them unlocked very specific musical landscapes in settings by Debussy, Duparc, Chausson, de Bréville, Séverac, Fauré and Schubert.Praised by Opera for her “dramatic wit and vocal control” in stand out performances on opera and concert platforms, Mary Bevan is a winner of the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Young Artist award and UK Critics’ Circle Award for Exceptional Young Talent in music. Pianist Joseph Middleton specialises in the art of song accompaniment and chamber music and has been highly acclaimed within this field. Described in the BBC Music Magazine as “one of the brightest stars in the world of song and Lieder”, he has also been labeled “the cream of the new generation” by The Times and “a perfect accompanist” by Opera Now

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Mary Bevan & Joseph Middleton – The Divine Muse (2020) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Mary Bevan & Joseph Middleton – The Divine Muse (2020)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:04:45 minutes | 1019 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Signum Records

After the success of their debut disc, ‘Voyages’, Mary Bevan and Joseph Middleton present their second recital disc exploring Lieder in German and Italian by Schubert, Haydn and Wolf. The programme is woven around songs inspired by the ‘muses’ of the day, both mythological and divine.

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12 Ensemble, Mary Bevan, Joseph Middleton – Visions Illuminées (2023) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

12 Ensemble, Mary Bevan, Joseph Middleton – Visions Illuminées (2023)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:14:56 minutes | 1,28 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Signum Records

Mary Bevan was born in Somerset into a large musical family (her slightly elder sister Sophie is also an internationally-acclaimed soprano), and read Anglo-Saxon, Celtic and Norse at Trinity College Cambridge before taking up a place at the Royal Academy of Music. Shortly after graduation she became a Harewood Young Artist at English National Opera, where her roles included Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro, Yum-Yum in The Mikado, Papagena in The Magic Flute and Rebecca in Nico Muhly’s Two Boys. Engagements elsewhere include the title-role in Mark Antony Turnage’s Coraline at Covent Garden, Merab in Barrie Kosky’s landmark staging of Handel’s Saul at the Adelaide Festival, and Dalinda in Handel’s Ariodante with The English Concert.

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Davina Clarke, Mary Bevan, The Davina Clarke Ensemble – Sweet Stillness (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Davina Clarke, Mary Bevan, The Davina Clarke Ensemble – Sweet Stillness (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:06:57 minutes | 1,33 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © VOCES8 Records

Soprano Mary Bevan is among the most versatile figures on the British operatic scene, with a repertory stretching from Monteverdi to contemporary premieres. She has a bent toward comic opera and has appeared several times in operettas by Gilbert & Sullivan. Bevan was born in Hertford in southeast England in 1985 into a musical family: her siblings Sophie Bevan and Benjamin Bevan are both successful vocal soloists, and their father, David Bevan, was a conductor.

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Tim Mead, Anna Dennis, Mary Bevan, Hilary Summers – Handel: Amadigi di Gaula (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Tim Mead, Anna Dennis, Mary Bevan, Hilary Summers – Handel: Amadigi di Gaula (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 02:36:47 minutes | 2,65 GB | Genre: Classical, Opera
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Chandos

The countertenor Tim Mead leads an all-star cast in the Early Opera Company’s recording of Handel’s Amadigi di Gaula, conducted by Christian Curnyn.

The opera was first performed, in London, in 1715, in the first season under the reign of George I, at the King’s Theatre on the Haymarket. The complex, twisting plot features the lovers Amadigi and Oriana, imprisoned by the sorceress Melissa (who seeks Amadigi’s love). His ally Dardano turns against Amadigi, his former friend, when he realises that they both love Oriana and he sides with Melissa. Her plans are repeatedly foiled, and true love triumphs at the final curtain!

Amadigi is considered the finest of Handel’s early London operas in terms of musical sophistication, theatrical pacing, and a perfectly balanced exploration of the interconnected relationships, motivations, and emotional divergences among just four dissimilar yet equally arresting characters.

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