dream.risk.sing: elevating women’s voices
Album release date 29th September 2023 on Delphian Records
dream.risk.sing is a recital programme which gives voice to women’s experiences which are rarely heard in song. The programme highlights five specific aspects of a woman’s life: adolescence, love and lust, motherhood, career and legacy, while a palpable thread running throughout reminds listeners of the constraints on freedom that still exist in women’s lives.
Bringing forward this subject matter – far from the staple of traditional song recitals – has involved Crawford and Bode in commissioning new music and reviving other, often unfamiliar repertoire, and the album includes a new song-cycle by Charlotte Bray, new arrangements of two songs from Judith Weir’s groundbreaking cycle woman.life.song, recent works by Helen Grime, Libby Larsen, Ricky Ian Gordon and others, as well as earlier twentieth-century contributions from Rebecca Clarke and Florence Price.
Samantha and Lana’s recording of the full programme took place in summer 2022 and was released to critical acclaim on Delphian Records on 29th September 2023.
“This [dream.risk.sing] is really a most interesting collection of material which so clearly demonstrates that normal song recitals barely touch on women’s own lived experience”
JUDITH WEIR
Composer insights
Press
“This witty, poignant and candid recital of songs centring on female experiences has to be one of the most arresting recording-debuts I’ve heard all year: Crawford’s big, bright voice packs a tremendous punch, with diction always crystal-clear and plenty of bite when required (which is often).”
PRESTO MUSIC
“woman.life.song…benefitted from Crawford’s easy communication of text, while Edge, a remembrance of first love to words by Toni Morrison, sounding haunting with Bode tracings unrooted harmonies…the historic paucity of genuinely female-centred material [is] on the way to changing thanks to performers and composers such as these.”
THE GUARDIAN
“dream.risk.sing was ablaze with originality, fierce pride, strength and vulnerability – and humanity…The maturity and tenderness in their playing and singing cast light on the broad palette of moods and colours that this programme has to offer, and it was the symbiotic relationship between Crawford and Bode which brought each piece its magic.”
DAILY INFO
“The visceral imagery was shaped with lyrical intensity by Crawford, the vocal leaps weaving through Bode’s swirling, crystalline arpeggios.”
OPERA TODAY