  Go to LAN280 - Byrdland
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Gramophone - Gramophone Recommended, October 2007
'‘It is mildly disappointing that the early music world has not retaliated to Sting’s much-publicised Dowland project with a covers album of songs by The Police. But instead of singing “Roxanne” or “Message in a Bottle”, Lawrence Zazzo has responded with a recital of early English song accompanied by an SATB saxophone quartet. Unlike Sting’s over-produced and closely miked studio sound, this disc is permeated by an organic and lifelike sound, and abounds with truthful artistry. Zazzo writes that he finds common ground between the melancholy nihilism of these songs and “the bittersweet, lonely sound” of legendary jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker, and the title “Byrdland” is a pun on the famous New York jazz club (immortalised by the fusion band Weather Report).
Zazzo’s interpretation of the text and tasteful shaping of melody would grace any kind of performance style, and it is intriguing to hear some tenderly realised polyphonic lines delineated by the Paragon Saxophone Quartet. Byrd’s “Lullaby” and Gibbon’s “The Silver Swan” get an attractive alternative life here. The saxophones play in a predominantly melancholic and soft way, although occasionally, as in the climax of Dowland’s “In darkness let me dwell”, they show more rasping timbres. “Ye sacred muses” (Byrd’s elegy to his deceased friend and teacher Tallis) and Purcell’s “If love’s a sweet passion” are perhaps the most successful fusions of ancient and modern…a disc that is a rare example of successfully reinventing “early” music.'
David Vickers Philadelphia Enquirer, October 2007
'When countertenor Lawrence Zazzo, who is from Cherry Hill and made his Metropolitan Opera debut in the spring, revealed that he had recording 17th-century English songs by William Byrd, Orlando Gibbons and Henry Purcell with saxophone quartet, you were sure it was a crossover nightmare. Once the disc hits your ears, though, it makes perfect sense. The saxophone arrangements are beautifully restrained, with the close-knit, subtly shifting harmonies of a viol consort, but with the kind of robustness that's endemic to wind instruments. Such accompaniment is probably more appropriate to a countertenor voice with as much sonic plumage as Zazzo's. His readings of the songs are thoughtful, with a strong emotional presence and a dignified sensitivity to the language.'
David Patrick Stearns The Sunday Telegraph, September 2007
'American countertenor Lawrence Zazzo has a pure, plangent voice well suited to this repertoire. David Daniels has a rival. The accompaniments by a saxophone quartet are surprisingly effective, often resembling a consort of viols with their depth of tone. Of the 24 tracks, Zazzo is particularly impressive in Byrd's exquisite Lullaby and Dowland's Now, oh now I needs must part and Flow my tears. The quartet comes into its own in items by Galilei, Anthony Holborne and Gibbons's four-part Fantasia.'
Michael Kennedy BBC Music Magazine (Performance **** Sound ****), August 2007
'Scoring 16th and 17th century romantic songs for instruments designed for 19th century military bands and apotheosed in early 20th century dance-music really shouldn’t work. Yet it does, thanks not least to the elegant phrasing and sumptuous tonal character of the Paragon Quartet.
The title of the disc is a nice joke: Byrdland was of course the Manhattan club named after Charlie ‘Bird’ Parker, the greatest saxophonist ever. I would question whether the fundamental correspondences between jazz and early music that Zazzo claims in his notes are that strong, but no matter: the success of these performances on their own terms obviates any need to justify the use of saxophones.
Zazzo has one of the most flawless, beautifully-controlled voices you could wish to hear. He sings with proper attention to the story a song tells, and if he doesn’t quite match the expressive individuality of Deller or Bowman, his sound and technique rival even Scholl’s and his diction is excellent in this astute mixture of familiar and less-known pieces.'
Barry Witherden Classic FM Magazine, August 2007
'I first heard Zazzo about 10 years ago, soon after he graduated from King’s College, Cambridge, and was struck then by the countertenor’s smart musicianship and vocal allure. Byrdland, apparently, was born around the same time – its seed planted when Zazzo sang for a friend’s al fresco wedding with saxophone quartet backing. For this recording, he’s partnered by the effortlessly lyrical Paragon Saxophone Quartet, which more than lives up to its name. If you’re unsure about the male voice and sax combo’s virtue, listen to Dowland’s Can she excuse my wrongs? or Byrd’s Lullaby. Prepare to be hooked.'
Andrew Stewart International Record Review, July 2007
'The title ties together William Byrd, Charlie ‘Bird’ Parker and the famous New York jazz club named after that great bop innovator. Even the black-and-white cover shot seems to nod in the direction of the Blue Note jazz label. However, these arrangements of works by English Renaissance and early Baroque masters aren’t ‘sexed-up’ cross-over confections. This is Byrdland indeed – full of the serious, the melancholy, the witty and the sublime.
In Lawrence Zazzo’s booklet introduction, he says the idea to record a disc of music arranged for countertenor and saxophone quartet had been brewing in his mind ever since he performed a Purcell song at a friend’s wedding, for that combination, about ten years ago. Zazzo’s subsequent exploration of the English consort and lute song repertoire further convinced him that it was a project well worth pursuing. Ian Gamine’s arrangements follow the original viol parts – or vocal parts in the case of the lute songs and madrigals – to the letter (although in the case of Dowland the purely instrumental sections reflect some recourse to the solo lute versions, even if used merely as inspiration for improvised divisions).
Byrd’s consort songs for solo voice and viols are masterpieces of their genre; Dowland’s lute songs are a direct outgrowth of the consort song but are more chordal in texture and are scored for four voices and lute. It was quite common for the three lower voices to be played by viols or recorders; any or all of them could also be omitted. The English madrigal was often treated in like style, and of the two examples on this disc Gibbons’s The Silver Swan is often heard today with viols and solo voice.
This kind of flexibility gives the modern performer a range of choices that shouldn’t preclude the use of modern instruments. Not only do the darker, more melancholy qualities of the saxophone evoke the viol, curtal, sackbut and the lower members of the recorder family, its brightness also recalls instruments like the cornett, crumhorn, shawm and the like. Particularly in the Purcell arrangements, the sound of the organ also comes to mind; overall, and perhaps more anachronistically, the Viennese wind serenade rises up in the listener’s imagination too. So there’s a wonderful, multi-layered process at work here that, combined with the music and the texts themselves (the latter delivered with great purity of tone and diction by Zazzo), results in something very special indeed.
The disc opens and closes in darkness, but whereas Byrd’s grief-saturated elegy to his friend Thomas Tallis invites the muses to descend in mourning weeds to earth, ‘where sorrow dwelleth’ (both Zazzo and the Paragon Saxophone Quartet here immediately establishing their supreme expressive credentials), Purcell’s Evening Hymn reaches heavenward. The rest of the disc explores these extremes: note the juxtaposition of Byrd’s Come to me, grief, for ever with the mischievous, lively I thought that Love Had Been a Boy, which in turn is followed by a meditation on the torments of love from Purcell’s The Fairy Queen.
In these, as throughout, Zazzo’s ability to colour each syllable according to the import of the text is a marvel. The Paragon Quartet are likewise alert to such opportunities (listen to what they do at ‘hellish jarring sounds’ in Dowland’s In Darkness Let Me Dwell). The Quartet’s virtuosity is also highlighted in the galliards by Anthony Holborne and John Danyel’s The Leaves Be Green, while its relaxed, natural approach in Gibbon’s Fantasia recalls the polyphonic duets of jazz greats Lee Konitz and Warne Marsh.
Well recorded, and with excellent booklet notes by Gammie, ‘Byrdland’ is an object-lesson in how (in the words of Ezra Pound) to ‘make it new’. '
Robert Levett The Times, June 2007
'Historically, the instruments supporting Zazzo's countertenor in Byrd, Dowland and Purcell should be viols or lutes. Here, they're the Paragon Saxophone Quartet. The fit is ideal for the music's melancholy...Zazzo's voice is gold-plated steel…the saxophonists are pungent, often electrifying.'
Geoff Brown The Daily Telegraph, May 2007
'It's emphatically not a crossover gimmick, but a genuinely illuminating meeting of jazz and Renaissance traditions, and the expressive variety and rhythmic subtlety of Zazzo's singing is further proof of the growth of a considerable artist.'
Rupert Christiansen
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