• The point where language and music collide is an abiding preoccupation for the French-born, London-based Héloïse Werner, whose new solo album, Phrases (Delphian), displays her versatility as a singer and composer, but as musical catalyst too. The 12 tracks, mostly premiere recordings, include works by Elaine Mitchener (the sensuously surreal Whetdreem); Nico Muhly’s prayer-like Benedicite Recitation, with beautiful solo flute; Oliver Leith’s Yhyhyhyhyh, an exploration between voice and detuned cello; Cheryl Frances-Hoad’s tiny scena Something More Than mortal; and Josephine Stephenson’s hypnotic Comme l’espoir/you might all disappear, with guitar.
Werner’s four songs (including Syncopate, with Zoë Martlew), from vocal acrobatics to verbal confession, and Récitations by the Greek experimental composer Georges Aperghis complete this distinctive album. Werner is joined by her first-rate regular collaborators: Colin Alexander (cello), Amy Harman (bassoon), Calum Huggan (percussion), Lawrence Power (viola), Daniel Shao (flute) and Laura Snowden (guitar).
• The Danish String Quartet, who made their debut in 2002 when three of the original lineup were barely out of their teens, are as adept at playing folk and contemporary as mainstream classical. Prism IV (ECM) is the penultimate album in their series uniting a Bach fugue, a Beethoven quartet and a work by a later composer. Here, Beethoven’s Quartet Op 132 in A minor is preceded by Bach’s G minor fugue from the Well-Tempered Clavier (arranged by Emanuel Aloys Förster) and followed by Mendelssohn’s String Quartet No 2.
These players have a stated mission to keep the quartet repertoire fresh. They tackle Beethoven’s hallowed late work (which has the Heiliger Dankgesang, song of thanksgiving, in the third movement) with a sense of adventure and freedom rather than weighty reverence. Precise, lithe, flexible, their performance might not replace the many great interpretations out there – from the Busch to the Takács Quartets and beyond, depending on taste – but for vitality and humanity, keep this one by you.
• If you haven’t heard it yet, Grace Williams’s Sea Sketches (1944), suddenly on everyone’s repertoire list, will open the BBC National Orchestra of Wales’s live concert from the Aldeburgh festival, conducted by Martyn Brabbins. Also features a new work by Gavin Higgins. BBC Radio 3, Friday, 7.30pm/BBC Sounds.
