Wilde was full of contradictions, and his poetry reflected it. “Taedium Vitae” denounces erotic love, reviling the lust that “stab[s] my youth with desperate knives.” And indeed, Linton’s steady vocal line comes under assault from a pointillistic battery in the piano part. Crossley-Mercer’s voice impressively traverses the gradations of temptation and resoluteness.
~ From Opera News 2019. Joshua Rosenbaum