FINZI. SONGS, Derek Hammond-Stroud (baritone), Josephine Lee (piano). Celebre Q EPC15 (7 in. 10s. 9d. plus is. 9d. PT.). Celebre Records, 7 Priory Gardens, Highgate, London, N.6.

Songs: Fear no more the heat o' the sun. 0 Mistress Mine. Who is Sy/via?

These three songs by Gerald Finzi are taken from his settings of five Shakespeare lyrics which he dedicated to Vaughan Williams on the latter's seventieth birthday. They are now often heard in song recitals and are justifiably popular.

Derek Hammond-Stroud has a fine baritone voice of sympathetic timbre which he uses with intelligence and considerable technical accomplishment, and his diction is irreproachable. At the moment one is conscious of the great care with which he sings, and the scrupulous attention which he pays to the words, and he has not yet acquired the complete identification with a song which a singer like McCormack was able to achieve so effortlessly, but this may well come with greater experience in the recording studio. The excellent accompanist is Josephine Lee.

The sound is very forward and inclined to be over-modulated in places, but a judicious use of filter controls should remove any roughness, and this little disc should give much pleasure to all lovers of English song. J.F.