 Sarah Walker began her musical life as a violinist at the Royal College of Music and subsequently studied singing with Vera Rozsa with whom she has a built up an extraordinarily wide repertoire ranging from Bach and the Baroque to twentieth century composers such as Berio, Boulez and Birtwistle.
On the concert platform she has worked with conductors such as Solti, Kleiber, Norrington, Masur, Rattle, Gardiner, Muti, and Haitink. She was a memorable Britannia at the Last Night of the Proms and took part in the performance of Beethoven's 9th, conducted by the late Leonard Bernstein in Berlin, given to celebrate the opening of the Berlin Wall at Christmas in 1989.
Since her debut at Glyndebourne she has sung in opera houses all over the world including The Royal Opera House Covent Garden - where she made her debut as Charlotte in Massenet's "Werther" opposite Alfredo Kraus, The Metropolitan Opera New York - where she debuted as Micah in Handel's "Samson" with Jon Vickers in the title role. Among more than sixty roles in her repertoire are Didon, Maria Stuarda, Fricka, Klytämnestra, Dorabella, Donna Elvira, Katisha, Mistress Quickly, numerous Handel and Monteverdi heroines and the title role in Britten's Gloriana, videoed for Virgin Classics. |
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See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | Based on the play by J.M. SyngeProduced and Directed by Louis Lentin.
Sarah Walker, Yvonne Brennan, Kathleen Tynan, Hugh Mackey & Martin Murphy Radio Telefis Éireann Chamber Choir and Concert Orchestra, Bryden Thomson Riders to the Sea is Vaughan Williams’ most successful operatic achievement. It is short, but the music is written on a grand scale, and it is emotionally powerful. He based his opera on J.M. Synge’s great tragic one-act play about Aran fisherfolk. The Irish dramatist spent several summers on the stormy West Coast of Ireland, and the primitive life of the islanders, whose existence depended almost entirely on the sea, provided him with the material for his play. Vaughan Williams was inspired by the theme of human endurance in the face of the natural elements, and his opera is absolutely faithful to Synge’s original play, almost word for word. The tautly structured music is integrated perfectly with Synge’s dialogue, and at the end it opens out into a great dignified lament, sometimes compared to the lament from Dido and Aeneas. This film, made in the studio in 1988 by the Irish broadcaster Radio Telefis Éireann, is unique, because it is the only audio-visual representation of any of Vaughan Williams’ operatic and stage works currently available. The opera stars Sarah Walker in the central role of the mother Maurya, who has already lost six men in her family to the sea, and fears for the safety of her two remaining sons. Her daughters Cathleen and Nora are played by Yvonne Brennan and Kathleen Tynan, and her son Bartley is sung by Hugh Mackey. Martin Murphy portrays J.M. Synge. The Radio Telefis Éireann Chamber Choir and Concert Orchestra is conducted by Bryden Thomson. It is produced and directed by Louis Lentin. A new production of Riders to the Sea is being staged at English National Opera this November, to mark the 50th anniversary of Vaughan Williams’ death. | 
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| |  | Voices is one of Henze’s prominent political works of the 1970s which sets texts
by a variety of writers in several languages. This unique recording is released
internationally on CD for the first time in 2006, the year of Henze’s 80th birthday.
Sarah Walker (mezzo-soprano) & Paul Sperry (tenor) London Sinfonietta, Hans Werner Henze “Spirited, meticulous and virtuoso performances under the composer’s own direction.” Gramophone | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Ode To FreedomRecorded at the Schauspielhaus, Berlin, 25 December 1989
June Anderson (soprano), Sarah Walker (mezzo-soprano), Klaus König (tenor) & Jan-Hendrik Rootering (bass) Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks & Rundfunkchor Berlin
Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks & Members of the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, Orchestra of the Kirov Theatre, London Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris, Leonard Bernstein Subtitles: English, German, French, Spanish The fall of the Berlin Wall on November 1989 unleashed a wave of democratisation in Central and Eastern Europe that radically transformed the world order. In a typically grandiose yet eloquent gesture, Leonard Bernstein spontaneously accepted an invitation to conduct a performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony to celebrate this freedom | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Beethoven - Symphonies Nos. 5 & 6
Yvonne Kenny, Sarah Walker, Patrick Power & Petteri Salomas The Schütz Choir of London & London Classical Players, Sir Roger Norrington | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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Faye Robinson (soprano), Sarah Walker (mezzo-soprano), Jon Garrison (tenor) & John Cheek (bass-baritone) City of Birmingham Chorus & City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Sir Michael Tippett This unique recording was conducted by Sir Michael Tippett himself when he was 85. It is thus a wonderful testament to one of great figures of British music of the twentieth century and very fitting that it should be once again in circulation during the centenary year | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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Paul Charles Clarke, Alastair Miles, Mary Plazas, Garry Magee, Diana Montague, Matthew Hargreaves, Sarah Walker Geoffrey Mitchell Choir, Philharmonia Orchestra, David Parry Sung in English | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Schubert Lieder
Schubert: | Der Musensohn, D764 (Goethe) Ganymed, D544 (Goethe) Schäfers Klagelied, D121 (Goethe) Rastlose Liebe, D138 Suleika I & II An den Mond, D296 Der Fischer, D225 (Goethe) Erlkönig, D328 Wandrers Nachtlied II 'Über allen Gipfeln ist Ruh', D768 Die Sterne, D939 (Leitner) Der Einsame, D800 Nachtstück, D672 (Mayrhofer) Der Zwerg, D771 (Collin) Im Abendrot, D799 Nachtviolen D752 (Mayrhofer) Die junge Nonne, D828 Nacht und Träume, D827 |
Sarah Walker (mezzo soprano), Roger Vignoles (piano) | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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Sarah Walker (mezzo soprano), Henry Herford (baritione) Guildford Choral Society, The Philharmonia Orchestra, Hilary Davan Wetton | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Henri Duparc - The Complete Songs
Sarah Walker (mezzo soprano), Thomas Allen (baritone), Roger Vignoles (piano) 'Roger Vignoles is a most sympathetic accompanist, and virtuosic where virtuosity is called for, and the whole set is at one with Duparc's own evaluation of these magnificent songs' (Gramophone) | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Markevitch - Complete Orchestral Works Volume 1
This first volume of the Naxos Igor Markevitch Complete Orchestral Works Edition, to be followed by the seven volumes previously released on Marco Polo, brings together two relatively early compositions of astonishing technical and æsthetic assurance. The Partita is in effect already his second Piano Concerto, written when the composer was twenty. The granitic oratorio Paradise Lost, whose première the composer himself conducted at the BBC in London barely three years later, is among the most important of the composer’s works, bearing comparison with Stravinsky’s contemporaneous OEdipus Rex and Perséphone, yet of striking individuality of vision. |
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