Ecstasy and awe from the Cardiff Singer of the World

Classical Louise Alder

Wigmore Hall, London W1 ★★★★★

The wisdom of crowds isn’t always especially wise, but it certainly was on the night of June 18 2017, when the audience prize at the Cardiff Singer of the World competition went to British soprano Louise Alder. She had it all: a gleaming, clear voice, thrillingly in focus right across the range, an ability to get to the heart of the song without signalling emotion in an obvious way, and a combination of commanding stage presence with an approachable human quality.

All those endearing qualities were on display at Monday night’s song recital at the Wigmore Hall. On stage with her was pianist Joseph Middleton, an artist every bit as fine and insightful as Alder herself. Alder wasn’t on absolutely top form – there were flecks on the fine threads of vocal sound that suggested she was getting over a cold – but it didn’t matter. All the songs shone in their own rich colours, which was quite a feat as the musical range was so vast.

In some ways the hardest songs to bring off were the opening group of French mélodies by the very young singers Gabriel Fauré and Nadia Boulanger. They had a peculiar ecstasy, with lines about “two souls soaring towards death” and a fluttering, rising excitement in Middleton’s piano accompaniment which suggested that the ecstasy was actually very earthly. They could have come over as arch and overheated, but the flaring beauty in Alder’s tone burned away the fin-de-siècle period flavour and caught the emotional truth in the songs.

With Mahler’s Rückert-Lieder, the two artists had to switch instantly from grand passion in the salon to deep folk-like simplicity. Alder found just the right burningly focused tone, which swelled into magnificence at the end as she realised that God is present even at blackest midnight.

Aaron Copland’s 12 Poems of Emily Dickinson dealt with equally weighty matters but with a light, oblique touch, and even a touch of humour. Here, her singing (and Middleton’s playing) were poised exactly at the mid-point between conversational homeliness and awe at God’s mysteries – just like the poems themselves.

Finally came a group of American songs from Ned Rorem, Richard Rodgers and Florence Price. Here, ecstasy and the mysteries of the hereafter were set aside for a gentle, more everyday sort of joy, which Middleton and Alder caught with tenderness laced with a touch of wry worldly wisdom. It showed a nice tact, to bring us down so gently from the heights to the everyday.

No further performances

Astonishing: the British soprano Louise Alder