Search - Enrique Granados, Joaquin Rodrigo, Joaquin Nin :: Canciones Amatorias

Nice repertory and singing, but give the girl some castanets

Terry Serres | Minneapolis, MN United States | 12/24/2002

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This recital was a mixed blessing. The program is well chosen. The music is exciting and alluring, accessible yet rare enough to be attractive to travelers along the byways of song. The performances are beautiful and thoughtful. Fink's tone is consistently attractive, her technique and ornamentation are impressive. But there are essential Spanish elements missing. Rhythms are not accented, with scarcely any rubato in evidence. She does not bite into her consonants or relish the typical Spanish sounds like "ll," "j," and "y." Part of the problem is in the foursquare playing of Roger Vignoles on the piano. In any case, the songs are captivating and Bernarda Fink's expressiveness is beautiful but undermined by this lack of flair. Though less effective than her debut art song recorded of Schumann Lieder on harmonia mundi, this remains nonetheless a record of lasting appeal.The program is of love songs offered from the perspective of man, woman, and third person. This music is so rarely heard and worth hearing as to make the disc self-recommending. Spanish composers lean more toward collections than narrative cycles, and here we have some collections presented in full and some excerpted. Spanish art song conveys a rich bittersweetness, stretching the ear with tangy chromaticisms and veiled harmonies, their unsettling effect kept within bounds by recognizable rhythms, modulations, melismas, and other characteristic flourishes. Refined, yes, but never too distant from its popular variants.The Granados collection that begin the disk has the first 5 songs rather centered on the pains of love, from different angles: deeply sympathetic narrator, a girl in the torments of young love, one man rueful, another wry and cynical. The last 2 songs move into more sanguine areas of the heart, the 6th a lighthearted folksong admiring young beauties at work, the 7th an exuberant transport in rhythms alternately propulsive and swaying. The Granados mini-cycle "La maja dolorosa" that follows is the best-known item in the program. Portraying three different women in grief, or perhaps a progression of grief in the same woman, the first song represents stark betrayal and disbelief; the second emerges somewhat, still distraught, dispossessed, drenched in desolate desire; in the third, bereavement gives way to a proud nostalgia.The Rodrigo selection is astute: "Pastorcito santo" a haunting, gently lilting Christmas carol, "Coplillas de Belén" another carol with jazzy rhythms imparting the impatient joy of Christmas morning. "Por mayo era" starts with the heat of the day underscored by piano arpeggios (shifting neatly to depict a nightingale). The fullness of the scene is contrasted with the singer's desolation in the second verse, where the arpeggios now become fractured and acerbic. "Adele" is pure folksong, sad and plain in regard of the girl's demise for love, free of harmonic twists and other commentary. The set concludes with the vibrant and soaring "Cancion del Duero," with rustic images elevated by the rapture of joyous and world-embracing love, building to a thrilling final verse and a rousing sendoff.The 3 Nin songs, while enjoyable, are more self-conscious in execution and the music a tad more bombastic. His arrangement of "El Vito" is too dense, not nearly as fun as Obridors's. "El pano murciano," about setting a kiss in silver, after a rather excessive piano introduction, does give into the simple whimsy of the verses.The program ends with music of the singer's homeland, Argentina. Guastavino is very sentimental: "La rosa y el sauce" ("The Rose and the Willow") is a pensive elegy. "Cita" offers a charming scene of a lazy tryst. "La palomita" ("Little Dove") is in antique style. These are united expressively in a straightforward musical style. Ginastera is represented by a sensuous, sad tango "Canción al arbol del olvido" ("The Tree of Forgetting") and a collection of 5 popular songs. "Chacarera" is notable for its dense rhythms. "Triste" starts with slow arpeggios again depicting a dry landscape of the soul, the blankness pierced by the singer's stricken cries of "Ah!" "Arroró" is a lovely lullaby, with sharp insomniac harmonies and the long hours tolling in the piano layer. Ginastera's accompiments are restrained but inventive.Though by rights this music ought to be close to home for her, what I found lacking here were musical traits that are distinctly Spanish -- the rhythmic verve, the bite of the consonants -- elements that would have given her performances greater personality. This is especially noticeable in the faster songs, where words are less distinguishable because of this weakness and accentuation of individual words doesn't come through. Berganza and De Los Angeles both have it -- you can compare their versions of "La maja dolorosa". Berganza's is on a 2-disk set on DG, De Los Angeles in a 4-disk compilation on EMI. Native qualities of De Los Angeles's voice, the inimitable blend of sweetness and sadness, give her an advantage in these songs. Her performance of the first features cor anglais accompaniment along with the piano, deepening the sorrowful effect. With this additional support, DLA takes a slower tempo resting on sturdy chest tones. The third song is underpinned by tentative staccato in the piano as the bereaved avows feelings and memories. Berganza is more confessional, but at times a tad lugubrious. Both have a piquancy to their voice that Fink lacks here. Even Margaret Price on an Orfeo disk of French and Spanish songs sounds no less authentic.The elements of rhythm and enunciation are even more decisive in comparing DLA's performance of 6 of the 7 Granados songs, recorded live in 1971 with De Larrocha at the piano delivering more robust sound. Though DLA is less secure tonally throughout, her performances have a radiance that Fink's lack. "Mañana era" is very delicate with more sadness in the voice; "Mira que soy niña" has crispness of rhythm; "Gracia mia" dances, the rapid-fire phrases maintaining a contour that Fink loses. Though both singers have facility in ornamentation, De Los Angeles is more successful thank Fink because her placement and pacing are better."