“A great red jewel” was Max de Schauensee’s description of Journet’s tone: unlike that of most heavy voices, it sparkled. Such terms are subjective and emotive, no doubt, but if they are meant and are not merely pretty figures of speech, they can tell us something. What’s more, he heard Journet in his later years, starting in the 1920s which were the singer’s fifties. And ‘red’, he said: meaning (perhaps) full-bodied (full-blooded), kingly (majestic), eye-catching (ear-catching). Journet’s recordings certainly do not contradict anything of that; and never since his death can there have been such an opportunity of appreciating them as we have just now, with the first volume of a projected complete edition on the Marston label (9/98) and now the simultaneous arrival of two singles, excellent selections both of them and each with attractions of its own.
The Pearl disc starts with Mephistopheles in song, Gounod’s and then Berlioz’s in full demonic delinquency with an unassailable solidarity of tone matched by a dazzlement of energy. Both discs have a sample of the third incarnation, the Mefistofele of Boito, Nimbus offering also the more vivid glimpse with his “Son lo spirito che nega”. Nimbus also include the King’s prayer in Lohengrin and the Evening star in Tannhauser, both superb pieces of singing, as are the Wagnerian excerpts the two selections have in common, Wotan’s solo at the end of Rheingold and (best of all) Hagen’s Watch in Gotterdammerung. Nimbus have a specimen of the most noted of Journet’s world premieres, his part in Boito’s Nerone. Pearl have an impressive and unexpected example of his comic gift in the Catalogue song from Don Giovanni. Less satisfying, I would say, are the aria from Don Carlo (1905) on Nimbus and Franck’s dreary La procession on Pearl (1926).
Eleven items and two different recordings of the same solo are held in common, which of course makes comparisons inevitable. The transfers (made in America) heard on the Pearl issue are closer and brighter; on Nimbus the voice is heard as in a hall, and the orchestra (which we don’t want to hear very much anyway) as much dimmer. If you play Nimbus first and Pearl immediately afterwards, the comparisons will favour Pearl; moving between the two, I felt gratitude for the different perspectives offered, rather as in changing seats in the theatre, or hearing the singer again, but in a different house. Either way, this journee of Journet’s is timely and welcome, with both of these CDs whetting the appetite for what is still to come on Marston.R1 '9813127'