DCD34348-CD

everything you've ever lived

Regular Delphian collaborator Lotte Betts-Dean has wowed critics with her ethereal, ‘starkly beautiful’ voice. Here, she teams up with outstanding Greek guitarist Dimitris Soukaras in their first duo album, as they present a terrific array of songs exploring ideas of nostalgia, childhood memory and the state between waking and sleep.
 
Through borrowing, gathering and reimagining, this eclectic album wanders effortlessly through the creative spaces between genres, taking us from Ravel and Britten to Burt Bacharach and Sinead O’Connor.

‘Betts-Dean and Soukaras are known for their versatility and eclecticism, and the range of styles and genres here is diverse to say the least.

Throughout, Soukaras is a generous and sensitive accompanist; however, his full range as a guitarist is best appreciated in the too few solos here, such as Vicente Asencio's La calma or Jorge Cardoso's Milonga. ... 'Everything You've Ever Lived' is everything you've ever wanted in a voice-and-guitar recital: a varied and imaginative programme impeccably realised by two prodigiously talented young artists.’

‘Betts-Dean’s lyrical mezzo floats wistfully above the texture. With a rich lower range and a more reedy upper register, her voice pairs nicely with the more carefree works… This is aided by an intimate, live-feeling recorded quality from Delphian.

The album segues fairly seamlessly into songs by Ravel and Debussy, with Betts-Dean’s woody vocals tightened up but kept in a similarly dreamy sound world.

‘If you’re yet to discover Betts-Dean’s wide, powerful and pure, otherworldly voice with its tremendous range, you couldn’t hope for a more multi-faceted introduction, from the ethereal punch and sensuality she brings to the aforementioned ‘Canto de Ossanha’; to her wide warmth and depth in Caroline Polacheck’s ‘Go as a Dream’, and ethereal treble registers in Debussy’s ‘Les Angélus’.

Soukaras’s technique and colouristic paintbox is equally diverse, between but also within individual pieces...’

Charlotte Gardner

Read the full review here.

Betts-Dean's voice, no matter the subject she is singing about, is wonderfully seductive and beautifully smooth and partnered by Soukaras' stunning guitar playing. That at least ten of the tracks on the disc are his own arrangements must be to his credit in creating the sense of coherence and flow...The recording itself is something of a bit of magic too. Soukaras' guitar is recorded with plenty of crunch detail yet with air around the sound which matches Betts-Dean's voice where her seductive, smooth and silky quality is given a positive aura around it. The result is to make the disc a complete package.’

Planet Hugill

Read the full review here.

 

Release date: 26 September, 2025
Recorded on 2-3 December 2024 at Crichton
Collegiate Church, Edinburgh
Producer/Engineer: Paul Baxter
24-bit digital editing: Jack Davis
24-bit digital mixing & mastering: Paul Baxter
Paintings by Heather Betts: cover – ‘Overthrown’,
2017 (detail, reworked); booklet rear – ‘He letsme go’, 2015 (detail)
Cover photograph © Nikolai Matiushev
Session photography: foxbrushfilms.com
Design: Eliot Garcia
Booklet editor: John Fallas


Singing In Secret: Clandestine Catholic Music by William Byrd CD Delphian Records

PREVIEW

Shara Nova: Have You Ever Seen an Angel

Apple Music Style Audio Player

Watch


Lotte Betts-Dean and Dimitris Soukaras perform Armando Soares's Sodade in Crichton Collegiate Church ...

Album Booklet

Further reading....

 

Dimitris Soukaras on Everything you've ever lived

Dimitris, in conversation with Artemis from Madame Figaro,shares the joy of collaboration with Lotte Betts-Dean on their new album.

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