Henry Herford and American Song
- Apr 30
- 5 min read
More American twentieth century song composers. For many years, I have had a disc of American songs, ‘The Cloisters’ performed by Scottish baritone Henry Herford (b.1948) with his regular accompanist Robin Bowman, but have only just listened to it for the first time. Herford is a slightly older contemporary of mine: we took part in a Pierre Bernac masterclass together in the mid-1970s, (Bernac was enthusiastic about him, far less so about me) and sang a couple of concerts together. Henry had an excellent career and was particularly admired as a recitalist. He has the very special distinction of being the first non-American singer to win the Carnegie Hall International American Music Competition for vocalists. The CD I shall discuss was recorded, on the back of this success, in 1982.
The recital opens with three songs by Arthur Shepherd (1880-1958), settings of poems by the Irish poet and politician Oliver St. John Gogarty (1878-1957). Gogarty had the most extraordinary life, and deserves a Blog to himself (which he will get in due course). Shepherd was something of a child prodigy, entering the New England Conservatory at the age of twelve. He had a varied career as composer, conductor and academic. His music was particularly influenced by the French Impressionists and Vaughan Williams. These songs are most attractive. ‘To a Trout’ has a quietly ecstatic vocal line over a bubbling piano accompaniment, which fits the playful but still pensive verse:
None knows what makes you spring in air;
And no one knows what sets me silly,
Why a hookless bait I fare
A hookless fly and a dumb gillie.
‘Golden Stockings’ is a poem of suppressed sexual excitement:
Golden stockings you had on
In the meadow where you ran
And your little knees together
Bobbed like pippins in the weather
When the breezes rush and fight
For those dimples of delight
Shepherd’s setting is warmly lyrical, sensitive but not too earnest.
‘Virgil’ is the most successful song of the three. Gogarty’s heartfelt appreciation of the Roman poet drawing music from Shepherd of sumptuous eloquence.
From Mantua's meadows to Imperial Rome
Came Virgil, with the wood-light in his eyes,
Browned by the suns that round his hillside home
Burned on the chestnuts and the ilices.
And these he left, and left the fallows where
The slow streams freshened many a bank of thyme,
To found a city in the Roman air,
And build the epic turrets in a rhyme.
But were the woodland deities forgot,
Pan, Sylvan, and the sister nymphs for whom
He poured his melody the fields along?
They gave him for his faith a happy lot:
The waving of the meadows in his song
And the spontaneous laurel at his tomb.
Herford and Bowman’s performances are exemplary, the singer skilfully giving an American tang to some of his vowels. These songs are immediately attractive and are worth consideration from any young baritone (I think they work best with a youngish baritone voice) looking for unhackneyed, worthwhile repertoire.
Ben Weber’s ‘The Ways’ represents an altogether stiffer challenge for performers and listeners. Ben Weber (1916-1979) was a largely self-taught, serialist composer, who received early encouragement from Schoenberg. He was a prominent member of a group of gay American composers who lived and worked in New York in the 1950s and 60s. ‘The Ways’ sets a poem by Pauline Hanson, an American writer who is unfortunate enough to share a name with a controversial Australian politician, so that finding information on her is a laborious process. The ‘other’ Pauline Hanson made some inflammatory remarks about Muslims in general and the burqa in particular, which takes up a lot of space on Wikipedia. Hanson the poet, writes highly charged, rather knotty lyric poetry, which involves some serious unravelling for it to make any sense. When coupled with Weber’s angular vocal line, the effect is austere, although often very beautiful. Henry Herford’s response to the more lyrical music is unfailingly sensitive, although he lacks the weight of voice to do full justice to the more dramatic writing.
The only composer on this disc previously known to me is John Corigliano (b. 1938), perhaps best known for his opera ‘The Ghosts of Versailles’. His librettist for this, William M. Hoffman, provides the poems for ‘The Cloisters’, a cycle of four songs inspired by the Cloisters, a museum of medieval art in Manhattan. The last song of the four ‘The Unicorn’ was the first to be composed, and suggests a homo-erotic subtext (composer and poet are both gay), although initial inspiration came from a medieval tapestry depicting a unicorn:
Now, now before asphalt buckles
and this grass-starved city
grows weeds in the street.
quick boy, come to me cold –
let our swell and sweet bend
warm these woods-
Other songs reference the Nativity, both positively in ‘Christmas at the Cloisters’
The new one,
the third one, Saviour and baby,
sleeps again
in Bethlehem.
Praise Him!
and more enigmatically in ‘Song to the Witch of the Cloisters’
My Lady of the Cloisters.
where Mary is forever weeping,
the holy baby never wakes.
and Christ lies unresurrected.
These songs go very high in the baritone register and Henry Herford does not always sound entirely comfortable in the vocal stratosphere, but, as always, his intelligence, warm lyrical voice and sterling musicianship make him an excellent advocate for these demanding but ultimately rewarding songs.
The recital concludes with Conrad Susa’s ‘Hymns for the Amusement of Children’. Susa (1935-2013) was probably best known as an opera composer. ‘Transformations’ a chamber opera based on the poems of Anne Sexton, is regularly performed in the USA. The six ‘Hymns’ are settings of poems by Christopher Smart (1722-1771) whose work was set by Benjamin Britten in ‘Rejoice in the Lamb’. These simple but quirky verses are set in a generally bluesy/spiritual style by Susa, and, while uneven in effect, can be very moving, especially ‘At Undressing in the Evening’
These cloaths, of which I now divest
Myself, ALL-SEEING EYE,
Must be one day (that day be blest)
Relinquish'd and laid by.
Thou cordial sleep, to death akin,
I court thee on my knee;
O let my exit, free from sin,
Be little more than Thee.
But if much agonizing pain
My dying hour await,
The Lord be with me to sustain,
To help and to abate.
O let me meet Thee undeterr'd,
By no foul stains defil'd!
According to thy Holy Word,
Receive me as a Child.
Again, Herford and Bowman prove ideally sympathetic advocates for these unusual songs and the whole disc will repay serious study. I understand that Henry is not in the best of health, and is no longer able to perform or teach. This recording is a fitting tribute to his rich artistry and deserves a far wider circulation. It also reminds us of the huge contribution Robin Bowman has made to the study and performance of the Art song in the UK, Europe and the USA.
Comments