Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco - Shakespeare Sonnets (Ashley Riches; Emma Abbate)

Information

Composer: Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco

1. Sonnet 8: Music To Hear, Why Hear’st Thou Music Sadly?
2. Sonnet 30: When To The Sessions Of Sweet Silent Thought
3. Sonnet 97: How Like A Winter Hath My Absence Been From Thee
4. Sonnet 105: Let Not My Love Be Called Idolatry
5. Sonnet 73: That Time Of Year Thou May’st In Me Behold
6. Sonnet 109: O Never Say That I Was False of Heart
7. Sonnet 18: Shall I Compare Thee To A Summer’s Day?
8. Sonnet 146: Poor Soul, The Centre Of My Sinful Earth
9. Sonnet 27: Weary With Toil, I Haste Me To My Bed
10. Sonnet 106: When In The Chronicle Of Wasted Time
11. Sonnet 90: Then Hate Me When Thou Wilt; If Ever, Now
12. Sonnet 102: My Love Is Strengthen’d, Though More Weak In Seeming
13. Sonnet 32: If Thou Survive My Well-Contented Day
14. Sonnet 53: What Is Your Substance, Whereof Are You Made
15. Sonnet 35: No More Be Grieved At That Which Thou Hast Done
16. Sonnet 60: Like As The Waves Make Towards The Pebbled Shore
17. Sonnet 128: How Oft, When Thou, My Music, Music Play’st
18. Sonnet 57: Being Your Slave
19. Sonnet 29: When In Disgrace With Fortune And Men’s Eyes
20. Sonnet 64: When I Have Seen By Time’s Fell Hand Defaced
21. Sonnet 65: Since Brass, Nor Stone, Nor Earth, Nor Boundless Sea
22. Sonnet 87: Farewell! Thou Art Too Dear For My Possessing
23. Sonnet 104: To Me, Fair Friend, You Never Can Be Old

Ashley Riches, baritone

Emma Abbate, piano

Date: 2014

Label: Resonus

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Review

Say the name Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco to anyone and the chances are that they will think of the guitar music. He was also a prominent film composer working on over 200 films in Hollywood and a number of the film greats were his pupils. This new disc from baritone Ashley Riches and pianist Emma Abbate showcases another side to the composer, his love of Shakespeare. Recorded on the download-only Resonus Classics label we have 23 of Castelnuovo-Tedesco's settings of Shakespeare's sonnets.

Castelnuovo-Tedesco came from prominent Jewish banking family in Florence and his early career had involved study with Pizzetti and Casella. Castelnuovo-Tedesco left Italy in 1939, fleeing the new racial laws. Though he worked in films for 15 years (Rita Hayworth's The Loves of Carmen was one of his) he continued to write concert music as well and would return to Shakespeare with the opera The Merchant of Venice in 1956. Shakespeare seems to have been an ongoing obsession for him and these settings of the sonnets date from 1940-45; he had already set the 33 songs from the plays in the 1920s.

There is little sense of war or anger in these songs, no feeling of the period in which they were written. Musically they are clearly late romantic, rather complex with long vocal lines. There certainly isn't much of a whiff of film music either, these are highly serious pieces. The songs are all quite short, around two and a half minutes.

The problem for me is that the sonnets themselves, which Castelnuovo-Tedesco sets in English, are quite wordy and very strong in their own right. Castelnuovo-Tedesco's word setting is generally syllabic and I have to confess that I find the results rather meandering. Individual moments can be expressive, but ultimately the songs did not quite move me. In terms of style, the closest that I can come up with is the late Romantic sense of Samuel Barber but without Barber's intense melodic memorability Each song is almost a little scene and they work well individually but do not quite add up to a coherent cycle, with a little too much feeling of the same. The songs will probably work well with just a few in a mixed recital.

This is no fault of the performers, Ashley Riches and Emma Abbate are very fine indeed. Riches produces a lovely flexible yet firm line with gorgeous dark hints in the tone quality. He shapes Castelnuovo-Tedesco's sometimes diffuse vocal lines into things of really expressive beauty. Abbate is equally impressive, highly supportive of Riches in the richly chromatic piano part.

The CD booklet contains the full texts and an article which devotes rather too much space to song in Shakespeare and rather too little to Castelnuovo-Tedesco and his songs.

Castelnuovo-Tedesco remains a somewhat neglected and underrated. You do rather wonder whether his period in Hollywood has still tarnished his reputation. These are pieces that I wanted to like more, but dismally failed I am afraid. They are certainly well worth investigation, especially in such fine performances from a talented pair of young artists and this is a fine disc to dip into.

— Robert Hugill

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Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco (3 April 1895 — 15 March 1968) was an Italian composer. A student of Ildebrando Pizzetti, he gained recognition in the 1920s but was forced to emigrate to the U.S. in 1939 due to Mussolini's anti-Semitic laws. Settling in Hollywood, he composed concertos for piano, violin, cello and guitar, and wrote overtures for 12 Shakespeare plays. He also set Shakespeare's poems and sonnets to music and composed two Shakespearean operas. Castelnuovo-Tedesco's chamber and piano works are noted for their symphonic scope, while his vocal music reflects the melodic tradition of the Italian school.

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Ashley Riches is a British baritone. He studied English at King's College, Cambridge, singing in the King's College Choir, and later trained at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. A former Jette Parker Young Artist at the Royal Opera House, he made his debut in a gala performance alongside Roberto Alagna. Riches has performed major roles with leading opera companies, including Count Almaviva (Le nozze di Figaro, Mozart) and Owen Wingrave (Britten). His concert work includes collaborations with John Eliot Gardiner and Esa-Pekka Salonen. His discography features works by Poulenc, Sullivan, Handel and Bach.

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Emma Abbate is a Neapolitan pianist acclaimed for her work as a piano accompanist and chamber musician. After graduating from conservatoires in Naples and Rome, she studied in London at the Royal Academy of Music. She has performed widely across Europe and the US, appearing at venues like Wigmore Hall and the Royal Opera House. Abbate is known for her recordings of Italian vocal chamber music, including works by Alfano, Pizzetti and Castelnuovo-Tedesco, collaborating with singers such as Hanna Hipp and Anna Pirozzi. Based in London, she teaches at Guildhall School and works as a coach at the Royal Opera House.

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