Brindley Sherratt came late to opera, beginning his stage career well into his 30s, and has waited another couple of decades for good measure before making his first recital recording. The highly rewarding result captures his drinkably deep bass voice at its peak. Teamed with the pianist Julius Drake, he offers a programme exploring themes of fear and death, with a final affirmative twist.
He’s in his element in four German songs by Schubert, starting with the journey across the Styx in Fahrt zum Hades – there’s a significant overlap generally between death songs and boat songs – and continuing with Der Schiffer, Sherratt’s delivery firm against the busy outboard motor of Drake’s piano. The perkier Italian idiom of L’incanto degli occhi doesn’t sound so effortlessly natural for Sherratt, but then it doesn’t for Schubert either.
In Mussorgsky’s Songs and Dances of Death, Sherratt is no pantomime villain, instead chilling us with steady characterisation and long, velvety lines. He closes with English songs, including touching performances of Finzi’s title track and Gurney’s By a Bierside, where contradictory responses to death conclude with the idea that “It is a grand thing to die”. Fear dissipates, and Sherratt’s final two numbers, both old-sea-dog songs, brim with warmth and acceptance.
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