Welsh bass baritone Bryn Terfel, last heard in Dublin in 1989 at what was then the Carrolls RTE Proms, returned on Saturday for a first appearance at the National Concert Hall. Eight years ago, when he sang arias by Mozart, Verdi and Wagner, he was fresh from the Cardiff Singer of the World Competition, where he been awarded the Lieder Prize. This time, now a familiar figure on the great operatic stages of the world, he presented Dubliners with a song recital.
He included songs by Schubert, Finzi (the Shakespeare cycle, Let us garlands bring) and Vaughan Williams (excerpts from Songs of Travel), a Welsh folk song medley, and a handful of numbers from musicals. And he handled everything in such a way that fans of the vocally operatic can hardly have felt like cavilling for a moment about the lack of anything that was actually from an opera. Take the Schubert alone. The dark opening song, Gruppe aus dem Tartarus, was barkingly dramatic, and was followed by the utterly contrasted calm and peaceful rest of Litanei auf das Fest Allerseelen, where, at the close, the voice was hushed almost to inaudibility. Angler, trout and observer were all vividly characterised in Die Forelle, as were, by voice, manner and action, the three participants in Erlkonig. Even Heidenroslein, given as an encore, found the tension of its encounter wound well beyond the normal. And in the songs from the shows, Terfel's very considerable acting skills were given their fullest rein. The NCH acoustic slightly hollowed out the voice at its loudest, but in softer moments the particular beauties of its honeyed resonance were hauntingly conveyed.
