Nyle Wolfe (baritone) and David Wray (piano)

{TABLE} Liederkreis Op 39 ........................... Schumann Three Songs Op 10 ............................ Barber Old American Songs ........................... Copland {/TABLE} OF the many recitals I have heard from young Irish singers, that given by Nyle Wolfe (baritone) last Wednesday night was among the most engaging. With David Wray (piano), he presented a well devised programme of songs by Schumann, Barber and Copland.

Wolfe has a sensitive appreciation of texts and he understands that, with such masters of declamatory setting as Schumann and Copland, the text, no less than line, should define shape. So, in Schumann's Liederkreis Op. 39, he was alive to textual nuance and was not seduced by beauty of line.

In that music, at least, it might have been better if he had occasionally succumbed, for this rather melancholy collection went rather too much line by line. The consequent fragmentary effect was not helped by David Wray's over absorption with detail nor by his occasional lagging behind Wolfe's drive.

A much more complete result was achieved in the two sets of American songs by Barber and Copland. Throughout, I would have welcomed a more combative approach from David Wray but in these English language settings Wray was at his strongest and Wolfe at his most persuasive.

This was my first experience of Nyle Wolfe and I was struck by the consistently pleasing quality of his voice. In the Old American Songs Copland pillages, with characteristic virtuosity, styles ranging from Stephen Foster through white folk song to negro spirituals. Wolfe handled these with a range of colour and a confidence not seen in the Schumann. He did likewise in his Percy French encores. He could earn a living doing music as easy as the French, but he has the equipment to do more.