Hyperion Records
Click album cover image to view the sleeve notes
CDH55067
(Originally issued on CDA66209)
Helios (Hyperion's budget label)

Buy? £6.99

Recording details: July 1985
St Barnabas's Church, North Finchley, London, United Kingdom
Produced by Martin Compton
Engineered by Antony Howell
Release date: June 2001
Total duration: 58 minutes 19 seconds
Available for download on iTunes: Yes

View sleeve notes/artwork

'Wonderful performances of two of Britten's finest song cycles, consistently beautiful in vocal quality, and almost miraculous in their integration of clear expressive diction. Deserves a place in every collection' (BBC Music Magazine)

'English vocal intelligence at its best, accompanied with utmost orchestral colouring by Graham Johnson' (The Independent on Sunday)

'Strongly recommended' (Fanfare, USA)

Britten: Winter Words
Anthony Rolfe Johnson (tenor), Graham Johnson (piano)
Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo, Op 22  Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)
1
No 1: Sonetto XVI. Sì come nella penna e nell' inchiostro  [2:01]
2
No 2: Sonetto XXXI. A che più debb'io mai l'intensa voglia  [1:29]
3
No 3: Sonetto XXX. Veggio co' bei vostri occhi un dolce lume  [3:54]
4
No 4: Sonetto LV. Tu sa' ch'io so, signor mie, che tu sai  [1:54]
5
No 5: Sonetto XXXVIII. Rendete a gli occhi miei  [1:50]
6
No 6: Sonetto XXXII. S'un casto amor, s'una pietà superna  [1:22]
7
No 7: Sonetto XXIV. Spirto ben nato, in cui si specchia e vede  [4:48]
8
Canticle I 'My beloved is mine and I am his', Op 40 'Ev'n like two little bank divided brooks'  [7:28]  Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)
9
The Salley Gardens 'Down by the Salley Gardens my love and I did meet'  [2:40]  Anonymous - traditional, arr. Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)
10
The trees they grow so high  [3:34]  Anonymous - traditional, arr. Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)
11
Little Sir William 'Easter day was a holiday'  [2:48]  Anonymous - traditional, arr. Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)
12
O Waly, Waly 'The water is wide, I cannot get o'er'  [3:37]  Anonymous - traditional, arr. Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)
Winter Words, Op 52  Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)
13
No 1: At day-close in November  [1:43]
14
No 2: Midnight on the Great Western 'The Journeying Boy'  [4:49]
15
No 3: Wagtail and Baby 'A Satire'  [2:04]
16
No 4: The Little Old Table  [1:23]
17
No 5: The Choirmaster's Burial 'The Tenor Man's Story'  [3:45]
18
No 6: Proud Songsters 'Thrushes, Finches and Nightingales'  [1:04]
19
No 7: At the Railway Station, Upway 'The Convict and the Boy with the Violin'  [2:46]
20
No 8: Before Life and After  [3:20]