Sunday 20 February 2011

I haven't heard Elizabeth Watts before and, on a new CD of Bach cantatas and solo cantata arias her voice sounds quite beautiful. She is billed as a soprano, but on this CD comes over more as an alto or, at best, a mezzo soprano. This seems to be the problem with the chosen pitch of A = 415 Hz, where everything comes over a bit murky and even the normally exuberant trumpet in "Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen" sounds here a bit like an emasculated trombone. At this pitch, most of the orchestral detail, so important in Bach, recedes into the undergrowth. Slower arias are taken very slowly, and much of the CD reminds me of what things used to sound like when I inadvertently played a 45 rpm disk at 33 rpm. Let us hope to hear Ms Watts at a more acceptable pitch and with a more alert conductor than Harry Bicket.

No comments: