Episode 334. Gloria Davy Revisited

Episode 334. Gloria Davy Revisited

I’ve been wanting to revisit the legacy of the great African American soprano Gloria Davy (born in Brooklyn on 29 March 1931 and died in Genève on 28 November 2012) for some time now. In the first year of the podcast, I devoted one of my very first Black History Month episodes to exploring her career, recordings, and legacy. At that time, however, I had not yet acquired a commercial recording central to her recorded output: a 1957 LP on London Records entitled, simply, Concert Recital, which featured the soprano, accompanied by Giorgio Favaretto, in a varied program of Purcell and Brahms songs, followed by two important twentieth century song cycles, Poulenc’s 1939 cycle Fiançailles pour rire, set to poems by his close friend Louise de Vilmorin, and Joaquín Turina’s 1918 cycle, Poema en forma de canciones. A few years after posting that episode, I finally got my hands on this ultra-rare recording, which I am thrilled to present here. Recordings of either or both of those song cycles in particular were rare at the time this recording was made, and recordings of the complete Turina cycle remain so. On this record I supplement this record with her first London/Decca release from the year 1956, entitled simply Gloria Davy Spirituals. I have already played these recordings on the podcast, but they are always worth rehearing, especially because the spirituals, many of them quite off-the-beaten-path, are arranged and conducted by African American composer Julia Perry, who has only recently, particularly in the year of her centennial, been gaining the public exposure that she so richly deserves. In between I include additional examples of Gloria Davy in song, including excerpts from an early-career performance of Poulenc’s Caligrammes, his final cycle of poems by Guillaume Apollinaire, as well as an obscure but rousingly rendered song by the Italian composer, conductor, pianist, and teacher Vittorio Maria Vanzo.

RECORDINGS HEARD IN THIS EPISODE

Concert Recital. Gloria Davy, soprano; Giorgio Favaretto, piano [1957]

Four Songs by Henry Purcell

• Not all my torments, Z. 400 (anonymous text)
• If music be the food of love, Z. 379 (text by Henry Heveningham)
• From rosy bow’rs (Don Quixote, Z. 579/9) (text by Thomas d’Urfey)
• Man is for the woman made, Z. 605/3 (text by Peter Anthony Motteux)

Four Songs by Johannes Brahms

• Immer leiser wird mein Schlummer, Op. 105/2 (poem by Hermann Lingg)
• Franz Kugler: Ständchen, Op. 106/1 (poem by Franz Kugler)
• Auf dem Kirchhofe, Op. 105/4 (poem by Detlev von Liliencron)
• Wiegenlied, Op. 49/4 (Traditional German, arr. Clemens Brentano, Achim von Arnim (verse 1), Georg Scherer (verse 2)

Francis Poulenc, Guillaume Apollinaire: Caligrammes, FP 140 [excerpts]. Gloria Davy, Donald Nold [live New York 04.XI.53]

• II. Mutation
• III. Vers le sud
• IV. Il pleut
• V. La Grâce exilée
• VI. Aussi bien que les cigales

Francis Poulenc, Louise de Vilmorin: Fiançailles pour rire, FP 101.

• I. La Dame d’André
• II. Dans l’herbe
• III. Il vole
• IV. Mon cadavre est doux comme un gant
• V. Violon
• VI. Fleurs

Joaquín Turina, Ramòn de Campoamor: Poema en forma de canciones.

• I. Dedicatoria [piano solo]
• II. Nunca olvida
• III. Cantares
• IV. Los dos miedos
• V. Los locas por amor

Vittorio Maria Vanzo: Alceta. Gloria Davy, Giorgio Favaretto [live Siena 27.VII.60]

Gloria Davy Spirituals. Arranged and conducted by Julia Perry [1956]

• Let Us Break Bread Together on Our Knees
• On My Journey
• Sister Mary Had-a But One Child
• Hold the Wind
• Eagle’s Wings
• You Must Have that True Religion