Wagner, Wesendonck Lieder
Berlioz, Villanelle; Le spectre de la rose
Duparc, Lamento; Au pays où se fait la guerre
Hahn, Infidélité
Chausson, Les papillons
Falla, Trois Mélodies

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Sir Thomas Allen (baritone)
Malcolm Martineau (piano)
Members of the Aurora Orchestra

Poulenc and Courtly Love
Debussy, Trois ballades de Villon
Poulenc, Songs from Poèmes de Ronsard
Duparc, L'invitation au voyage; Soupir; Le manoir de Rosemonde
Ravel, Don Quichotte a Dulcinée
Poulenc, Le bestiaire; Le bal masqué

Hooray for Wigmore Hall. To American ears the name sounds funny, and some of the bag-toting habitués who come for a concert every day may qualify as wiggy. But no other venue offers more great music in an intimate setting than here. As crowds devour the summer sale at Selfridge’s around the corner on Oxford Street, a few hundred listeners repose in the beauty of chamber music and song inside the jewel-box Wigmore. Dappled sun peeks in through the skylights – or the tap-tap of rain – while for half the price of tea at the Ritz some of the best performers in the world play for your pleasure.

I don’t know if they bring seconds at the Ritz, but the Wigmore does. Yesterday I attended two song recitals by famous British singers in the afternoon and evening. The first featured soprano Felicity Lott, beloved enough in the UK to have become Dame Felicity. I identify her with Richard Strauss (she sings the Marschallin on a video of Der Rosenkavalier under the great Carlos Kleiber), for which her supple, lustrous soprano is perfectly suited. This recital featured Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder and French songs by Berlioz, Hahn, and Duparc. Don’t let the sea of grey and blue-rinsed hair fool you as you look out over a Wigmore audience. These listeners are sharpies, and they know their Hahn and Duparc. Lott met their demanding tastes, but at 61 she’s given some affectionate leeway, too.

She mostly didn’t need it. The voice remains as smooth as Devon double cream – its most famous attribute – with perfect intonation and only a spread at high volumes to betray Lott’s age. Like many British singers, she’s on the bland side as an interpreter; she won’t often reach for affecting emotional depth. And no diva attitude is allowed. One expects to meet one’s artists over a Pimm’s cup in the green room, not pay homage at the altar. The Wesendonck set is always sung by a mezzo or alto, so hearing it from a soprano felt odd. Higher voices intrinsically smile, and this music probes a melancholy heart. Lott was assured but too extrovert. Only in the two greatest songs, Im Treibhaus and Träume, based on themes from Tristan, did Lott amplify her voice into a cri de coeur -- they were more moving than anything else she sang except for Hahn’s Infidèles, which was exquisite and passionate at the same time. Without both qualities, I find French chansons too precious – not for me their cool etched finesse. 

I guess the baritone Thomas Allen isn’t as beloved by the general public, because his evening recital was a quarter empty, but he’s much the greater artist (...and well enough liked to be Sir Thomas). In honor of his artistry I attended even though the entire program was French and featured songs by one of my few bêtes noirs, Francis Poulenc, whose whipped-cream confections mixed with a dash of religiosity and lots of boulevardier panache, aren’t a recipe I can stomach. Allen sings French perfectly (so I was told by a Francophone Wiggie sitting next to me), and he had England’s greatest accompanist behind him, Malcolm Martineau.

The result was richly satisfying and illuminating. I discovered that Poulenc’s songs on the poetry of Ronsard are stirring, and that I shouldn’t have foolishly overlooked Ravel’s lovely Don Quichotte cycle, either. Gallic charm has its moments. Allen came out after intermission with some string and wind players, very accomplished ones, and performed a set of miniature bestiary ditties by Poulenc, each a minute long, set to Apollinaire’s idea of a menagerie (dromedary, Tibetan goat, crayfish, mouse) – sophisticated morceaux that didn’t outstay their preciosity. Far better was Le bal masque, in which Poulenc sets circus music and hurdy-gurdy rhythms to dada lyrics by Max Jacob. Clearly the composer listened in at the window when Stravinsky’s Histoire du Soldat was being played, but Le Bal taps an original vein of neo-classical foolery. I tapped my foot and wanted more, please, after it was over. We Americans should pay attention to the veteran Allen – his CDs of Wolf and Brahms lieder are exceptional, and so, surprisingly, is his recital of songs by Samuel Barber. You can look as bluff as a Beefeater and still be a genuine artist. True to the British ethos, Allen may be unassuming, but Wiggies adore him, and they know.