Moments of love.

DOMINIQUE LABELLE

Bridge: 9406

Montreal-born soprano Dominique Labelle, who resides in central Massachusetts, has spent much of her illustrious career exploring: the Baroque and Classical repertoire, but music from the 20th century and beyond has also had a special attraction. All five of the composers featured on this disc lived into the 20th century or were born in that epoch. In the latter category are the Pulitzer Prizewinning American Yehudi Wyner, who also serves as Labelle's impeccable accompanist here, and England's renowned Benjamin Britten.

Wyner, now in his mid-80s, was born in Calgary but grew up in New York City. He and Labelle have worked together frequently in recent years, and their closeness shows in the pert-hi-mance of excerpts from The Second Malingal: Voices of-Women, his own work composed expressly for her in 1999. This Kous-sevitsky Foundation com-mission, originally scored for accompaniment by 11 instmments, was premiered by Labelle at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival; it is heard here in a version from 2012, with piano accompaniment. The texts, dating from various eras, are by or about women, and dwell on images of whimsy, vanity and eroticism. Wyner is clearly a big fan of Labelle, commenting in the program notes on the "sensual beauty of her voice" and the "depth of her perceptions and emotional communication."

The central part of the program is devoted to French repertoire: Ravers famous Tivis poemes de Ste-phane Maname, a group of five songs by Saint-Saens and a group of five by the Venezuelan-born Frenchman, Reynaldo Hahn. Labelle's haunting, white tone in the Ravel is ideal, as is Wyner's evocative accompaniment. She brings an endearing lyricism to the more foursquare Saint-Saens songs (concluding with a driving performance of the original vocal version of his famous "Danse macabre"), and her tone and phrasing in the lovely Hahn songs, with their gently -flowing accompaniments, are exquisite.

Britten's Cabaret Songs, a group of four witty morsels to texts by W.H. Auden composed in part during Britten's and Peter Pears' stay in Quebec, are a fantastic discovery for those who haven't heard them, reminiscent of the best Cole Porter ditties. They were never recorded during Britten's lifetime and only posthumously published in 1980. (Britten and Auden collaborated on two additional songs, "Give Up Love" and "I'm a Jam Tart," both since lost.) Labelle is perfect in the frenzied, breathless "Calypso" and delightful in the riotous "Tell Me the Truth about Love."--Rick MacMillan