Timothy Burris
CD reviews
Ciaccona
on baroque lute, archlute, and theorbo
“Lutenist Timothy Burris, who teaches at Colby College and the Portland Conservatory of Maine, has chosen a collection of passacaglias and ciacconas spanning the middle to late Baroque that ably demonstrate the genre’s potential and his skill as performer. […] Burris, a well-seasoned performer, presents these works with a clean and clear technique that allows compositional brilliance to stand in the forefront.” — Early Music America, Summer 2013
Lagrime Mie
with Jennifer Lane, mezzo
“This is a very attractive recording… Timothy Burris’s accompaniments on theorbo are superb, and his two solo tracks whet the appetite for more–he is deserving of a full recital disc from PGM. … Warmly recommended.” — Fanfare
Concert reviews
“One perceives in him a distinguished musicality and a depth of artistry, which join with a solid and finely shaded technique to produce sonorities strongly evocative of the princely courts.” — La Semaine d’Anvers
“Timothy Burris’s … performance of Piccinini’s Passacaglia was sensitive and impressive… He controlled the theorbo with precision befitting a seasoned master.” — The Virginia Gazette
“Burris, who has recorded some of Weiss’s work side by side with Bach’s lute music, made a strong case for [Weiss] with his warm-toned performances of the Fantasia, Allemande and Gavotte from Weiss’s Suite No. 11.
“I wish he had played the entire suite.” — The Portland Press Herald
“Burris demonstrated the flexibility of the instrument’s dynamics – as well as his own deftness at making melody lines ring out clearly over busy accompaniments, as if they were played on a second instrument – in expressive, shapely renderings of the “Marche Funèbre” from Fernando Sor’s 1836 “Fantaisie Élégiaque” (Op. 59), and a familiar Sor study, “Lesson No. 23” (from Op. 31, 1828).”— The Portland Press Herald
(Review by Allan Kozinn of a concert played on a Richard Berg copy of Antonio Torres’ FE17 (1864), an instrument played for over 20 years by a young Francisco Tárrega.)
“As he often does, Burris sidestepped the obvious choices and offered a few rarities instead – transcriptions from Lully operas (“Logistille,” from “Roland,” and “Chaconne des Herlequins,” from “Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme”) and a miscellaneous chaconne, all played gracefully and with attention to the balance between the delicate top lines and the robust accompaniments played on the theorbo’s open bass strings.”— The Portland Press Hera7ld
Music’s Quill
CD reviews
Songs of Philip Rosseter, Part I
“The Maine-based duo of Timothy Neill Johnson and Timothy Burris brings a natural rapport and gentle delivery to these songs. Johnson’s lines are silky and warm; Burris’s accompaniment is placed simply and gracefully.”— Early Music America
“Johnson’s singing is very well judged, the tone never forced, the diction exemplary, with some effective use of appoggiatura, graces and divisions, and giving a general impression he has paid great attention to the meaning of the lyrics… Johnson’s vibrato humanises rather than dominates.
“Burris plays with a very clean technique and generates a beautiful tone. He is a superb supportive accompanist, and the recorded balance of voice and lute is faultless.”— The Lute Society Magazine
Songs of Philip Rosseter, Part II
“Burris … plays with beautiful tone and is an absolutely first-class accompanist melodically, rhythmically and contrapuntally.”
“Johnson’s voice is light and clear, and his diction faultless.”
“The recording balance between the voice and the lute could not be bettered.”— The Lute Society Magazine
“Tim Burris and Timothy Neill Johnson perform these songs (and lute solos) with such grace and fluidity that it is as if they were one unit. Their playing and singing style are a perfect complement to Rosseter’s refined and charming songs. Johnson’s voice is warm and simple with perfect diction; Burris is a graceful and sensitive accompanist.”— Lute Society of America Quarterly
Concert reviews
From Allan Kozinn’s review of a 9 February, 2019 performance of Dowland’s Book 1, published in the Portland Press Herald.
“Music’s Quill adopted the same configuration that worked so well last year, with tenor Timothy Neill Johnson accompanied by Burris on lute and Todd Borgerding on viola da gamba. For the most part, these were straightforward readings, each song presented with all its verses (performers sometimes drop one or two), and with often subtle ornamentation providing variety along the way.
“Johnson, interestingly, performed most of the concert seated between Burris and Borderding, creating a closer sense of ensemble than is typical when a singer stands, yet sacrificing nothing in tone or vocal power. He also brought a fine sense of drama to the proceedings, endowing his brisk account of “If My Complaints Could Passions Move” with an energy that added emotional weight to those complaints. At the other end of the expressive spectrum, he brought a sublimely despondent sensibility and sound to “Go Crystal Tears” and an exquisite sense of resignation to “Come, Heavy Sleep.”
“Other pieces stood out for their interpretive inventiveness. The book’s lute work, “My Lord Chamberlaine His Galliard,” appears with the instruction “for two to play on one lute.” Instead, Burris and Borgerding shared the honors, with Borgerding plucking (rather than bowing) the melody line on the gamba.
“Borgerding also took a solo in “Now, O Now, I Needs Must Part,” taking a verse for an appealing, improvisation on the song’s melody. And Johnson was at his most daring in a reading of “Come Again” that began more slowly than is typical, but unfolded with a rhythmic flexibility that let him convey, with a visceral immediacy, the shifting passions and amorous enticements of the text.”
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“One was transported to the parlor of Samuel Pepys, Lawes’ contemporary, but somehow I don’t think the performances there would have been as professional, for all the famous biographer’s study of vocal trills. […] The most impressive piece of the evening was a French cantata by Louis-Nicolas Clerambault (1676-1749) for chamber orchestra and tenor. The mini-opera depicted the tragedy of Pyramus and Thisbe, the model for ‘Romeo and Juliet.’
“As sung by Johnson, it was surprisingly intense, with a musical depiction of emotion that seemed well in advance of its time.”— Portland Press-Herald
“Sor, a Spanish composer who worked mostly in Paris, was one of the most formidable guitarist-composers of his day, matched (and in some ways bettered) only by Mauro Giuliani, an Italian composer who spent the main years of his career in Vienna. Both were represented here by groups of rarely heard songs, which benefited from Johnson’s lithe tone and commanding sense of style.”
“Johnson and Burris also performed four French songs from “Premier Recueil d’Airs Choises,” a 1762 collection by a composer identified only as “Mr. Godard.” These have some appealingly peculiar touches – the sudden leaps into the tenor’s top range, in “Menuet de M. Valois,” for example, or the contest between extroversion and subtlety in “Ah, le Charmant Berger” – as well as elegant guitar accompaniments..”— Portland Press-Herald
ScheckMate
Concert review
“Scheck gave an energetic, rich-toned account of Giovanni Battista dagl’Antonii’s concise but wide-ranging Ricercata No. 6 in A minor (from his Ricercata, Op. 1, published in 1687). Burris gave expansive, beautifully detailed readings of the “Capricio detto il Capricioso” and the “Corrente detta l’Alfonsina” by Pietro Paolo Melii, a lute virtuoso who wrote in a similarly discursive, contrapuntal style similar to that of his more famous contemporary, John Dowland.”— Portland Press Herald
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Ensalada
Concert review
“The ensemble was at its best and most freewheeling in its version of Arcangelo Corelli’s “La Folia.” Usually heard in a version for solo violin with harpsichord accompaniment, the group reorchestrated the piece for its combination of timbres, with individual players, duos and trios within the ensemble taking individual variations and frequently adding new turns of their own. Interesting as the other offerings were, a full program of arrangements like this would make for a killer evening.” — Portland Press Herald
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