Erin Morley walks straight up into the front rank of high coloratura sopranos with her debut solo recording. The songs are all connected to flowers and gardens, and many also reference birdsong, which fits her perfectly: what’s most striking is her seemingly artless precision, however stratospherically high they take her voice. Her crystalline sound melts into liquid phrases that allow the words to come across strongly; moreover, her tone is full-bodied enough to carry more expansive songs such as the two she includes by Rachmaninov, Daisies and Lilacs. Her pianist, Gerald Martin Moore – also her teacher – is unfailingly poised in support.
At the centre is a new cycle by Ricky Ian Gordon. Despite being called Huit Chansons de Fleurs, it is in English, set to words by Dickinson, Wordsworth, Dorothy Parker and Gordon himself. Mostly in a wistful, post-Sondheim idiom, these feel a little bland; they offer her less chance to shine than well-chosen numbers by Saint-Saëns, Milhaud, Berg, Brahms and Zemlinsky. She’s joined by flautist Ransom Wilson for two songs, including an aria from Sullivan’s The Rose of Persia, in which they outdo Mozart’s Queen of the Night with a spiky little duet. Finally, she accompanies herself at the piano in Novello’s We’ll Gather Lilacs – just sentimental enough and, again, astonishingly controlled.
