Vocal Award 2023
The nominees for this year's BBC Music Magazine Vocal Award
Voting has now closed
Welcome to the 2023 BBC Music Magazine Awards
This year’s nominated recordings for the Vocal Award are listed below. Voting has now closed and the winners will be revealed at our Awards ceremony at Kings Place on Wednesday 19 April.
The nominations for the Vocal Award
Handel
Enchantresses (Arias)
Sandrine Piau (soprano); Les Paladins/Jérôme Correas
Alpha Classics ALPHA765
Sandrine Piau unleashed a ‘ferocious vocalism’ in this frankly dazzling selection of Handel’s sorceress-heroine arias. Magic, sparkle, musicality and vulnerability were the order of the day, the French soprano proving why she remains one of the world’s greatest Baroque singers. As the March issue review declared, ‘Handel confections have rarely been more deliciously served.’
György Kurtág
Kafka-Fragmente
Anna Prohaska (soprano), Isabelle Faust (violin)
Harmonia Mundi HMM902359
This very successful union of words and music was delivered with great panache and engaging chemistry by soprano Anna Prohaska and violinist Isabelle Faust. Our original review said, ‘Their intuitive rapport never falters, and, feeding off each other, the sparks they generate meld the fragments into something greater than the sum of their parts.’
Battle Cry: She Speaks
Works by Purcell, Eccles, Strozzi, Monteverdi, Owain Park
Helen Charlston (mezzo), Toby Carr (theorbo)
Delphian DCD34283
Mezzo-soprano Helen Charlston shone on this recording, spotlighting Baroque heroines and tragediennes like Boudica, Ariadne and Dido, with gloriously expressive performances in duo with theorbist Toby Carr. Owain Park’s title work proved a hauntingly contemporary take on Baroque themes, making for a cohesive and eloquent programme.
