No Language Barrier in Sylvan’s Poetic Recital

Song recitals in the language of their audience work completely differently than song recitals in foreign tongues. Witness Sanford Sylvan’s admirable program of 20th century American songs at the El Camino Center for the Arts on Friday night.

Connoisseurs and recital-novices alike could appreciate the poetic texts--by Kenneth Koch, Frank Horne, Emily Bronte and several others--along with the disparate musical styles displayed. In performances of Lieder or melodies, texts can often become irrelevant to the majority of listeners.

But not here. As a result of the language bond, and the texts printed in the program, sharing became a strong part of the experience, which was successfully reduced from ritual to reciprocity. Naturally, the good-size audience stayed to the end.

Sylvan is a treasurable singer; he unapologetically makes beautiful and varied sounds, colors words and utilizes a broad dynamic range to expressive ends. Without becoming esoteric or precious on the one hand, or indulging in phony machismo--the hallmark of some male American singers--on the other, he expresses his poets and himself with faceted directness. Hearing him is a pleasure; understanding him, a joy.

From the conversational, dry recitative of some undistinguished Virgil Thomson songs to the masterpiece that is Samuel Barber’s “Hermit Songs,” Sylvan and his unobtrusive pianist, David Breitman, gave all this music its head. In particular, one had to admire Earl Kim’s disturbing “Letters Found Near a Suicide” and four excerpts from David Leisner’s masterly cycle “Confiding,” which prove that the spirit of Faure is not dead, but thriving.

Oddly, the single encore, Schubert’s “Der Jungling an der Quelle,” emerged perfunctory from both singer and pianist.