Joel Allison, baritone; Mélisande Sinsoulier, piano. Walter Hall, Edward Johnson Building, University of Toronto Thursday noon, Mar 30, 2017.
Among the many musical events I look forward to every spring is the winners’ concert of the Jim and Charlotte Norcop Prize in Song and the Gwendolyn Williams Koldofsky Prize in Accompanying. These two prizes are given out annually to an exceptional voice student and an equally fine pianist enrolled in the University of Toronto Faculty of Music. This year, the winners are baritone Joel Allison, and pianist Mélisande Sinsoulier.
For those not familiar with the name of James Norcop, he is a former baritone and former manager of the Vancouver Opera, and he established the VO Training Program and the BC Opera Ensemble, both helped to train young Canadian singers. In addition to the Norcop Prize at the U of T, Norcop was instrumental in the establishment of the Art of the Song Program at the Toronto Summer Music Festival, and the Canadian Art Song Foundation which gives grants to promising young Canadian singers to further their training.
The 2017 Winners Concert took place at Walter Hall on Thursday. The program started off with the beautiful “Tom der Reimer” by Carl Loewe, a contemporary of Schubert and famous for his “alternate” version of Erlkonig. This piece with its most ingratiating melody captures perfectly the spirit of 19th century High Romanticism. Allison sang it with plenty of expression and textual nuances, with Sinsoulier as a most attentive and supportive pianist, totally in sync with the singer.
This was followed by Brahms Four Serious Songs, a very popular piece for low voices. With text drawn from Ecclesiasticus and Corinthians 1, the subject matter, as the title suggests, is a bit grim. Allison sang it well, although I would have liked a bit more introspective delivery. The voice rang out nicely and there was the requisite dynamic variation, but overall, I felt he tended to over-sing. Yes, one could attribute it to youthful enthusiasm, as the temptation is to strive for an impressive volume. But over-extending himself might have been the reason why in the soft singing, a tremolo occasionally crept in, and in the high notes for both Brahms and the Vaughan Williams to come, he went flat in a few places.
The Vaughan Williams Songs of Travel that concluded the recital was for me the most attractive part of his program. He interpreted the songs beautifully, paying great attention to the text. The upbeat song, “Bright Is the Ring of Words,” was wonderfully delivered. That said, in “Wither Must I Wander” – to me one of the greatest songs ever written — he really needed to curb his enthusiasm a bit more. It’s a tear-jerker of a song, and it never fails to move me every time I hear it, because the text is so poignant. Allison sang it beautifully if a bit too loudly, with essentially a mezza forte throughout. It took away some of the magic of the piece. But I don’t want to quibble as overall I enjoyed it.
Allison was helped in no small way by the marvelous playing of Ms. Sinsoulier. I was extremely impressed by her sensitivity, attentiveness, and most of all the very beautiful sounds she made on the Steinway. I had the benefit of sitting very close, so I was able to observe her every move. She made the piano sing on this occasion, a very deserving winner of the Koldofsky Prize. A final thought — both artists are exceptionally promising, and I am willing to predict that they will each enjoy a fine career in the future.
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