5 star review 

This beautifully packaged recording brings together songs around the conceit of a weekend love affair, beginning with an innocent young girl’s wonders and fears (the album’s title song, a setting by Benjamin Britten of a poem by WH Auden). The CD moves through a variety of emotions to its close: Britten’s version of the traditional Early One Morning.

In between, there is much to enjoy, not only in the quality of this well-paired performance, but in the emotional range displayed in a series of musical vignettes. 

Alexander Bryce, The Scotsman, 17 February 2013, 5*****

Half the fun in anthologies comes from seeing what has been chosen and how the programme has been sewn together...A pair of cabaret songs - Britten's setting of Auden's popular poem 'Tell me the truth about love' and Weill's 'Je ne t'aime pas', neither of them easy to pull off - fall early and late in what is an imaginative recital of art song. Most of the usual suspects are here but there is also a welcome thread of rarities from composers such as Boulanger, Marx and Dunhill. 

How often do we come across Loewe's playful 'Ich kann nicht fassen' or Mompou's elegiac 'Damunt de tu, només les flors'? Even better is the grand setting of Verlaine's 'En Sourdine' by Poldowski's, an interesting contrast to Fauré's melodie. Roocroft is impassioned in outgoing songs such as Bridge's ecstatic 'Adoration', where accompanist Joseph Middleton is really able to let himself go...persuasively shaped and coloured. The choice of songs, though, is its own strong selling point. It would be nice to think that every weekend fling might be as rewarding as this one.    

Richard Fairman, The Gramophone, June 2013

This is an intelligent and engrossing recital...Roocroft and Middleton's performance is glorious...Faure's Fleur jetee (Discarded flower) is altogether a surprise. A brilliant, Erlkonig like, piano part superbly rendered by Middleton, and the highly dramatic song gives Roocroft full rein...Mompou's Damunt de tu nomes les flors (Above you naught but flowers) evokes true sensuality in its direct uncluttered line. Roocroft brings real depth to this song, hinting at memories of Caballe. And we conclude in ecstasy, with Rachmaninov's Midsummer nights, Middleton revelling in the outrageously elaborate piano part. Roocroft is wonderfully intense here...Roocroft's performances are always dramatically involving, and she gives each song its own distinctive style. In this she is ably supported by Middleton who is dazzling...the whole adds up to a great recital from one of the warmest, vibrant and most human of sopranos.

Robert Hugill, Planet Hugill, 14 February 2013

a tidy and logical collection, impeccably delivered by each singer and their pianist Joseph Middleton, whose delicacy of touch and tonal elegance was at all times perfectly judged. And, although the subject matter rarely strayed from romantic love, the treatment and expressive range was remarkably varied.

David Hart, The Birmingham Post, 23 November 2012

The pianist, Joseph Middleton, a star in his own right, was in perfect sync with Allen throughout the concert. There was a camaraderie and a mutual delight in the music being shared by these two artists that added a very special tone to the evening.

Nancie Ottem, Review Vancouver, 13 June 2012

For sheer joy – for youthful panache and heartfelt commitment – nothing I have experienced musically this year comes near to matching this lovely soirée, given in the salon of a private house in South Kensington before a small invited audience. What a privilege to be there!

The concert marked the inauguration of a new group, The Myrthen Ensemble, named after a song that Schumann sent to his wife Clara and modelled on the fondly remembered Songmakers’ Almanac. Like the latter, it consists of a pianist and a quartet of singers functioning as a team of friends rather than stand-alone stars – here they are Joseph Middleton, and soprano Sophie Bevan, mezzo-soprano Clara Mouriz, tenor Allan Clayton and baritone Marcus Farnsworth.This line-up represents the crème de la crème of young British-based musical talent…

The programme was most intelligently devised by Joseph Middleton, an unfailingly sensitive accompanist. 

The Myrthen Ensemble will be performing at the Wigmore Hall next season. I hope and predict we will be hearing a lot more of them over the coming years.

Rupert Christiansen, The Telegraph, 30 March 2012

Swedish mezzo Katarina Karnéus has made all this repertoire very much her own...Joseph Middleton, often noted by Musical Pointers as a special musician, impressed throughout as her equal partner.

Musical Pointers

Sir Thomas’s performance of this raw and direct depiction of young love [Schumann's Dichterliebe] was exactly tailored to the intimate Holywell ambience, with every note and gesture considered and made to count...Prizewinning young accompanist Joseph Middleton provided excellent, unshowy support throughout. Giles Woodforde, Oxford Times, 26 October 2011

Pure musical magic…Allen and pianist Joseph Middleton put together a recital of German Lieder from the 19th century as well as a selection of 20th century art songs. To call this a class act would be a huge understatement. It was a living, breathing, example of what it means to effectively communicate in song…Allen’s approach [to Dichterliebe] was to keep the emotions from frothing up too mightily, while Middleton’s liquid-velvet work at the piano maintained a discreet counterweight. John Terauds, Toronto Star

Joseph Middleton, who is already established as an outstanding accompanist of some distinction, showed his burgeoning reputation is fully deserved. He would seem to have a flawless technique and provided Wolfgang Holzmair with nuanced support that was alert to his veteran singer's every whim. Jim Pritchard, Musicweb International

Joseph Middleton is as classy a Lieder pianist as can be found anywhere in the world... McGreevy and Middleton's first half built inexorably to a magnificent climax with “Mignon: Kennst du das Land.” Goethe's headily ecstatic vision of a paradise in the south was powerful stuff indeed...the final selection of characterful and lively Chabrier songs again brought out the best of both performers’ musicianship, humour and stagecraft.

Sebastian Scotney, www.bachtrack.com

Joseph Middleton was an outstanding accompanist throughout, providing musical and sensitive support with a formidable pianistic technique.

Belfast Telegraph, 26 October 2010

Their wonderfully supportive pianist Joseph Middleton, so sensitive and subtly shaded in the quieter numbers, dashed off the glittering Hexenlied (Witches’ Song) with virtuosic relish.

David Hart, Birmingham Post, 14 May 2010

The contribution of unassuming and beautifully phrased musicianship that Joseph Middleton brought to the accompanists role must impart confidence to a singer in no small measure … Exciting times are ahead for this talented musical partnership.

Musical Pointers, 5 July 2007