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DCD34359-CD
£19.99
‘Such a morning it is,’ wrote Laurie Lee – and this album, taking its title from his poem, is rooted in such particular moments of lived experience, capturing that fleeting, introspective British light. Bass-baritone Tristan Hambleton and pianist Simon Lepper create a landscape of songs by Britten, Sally Beamish, Judith Weir, Huw Watkins, Tarik O’Regan, Errollyn Wallen and others, many in first recordings, drawn together by themes of time, loss and uncertain footing. Recorded with a close, inward focus, voice and piano search not for display but for connection – a meditation on being, and on what it means, in Robert Louis Stevenson’s words, ‘to know not how it is with you’.
'Items range from Purcell arranged by Thomas Adès (incidentally ‘Full fathom five’, long attributed to Purcell, is now generally considered – like the rest of The Tempest score – to likely be the work of John Weldon) through Frank Bridge and Britten, culminating in a varied group of today’s creatives writing in various styles.
The result is an attractive collection, voiced with confidence and an attractive bass-baritone by Hambleton and with Lepper providing secure, sensitive piano accompaniments.
Highlights include the initial Britten sequence, including three rare songs from This Way to the Tomb, a play by Ronald Duncan initially staged in 1945; Judith Weir’s clean-edged, purposeful setting of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116 (‘Let me not to the marriage of true minds’); Tarik O’regan’s Three Motion Settings, based on texts by the former Poet Laureate, and which show a freshness of compositional voice; and Huw Watkins’s Look Down, Fair Moon, where the performers’ dramatic approach precisely suits the thoughtful material.
Indeed, it’s the quality of the performances as much as the attractions of an unusual programme (eight items new to disc) that make this assemblage so desirable. Everything is considered, imaginative and delivered to a high level.'
VOCAL CHOICE
'There is a dark tone to lots of the songs – the booklet explains that several were transposed lower to fit Tristan Hambleton’s range – and this has implications for the tessitura of the piano too. Britten is always unimpeachable, and his short sequence This Way to the Tomb, written during the composition of Peter Grimes, is a perfect opener, crisp but always teetering on the brink of melancholy. Sally Beamish’s song gives the album its name, has an admirable pared-back simplicity, as is Judith Weir’s more declamatory setting of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116. Thomas Adès’s arrangement of Purcell’s By beauteous softness is both beauteous and soft, while Tarik O’Regan’s settings of Andrew Motion are more troubled, both in the hesitant vocals and peripatetic piano parts. Huw Watkins’ three songs look up to the moon and explore some of the higher reaches of Hambleton’s register, while Stuart MacRae’s "I know not how it is with you" is a little gem, tentative and aching.'
'Hambleton's clarity of tone is a consistent pleasure throughout. Britten's This Way to the Tomb is particularly striking, Lepper's accompaniment percussive and alive to Hambleton's phrasing. Richard Sisson's The Silver Swan is a delight, and Stuart Macrae's I Know Not How It Is with You sits at the album's emotional heart. In Huw Watkins's contributions we hear the full expressive range of Hambleton's voice, while Sally Beamish's Day of These Days — brief but telling — captures Laurie Lee's words with quiet precision, Hambleton's lower register particularly effective. The album's most elegant moment may be Thomas Adès's arrangement of Purcell's By Beauteous Softness, sung with real poise.
Delphian's recording team have done their customary excellent work, the sound beautifully suited to the intimate nature of the material'
Read the full review here.
'An album subtitled “The British Isles Reflected in Song” sounds as cosy as cheese on toast. It isn’t. After an obligatory pair of Brittens, bass-baritone Tristan Hambleton and pianist Simon Lepper swing down lanes and byways. The title song, by Sally Beamish, is a contemplative ramble. Songs by Frank Bridge, Britten’s teacher, hide like a robin from a hedgerow. And gems by living composers — Tarik O’Regan, Huw Watkins, James MacMillan, Stuart MacRae and Richard Sisson — compose a portrait of an island diverse in temperament and temperature. I was much taken by MacRae’s darkly internalised “I know not how it is with you.'
Norman Lebrecht for:
“You’d have to have a heart of stone not to be moved. It’s really beautiful.”
RECORD OF THE WEEK
APRIL 2026 - VOCAL CHOICE
Collections: All Releases, Contemporary, Editor's Choices, New Releases, Song
Category: Benjamin Britten, Contemporary, Editor's Choices, Errollyn Wallen, Frank Bridge, Henry Purcell, Huw Watkins, James MacMillan, Judith Weir, Sally Beamish, Simon Lepper, Song, Stuart MacRae, Tarik O'Regan, Thomas Adès, Tristan Hambleton
