Classical home listening - Jamie Barton sings Jake Heggie

The Guardian 0

The mezzo-soprano and composer join forces on an album of rich, raw immediacy. Elsewhere, explosive Strauss from Berlin, with Louise Alder on glorious form

• Of the many connections between Joyce DiDonato, Susan Graham and Jamie Barton – all mega-star American mezzo-sopranos – one fact in particular unites them: their desire to perform music by the American composer Jake Heggie, best known for his opera Dead Man Walking (2000), in which all have sung the lead role of Sister Helen Prejean. On Unexpected Shadows (Pentatone; released 18 September), Barton performs 16 songs by Heggie, with the composer at the piano. The opening track, Music, about a man on death row hearing music (text by Prejean), sets the emotional tone: Barton’s voice, unaccompanied at first and then joined by piano, oscillates between rich, pure and raw. In The Work at Hand, to poignant texts by Laura Morefield, they’re joined by the cellist Matt Haimovitz.

Heggie’s style is melodic and immediate, now a touch of blues and scat, now exultant and climactic. He’s in the tradition of composer-pianists who know exactly how to play their own music (not automatically the case, but true here). Barton, versatile and big-hearted, catching any shred of wit or sorrow, responds to the music’s every need, each syllable crystal clear.