Kathleen Ferrier

KATHLEEN FERRIER - THE WORLD OF (1991)

1. Blow The Wind Southerly
2. The Keel Row
3. Ma Bonny Lad
4. Go not, happy day
5. Come you not from Newcastle?
6. Kitty my love
7. Rodelinda / Act 1 - "Art thou troubled?"
8. Serse / Act 1 - "Ombra mai fù"
9. Orfeo ed Euridice (Orphée et Eurydice) - "What is life?"
10. Elijah, Op.70 / Part 1 - "Woe, woe unto them who forsake Him!"
11. Elijah, Op.70 / Part 2 - "Oh rest in the Lord, wait patiently for Him"
12. St. Matthew Passion, BWV 244 / Part Two - No.39 "Have mercy, Lord on me."
13. Gretchen am Spinnrade
14. Die junge Nonne
15. An die Musik
16. Der Musensohn, D.764 (Op.92/1)
17. Fünf Lieder op.94 - 4. Sapphische Ode
18. Fünf Lieder op.47 - 1. Botschaft
9. Rückert-Lieder - Um Mitternacht

Kathleen Ferrier was born on April 22, 1912, in a Lancashire village in the north of Enland. Despite the limited financial means of the household, her mother insisted that Kathleen should have a proper education. Very early on, she became fascinated by the piano. Although a very bright student, she seemed to go on to university, but unfortunately, funds were lacking and she had to leave school at the age of 14 to start work as a telephone operator. As a pianist she participated in the many local festivals and won numerous prizes. Very soon, she accompanied her singing friends. In 1935 Ferrier married and the couple moved to Carlisle (the marriage turned out to be an unhappy one and was later annulled). It was her husband who challenged her to enter the Carlisle Festival for singing. After winning both the piano and singing prizes there in 1937, she decided to work as a professional singer, learning by appearing wherever she was asked. She studied with J.E. Hutchinson, who built her repertoire (songs by Purcell, Bach’s B minor Mass and Passions according to Saint John and Saint Matthew, excerpts from cantatas, Italian arias, oratorios by Handel and Elgars’ The Dream of Gerontius). She continued her studies with Roy Henderson, a former baritone and dedicated teacher who also introduced her to German songs. Within a short time Kathleen Ferrier became one of the world’s leading concert artists. She enjoyed tremendous success in Mahler’s orchestral songs, in songs by Brahms, Schubert and Schumann as well as in oratorios. She worked with all the celebrated conductors of the time like Monteux, Enescu, Karajan, Van Beinum, Erich Kleiber, Busch and Schuricht, to name but a few. The artist also reintroduced many previously neglected British songs to her audiences. She told in interviews that working with her mentor and fatherly friend Bruno Walter was probably of the greatest importance to her. Glyndebourne Festival saw her as Lucretia in Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia and Orfeo in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Eudridice (sung in English), her only two operatic roles. In 1951, a first operation interrupted her touring and, two years later, death of breast cancer put an early end to her too brief career.