Reviews ELENA URIOSTE AND TOM POSTER

ONE dreads to think how a more crossover-besotted label (the one that infamously passed on The Beatles perhaps) would have marketed this exquisite and accessible duo album by the 2007 winner of the Scottish International Piano Competition and equally prize-garlanded American violinist Elena Urioste. Thankfully Sweden’s esteemed Bis can be relied upon for some Scandinavian restraint. The sleeve photos of Urioste gazing at her beau give the game away, but just a listen to the disc would suggest that the pair are more than musical partners. The collection of classical pops they have recorded includes vintage arrangements by Fritz Kreisler and Jasha Heifetz and is unashamedly romantic, but always stays on the right side of cloying. Their story is irresistible though: thrown together by the BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artists scheme for a recording session, they struck up an immediate musical rapport, and when that relationship was rekindled at a chamber music festival a couple of years later, the deal was sealed. Although given the best of modern recordings, this is quite an old-fashioned album of lush repertoire, beautifully played. It includes Debussy from that first meeting as well as Dvorak and Elgar, and concludes with a four-song excursion into the Great American Songbook, Gershwin by Heifetz followed by three lovely arrangements by Poster himself. There’s not a seasonal tune on it but Estrellita is the Christmas gift to please just about anyone.

BARBRA Streisand has fire in her belly, her Democrat soul reinvigorated by the horror of Donald Trump in the White House. For her fans, this can only be a good thing. Her disgust at America’s present state has sparked her first album of mostly original material in more than a decade. Walls is Streisand’s state of the nation address, a grand gesture painted in broad strokes. On its 11 tracks she pays homage to the Statue of Liberty, laments the lack of kindness in the world and goes after Trump.

“These times give me energy,” the veteran vocalist told Billboard last month.

This energy is clear to all. Her voice, huskier with age, sounds different without sounding weaker. With this new tone comes a new fervour. When she contemplates hope, life and fear in her songs, she risks straying into cliche.

“What happened to just being kind, that’s what’s on my mind,” she sings on the opening track. She’s sincere but it’s hard not to balk at the earnestness of it all.

Regardless of the album’s politics, Walls is finely crafted and puts Streisand’s voice front and centre, where it belongs. In troubled times, that might be enough.