Kathleen Ferrier - Recordings

Recordings

Ferrier's discography consists of studio recordings originally made on the Columbia and Decca labels, and recordings taken from live performances which were later issued as discs. In the years since her death, many of her recordings have received multiple reissues on modern media; between 1992 and 1996 Decca issued the Kathleen Ferrier Edition, incorporating much of Ferrier's recorded repertoire, on 10 compact discs. The discographer Paul Campion has drawn attention to numerous works which she performed but did not record, or for which no complete recording has yet surfaced. For example, only one aria from Elgar's Dream of Gerontius, and none of her renderings of 20th-century songs by Holst, Bax, Delius and others were recorded. Only a small part of her St John Passion was captured on disc.

Two recordings were especially popular, being bought as records and played regularly as favourites on BBC Radio in shows such as Desert Island Discs, Housewives' Choice and Your Hundred Best Tunes. These were her unaccompanied rendition of the Northumbrian folk tune, "Blow the Wind Southerly", and the aria Che farò ("What is life?") from the opera Orfeo ed Euridice. These were the A-sides of the records and the corresponding B-sides, which also became familiar, were "The Keel Row" and "Art thou troubled?" from Handel's Rodelinda. These records sold in large numbers which rivalled other stars of the time such as Frank Sinatra and Vera Lynn. Today her recordings still sell hundreds of thousands of copies each year.