Sandrine Piau / Susan manoff APRÈS UN RÊVE

Sandrine Piau was recently forced to withdraw from both Glyndebourne and this year's Proms after sustaining a knee injury, so if you admire her work, then you're going to have to make do, I'm afraid, with her latest album. It thoughtfully examines images of night, sleep, dreams and waking in post-Romantic and modern song. Piau treats the subject metaphorically as well as literally, which allows her to include Poulenc's settings of surrealist poetry, Strauss's Morgen, and Britten's The Salley Gardens, which deals with waking up to reality after disappointment in love. She also gives us Vincent Bouchot's Galgenlieder – an eerie new song cycle that pitches settings of Christian Morgenstern somewhere between nightmare and nursery rhyme – together with some rarely heard Mendelssohn and familiar numbers by Chausson and Fauré. At 58 minutes, the disc is a bit short, and a preponderance of reflective material results in an occasional sameness of mood. But there's exquisite playing from Susan Manoff, and no mistaking the beauty of Piau's voice, or her hypnotic way with words. This is singing that sends shivers down your spine. (Tim Ashley / The Guardian)