Vaughan Williams: Discoveries Roderick Williams

• 1 Nocturne No. 1. Smile O Voluptuous Cool-Breathd Earth 03:53
• 2 Nocturne No. 2. Whispers of Heavenly Death 06:03
• 3 Nocturne No. 3. Out of the Rolling Ocean 07:52
• 4 A Road All Paved with Stars (after R. Vaughan Williams A Poisoned Kiss) 27:05
• 5 Stricken Peninsula (arr. P. Lane) 08:15
• 6 No. 1. Procris 02:29
• 7 No. 2. Tired 02:12
• 8 No. 3. Hands, Eyes and Heart 01:29
• 9 No. 4. Menelaus 05:05
• Total Runtime 01:04:23

Info for Vaughan Williams: Discoveries

Discoveries offers world-première recordings of works by Ralph Vaughan Williams and an insight into him as a visionary, as a romantic, as a patriot and as a lover. The works presented here span his entire working career, from the Three Nocturnes of 1908 to the Four Last Songs composed fifty years later. What unites them is that living composers have been involved in realising them in their present form. Three composers, Anthony Payne, Adrian Williams and Philip Lane, combine an understanding of Vaughan Williams’s music with a deep love of it, so that the additional writing enhances rather than conceals or modifies RVW’s original.

Roderick Williams, baritone (on tracks 1 - 3)
Jennifer Johnston, mezzo-soprano (on tracks 6 – 9)
BBC Symphony Orchestra
Martyn Brabbins, conductor

Roderick Williams
sings a wide repertoire, from baroque to contemporary music, in the opera house, on the concert platform, and in recital. He has performed in all the major opera houses in the United Kingdom and is particularly associated with the baritone rôles of Mozart. He has also sung world premières of operas by David Sawer, Sally Beamish, Michael van der Aa, Robert Saxton and Alexander Knaifel. Williams sings concert repertoire with all the BBC orchestras as well as the Bournemouth Symphony, London Sinfonietta, Philharmonia Orchestra, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Russian National Orchestra, and Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, among many others. His festival appearances include the BBC Proms, Edinburgh, Cheltenham, Aldeburgh and Melbourne. Roderick Williams is also a composer and has had works performed at the Barbican Centre, the Purcell Room, and Wigmore Hall.

Booklet for Vaughan Williams: Discoveries