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Track(s) taken from CDA67290

The Holy City

First line:
Last night I lay a-sleeping
composer
1892
composer
1892
author of text

Sir Thomas Allen (baritone), Malcolm Martineau (piano)
Recording details: January 2001
Champs Hill, West Sussex, United Kingdom
Produced by Mark Brown
Engineered by Julian Millard
Release date: February 2002
Total duration: 5 minutes 7 seconds

Cover artwork: Psyche Entering Cupid’s Garden (1903). John William Waterhouse (1849-1917)
Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston, Lancashire / Bridgeman Images
 

Reviews

‘A persuasive case for the often sublime artistry of the humble parlour song … I found no trouble at all in listening to in continuously from start to finish. That no doubt has also much to do with the great gifts and skills of both artists’ (Gramophone)

‘Thomas Allen recalls happy evenings round the family piano and offers this well sung collection, which will strike a lost chord with many’ (BBC Music Magazine)

‘Done stylishly … by a great singer with a gorgeous voice’ (American Record Guide)

‘I was amazed, listening to the rich warmth of Thomas Allen's voice, just how many of these songs I knew … Popular, enduring tunes encapsulating a golden era, honestly performed by one of the great baritones of our age’ (Classic FM Magazine)

‘Recording and presentation are first rate … strongly recommended’ (MusicWeb International)

‘There is a warm and intimate feeling about Allen’s treatment of these songs … Malcolm Martineau’s accompaniments are exemplary’ (Opera News)

‘Our focus is on Allen’s strong, full-voiced renditions that rarely fail to ingratiate and impress … this is music for everyone’ (Classics Today)
A barrister by profession, Fred Weatherly was one of the most prolific and successful writers of ballad lyrics. (He wrote, among many other things, the words to ‘Danny Boy’.) As for ‘Stephen Adams’, that was the pen-name of Liverpool-born Michael Maybrick, who also pursued a career as a singer under his real name. For the final twenty-five years of his life Maybrick lived at Ryde, Isle of Wight, where he was elected mayor five times. In 1889 he had been a witness in a sensational trial following the murder of his brother James, a Liverpool cotton-broker, and the case has recently attracted renewed attention with the publication of a Victorian diary supposedly identifying James Maybrick as the serial-killer, Jack the Ripper.

from notes by Andrew Lamb © 2002

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