Gramophone Magazine
May 2022
Editor's Choice

Nicky Spence (tenor), Julius Drake (piano), Timothy Ridout (viola)

Piatti Quartet

Vaughan Williams: Four Hymns
Vaughan Williams: The House of Life
Vaughan Williams: Folk Songs from the Eastern Counties
Vaughan Williams: English Folk Songs. IV. The brewer
Vaughan Williams: On Wenlock Edge

Nicky Spence and friends perfectly capture the urgency and thrill of the opening of ‘On Wenlock Edge’; with its varied and imaginatively chosen couplings, this is an album which every RVW aficionado will want to own.

"The famous cycle On Wenlock Edge (1909) has of ten been recorded, but this is a fine rendering with ‘Bredon Hill’ providing some particularly sublime moments. As always Julius Drake’s accompanying is evocative and nuanced, and in ‘Is my team ploughing?’ the Piatti Quartet swathe the song in a delicate veil of tensile sound." - BBC Music Magazine, May 2022.