Name: A Lad's Love by Brian Giebler
Brand: Brian Giebler
SKU: 090404954221
Price: 9.9 USD
Availability: OnlineOnly
Rating: 4.5 (154 reviews)

ALBUM

Just 23 when this recording appeared on the Bridge label in 2020, tenor Brian Giebler was already getting attention as a rising singer. This release will only help him along, for it combines beautiful singing with intelligent repertory choice and fine insight into some unusual works. The album earned a Best Solo Vocal Grammy nomination in 2020. The all-English program opens with Ivor Gurney’s Ludlow and Teme, published in 1923 but written much earlier. The work sets texts by A.E. Housman and is for the novel combination of tenor, string quartet, and piano, and Giebler appropriately reins in his powerful voice to balance with the instruments and with the classical simplicity of Housman’s texts. There are important works by Britten, not heard as often as they should be; these include the cycle Fish in the Unruffled Lakes. It has probably been neglected because it was put together from works discarded from other projects, but it has many striking moments, and Giebler digs into the subtle W.H. Auden texts, shifting gears effectively from the Housman. Giebler brings together talented players and singers throughout, as one can hear in Britten’s Canticle II, Op. 51, where countertenor Reginald Mobley is highly effective in the work’s quiet drama. There are also songs by Peter Warlock, John Ireland, Roger Quilter, and contemporary composer Ian Venables, not a one of them receiving anything less than Giebler’s full attention. The texts are unified by the theme of unrequited love, made emotionally immediate in a modern way in the Venables song. Rather cavernous sound from a collegiate concert hall is one of the few features marring a very affecting album.

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A Lad's Love

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1. Ludlow and Teme: No. 1, When Smoke Stood Up from Ludlow

2. Ludlow and Teme: No. 2, Far in a Western Brookland

3. Ludlow and Teme: No. 3, 'Tis Time, I Think, by Wenlock Town

4. Ludlow and Teme: No. 4, Ludlow Fair

5. Ludlow and Teme: No. 5, On the Idle Hill of Summer

6. Ludlow and Teme: No. 6, When I Was One and Twenty

7. Ludlow and Teme: No. 7, The Lent Lily

8. In Flanders

9. Canticle II, Op. 51 "Abraham & Isaac"

10. In an Arbour Green

11. Love's Philosophy, Op. 3 No. 1

12. The Land of Lost Content: No. 2, Ladslove

13. Fish in the Unruffled Lakes: No. 1, To Lie Flat on the Back

14. Fish in the Unruffled Lakes: No. 2, Night Covers Up the Rigid Land

15. Fish in the Unruffled Lakes: No. 3, Fish in the Unruffled Lakes

16. Fish in the Unruffled Lakes: No. 4, The Sun Shines Down

17. Fish in the Unruffled Lakes: No. 5, What's in Your Mind?

18. Fish in the Unruffled Lakes: No. 6, Underneath the Abject Willow

19. We'll to the Woods No More: No. 1, We'll to the Woods No More

20. We'll to the Woods No More: No. 2, In Boyhood

21. We'll to the Woods No More: No. 3, Spring Will Not Wait

22. Songs of Eternity and Sorrow, Op. 36a: No. 4, Because I Liked You Better

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