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Alison Smart (soprano) and Katharine Durran (piano) Tarik O'Regan Sainte Commission twenty composers to write a new song apiece and to attend their premieres and you have a sure-fire way to fill the Purcell Room, which can be a bleak venue for contemporary music when sparsely filled, as so often! Alison Smart and Katharine Durran persuaded British composers to set French literature of their choice from Victor Hugo (b.1802) to the present day and, two years on from the bi-centenary, the outcome has been show-cased. Alison Smart is a professionally equipped singer of great versatility, gained by serving in the BBC Singers, who have to tackle everything. She has a strong, flexible soprano voice, not in itself especially ingratiating, particularly in the top register, where there are problems - many contemporary composers are inconsiderate or ignorant of the impossibility of articulating words around the top of the stave! The music was thoroughly well prepared and the two make an impressive duo, with close rapport and unanimity of phrasing. They must be commended for preparing a collectable programme book, printed lavishly with parallel bilingual texts, photos and biographies of composers and authors; this to be the basis for the liner booklet of a forthcoming CD of the project. Unfortunately, as is the common way, the lights were dimmed at the Purcell Room so that it was not possible for most of the audience to follow the words, therefore one was left with a rather generalised impression. The songs were for the most part in conservative idioms and I was left unsure whether they would be sufficiently compelling to sustain a CD. The sequence made for a pleasant evening, and at the end of the two halves the composers were shepherded onto the platform to shake hands and have group photos. Alison Smart and Katherine Durran have on disc a successful previous project of English Song since 1970 (Metier MSV 92025); only eight composers, so it is less bitty and each has sufficient time to make a clearer impact. Most successful to my ears are Judith Weir's Scotch Mistrelsy, Nicola LeFanu's unaccompanied But Stars Remaining and George Nicholson's Peripheral Visions. Katherine Durran contributes two piano solos by Peter Maxwell Davies. Well worth exploring.
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