Feminist radical : Schubert and Wolfgang Rihm - Prégardien, Andrés Orozco-Estrada

Very interesting programme from Andrés Orozco-Estrada and Hr-sinfonieorchester Frankfurt - Schubert and Wolfgang Rihm.  Schubert Symphony no 2 and the Unvollende, with Rihm's Das Rot song cyle and six songs from Schwanengesang.  Listen HERE.  Perhaps not so unusual, though if you consider that Rihm was setting the poems of  Karoline von Günderrode 1780-1806). Von Günderrode was one of the earliest Romantic poets who adapted the revolutionary ethic of the period to develop what we'd now recognize as radical feminist ideas.  Her poems and letters were written a whole generation before the Brontë sisters : indeed she was long dead before they were even born.  

Though poor, background was aristoctratic and intellectual. Learning was her escape from the mundane restraints of women in society at that time.  Like so many thinkers of her time she was fascinated by the  margins of Europe - the "East" and the far north west, Nordic lands and Scotland representing uncivilized freedom where the unconscious could operate without convention. She also made the most of the passion of the time for writing literary letters which dealt with intellectual concepts.   These sorts of letters weren't just personal, but were discusssed in salons and sometimes published in book form. A useful outlet for women, whose chances of being taken seriously were limited. Uncowed, she wrote “Masculinity and femininity, as they are usually understood, are obstacles to humanity.”  In a letter to Gunda von Brentano she writes: “I’ve often had the unfeminine desire to throw myself into the wild chaos of battle and die. Why didn’t I turn out to be a man! I have no feeling for feminine virtues, for a woman’s happiness. Only that which is wild, great, shining appeals to me. There is an unfortunate but unalterable imbalance in my soul; and it will and must remain so, since I am a woman and have desires like a man without a man’s strength. That’s why I’m so vacillating and so out of harmony with myself….” (read more here and here) 

In Das Rot : Sechs Gedichte der Karoline von Günderrode, from 1990, Wolfgang Rihm addresses the epigrammatic nature of the texts, letting the poet speak for herself.   The first song "Hochrot" comprises just eight lines:

Du innig Roth,

Bis an den Tod 

Soll meine Lieb 

Dir gleichen,

Soll nimmer bleichen, 

Bis an den Tod,

Du glühende Roth, 

Soll sie Dir gleichen. 

(You, inward red dawn, until death should my life be like you, never fading,you glowing Redness , ever true.)

Thus the minimal piano line (Ulrich Eisenlohr) and restrained declamation in the voice part. A short pause before the last line, which rises high up the scale. Clear traces of the influence of Rihm's teacher, Wilhelm Rihm, and specifically of Killmayer's Hölderlin-Zyklusen. Making the connection between Hölderlin and Von Günderrode is valid. Both were way ahead of their time, more in tune with ours, in many ways. The text for the  second song "Ist alles stumm und leer" is strophic, Günderrode employing images like scents, distant sounds, fragile flowers.  But in the last verse, something wilder emegeges.Prégardien's voices lowers, grows richer.  "Phönix der Lieblichkeit,
Dich trägt dein Fittig weit
Hin zu der Sonne Strahl,
Ach was ist dir zumal
Mein einsam Leid!" (Phoenix of loveliness, your wings carry you far up towards the sun)  Thoughnthe phoenix might ignore the observer, it is an inspiration, for the phoenix flies into flames and is reborn.

"Des Knaben Morgengruß" and "Des Knaben Abendsgruß" are mirror images. Both employ similar images but for different purposes, which Righm reflects by settingbthe first with plangent spareness, the second more forcefully. Again, clear Killmayer influences in the ardent near-staccato rhythms.  Thus we're prepared for the wild intensity of "An Creuzer". The redness of dawn becomes the glowing redness of sunset, before it's annihilated in darkness.  Rihm's setting is jagged, reflecting the dissonant image in the text : the piano 's last notes dark and foreboding.  And so to the strange last song.

Liebst du das Dunkel 

auigter Nächte
Graut dir der Morgen 

Starrst du ins Spätrot
Seufzest beim Mahle 

Stößest den Becher
Weg von den Lippen 

Liebst du nicht Jagdlust 

Reizet dich Ruhm  nicht
Schlachtengetümmel 

Welken dir Blumen
Schneller am Busen 

Als sie sonst welkten
Drängt sich das Blut dir
Pochend zum Herzen. 

(Do you love darkness (ambiguity). Longing for a feast but pushing  the wineglass away, passion so strong it wilts flowers and ends in death.).  

Günderrode's life seemed full of contradiction : breaking away from conventional role models, yet not finding resolution.  She fell in love with a man she could not marry, and killed herself, aged only 26. One wonders if she would have been happy even if she had married? Perhaps for a Romantic, turbulence and tragedy make better art.  The Schubert Heine songs with which this interesting concert ended continued the mood of irony.  Günderrode would have been (just) old enough to be Schubert's mother but she is in some ways the predecessor of some of his poets like Schulze and Mayrhofer.  So it was good hearing Rihm's settings of her work with Schubert's orchestral work.

Christoph Prégardien Wanderer Tapestries

Christoph Prégardien Winterreise at the Wigmore Hall Thursday 21st March, in Normand Forget's arrangement for chamber ensemble with Pentaèdre, and Joseph Petric, accordionist.  This is an  arrangement for wind quartet and accordion, released on CD 10 years ago. Why do some people still go berserk at the idea of transcriptions ? Music has always stimulated creative respones. The idea that it should be standardized fixed product is only very recent, more to do with consumer expectations than to do with music or musicianship.  Winterreise in particular has attracted more arrangements than perhaps anything else in the repertoire.  There are Winterreise arranged for guitar, different types of chamber ensembles and even for hurdy-gurdy. There are stagings, adaptations and dance versions.   Prégardien's Winterreise with Andreas Staier on fortepiano is so good that it's an essential part of the discography.  Julian Prégardien's Hans Zender Schuberts Winterriese is a through-composed "new" piece not a transcription, also best in its class (Please read more here).

Gustav Mahler's Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen  exists as song for voice and piano,  the songs further adapted and incorporated in his Symphony no 1. Arnold Schoenberg's arrangement for small ensemble, was created for the Society for Private Musical Performances (Verein für musikalische Privataufführungen) in 1920.  This was an organization of musicians for musicians, hence the title "private".  Musicians only, dedicated to the analysis of new works. Some 154 pieces were examined, the concerts being the fruit of these discussions.  Schoenberg's arrangement brings out the correspondances in the songs, showing how they form a true, unified cycle. This orchestration is restrained, expanding the piano line with subtle flourishes that suggest Spring and lightness.  This delicacy works especially well for tenor, particularly one like Prégardien, whose timbre is pure and clean, suggesting youthful vigour.  Prégardien's recording with Ensemble Kontraste on the disc Wanderer for Challenge from 2010 is wonderful  a must for any serious Mahler listener.  

Prégardien and Ensemble Kontraste also perform several of Wilhelm Killmayer's Hölderlin-Lieder II, which Prégardien has recorded in full. Hölderlin's verses are fragments - one no more than the phrase ".....wie Wolken um die Zeiten legt...." .which Killmayer sets with great transparency  lots of white on the page, I suspect. But that's the essence of the poems : horizons stretch beyond articulation. Pinning down meaning would restrict and demean.  Killmayer created two sets of Hölderlin songs, one for voice and piano, the other for small ensemble. The chamber version is exqusite.  The flute tessitura runs very high, soaring upwards, defying gravity.  A pervasive sense of rapture : the poet contemplating the mysteries of the universe, transcending the prison that is his tower.  Lower, sensual murmurings from clarinet, viola and cello  : single note passages  like celestial light.  Epigrammatic as these songs are, they evoke infinite possibilities.  "Greichenland" sings Prégardien, in clear, bright tones : Hölderlin transfixed by shining ideals, the richness of the ensemble behind him adding dimension.  Killmayer was a master of re-invention, expanding afresh the frontiers of Lieder.

Also on this recording, Marcus Maria Reissenberger's arrangements for small ensemble of 14 pieces by Robert Schumann.  Reissbenberger's transcriptions are faithful to the basic piano line, the other instruments adding extra colour.  Also interesting is the way he mixes songs from  texts by Heine, Kerner and Eichendorff, (not all mega famous) with piano works, not in random order, but with a new logic. A tapestry woven from many threads.

 

An alternative Im Wunderschönen Monat Mai

Everyone knows Schumann's ImWunderschönen Mai from Dichterliebe but what about Franz Lachner's setting of Heine's poem ? Lachner's setting pre-dates Schumann's and is a masterpiece in its own right.  Lachner (1803-1890) gets short shrift because he wasn't Schubert or Schumann, but why should he have to be ?  As Peter Schreier said: “You appreciate the peaks when you know the landscape". He wasn't an imitator, and their "influence" as such was generic rather than direct, though he knew both Schubert and Schumann personally.  Setting the same poems means not a thing ! Heine's so interesting that composers are still setting him today.  Lachner was part of the Schubertiade circle, though he was very young - six years younger than Schubert yet still significant enough to be depicted in the 1826 drawing by Moritz von Schwind, which shows Schubert at the piano with Josef von Spaun to Schubert's right and Johann Michael Vogl to Schubert's left. Lachner is the figure with his head bent, behind von Spaun. Lachner is also seen with Schubert in von Schwind's pen drawings in the vineyards at Grinzing.
Lachner's Im Mai comes from his best known song cycle Sängerfahrt op 33 (1831-2) and is an early setting of Heine's Lyrisches Intermezzo.  Lachner, who was still living in Vienna, wrote the cycle as gift to his fiancée Julia Royko. Sängerfahrt (Singer's journey) and Dichterliebe (Poet's love) ! Ten years later Schumann would write Dichterliebe as a wedding gift for Clara Wieck.  The choice of  Heine is interesting, too, since the poems are too ironic to be romantic. Unless your loved one gets wooed on tales of loss and tragedy.   In Lachner's Im Mai, rippling triplets in the piano part suggest  gentle movement - perhaps warm breezes ? The vocal line rises, as the sap does in Spring. "Da ist in meinem Herzen, Die Liebe aufgegangen".  The  sprouting buds and branches of blossom in the text awaken in Lachner a wonderful circular melody in the piano part. It is so beautiful - reminiscent of the melodies Beethoven and Mendelssohn used in order to evoke the countryside The piano seems transformed, as if it were an ancient folk instrument. There's nothing quite like this in the genre, not even the faint echo of hurdy-gurdy in Der Leiermann (though there's no connection between the songs or cycles). Or perhaps it suggests the lyre of some antique shepherd in an Arcadian landscape.  For Lachner and his contemporaries this would have evoked the image of Orpheus, this time successfully leading his bride back into Spring and life. The circular figures may also suggest the rhythm of Nature, and changing of seasons.  Lachner respects the simplicity of Heine's poem, with its understated strophic verses : too much artifice would spoil the purity.  After the second verse the piano part returns, drifting off gently, into silence.

In 1836, Lachner (a Prussian), landed a powerful job as conductor of the Hofoper in Munich. He had direct access to the King, and influence on everything musical in Bavaria. Lachner was to Munich what Mendelssohn was to Leipzig and Berlin. Nonetheless, today Lachner's relatively unknown, primarily because he wasn't Richard Wagner.When Wagner came on the scene, Lachner was pointedly retired. Nonetheless, he's fascinating as a kind of missing link, between the very early Lieder of Beethoven  and the songs of Brahms. His chamber music is fairly well known,  and there's now more interest in his songs. There are several recordings of Lachner songs, mainly from Sängerfahrt op 33 but many others await discovery. Christoph Prégardien and Andreas Staier pioneered Lachner in a 1998 recording, presenting Lachner with Beethoven's An die ferne Geliebte and the songs of Nikolaus von Krufft (which I love) . The use of fortepiano is perfect, adding a period refinemt to songs that do need elegance and a light touch.  There is only one full recording of Sängerfahrt op 33 by Rufus Miller, which was a courageous thing to do at the time, but unfortunately the performance isn't very good. Prégardien has contuinued to sing Lachner over the years, often different songs , and  Mark Padmore's recorded a few for Hyperion.  Angelika Kirchschlager also has them in her repertoire and has done them at the Wigmore Hall. 

Christoph Prégardien Wigmore Hall

Christoph Prégardien at the Wigmore Hall, welcomed return of the perennial favourite of Wigmore Hall audiences. Prégardien and Julius Drake began with Carl Loewe’s Der Nöck (op 129/2, 1857) one of the most lyrical Lied by any composer, in a genre rich with beauty,  to a poem by August Kopisch.  Beside a tumbling waterfall, a water sprite plays his harp, enchanting the torrent so it hangs suspended in mid air, the vapours forming a rainbow halo. Circular figures in the piano part suggest tumbling waters. Prégardien breathed into the long vowel sounds in the refrain so they rolled. The flowing refrain evokes both the song of a nightingale and of the harp, symbols of song.  But suddenly the magic is broken when humans draw near. The waves roar, the trees stand tall, and the nightingale flees, until it’s safe for the Nöck to reveal himself again.  Prégardien and Drake paired this Der Nöck with another setting of the same poem which is driving me crazy because I can’t identify it, though I can’t place without having to look it up.

So omnipresent is Schubert’s Erlkönig that Carl Loewe’s Erlkönig (Op 1/23 1818) might seem to pale in comparison.  But it really isn’t bad on its own terms.  Loewe emphasizes the word “Knaben”, which Prégardien sings sensually : perhaps Loewe understood the subtext better than Schubert did, even if the song isn’t a masterpiece. Loewe’s “true” Erlkönig in any case is Herr Oluf, or even Edward, both songs of disguised sexual anxiety.  Loewe also wrote another song, Der spaete Gast Op. 7 Nr. 2 to a poem by Willibald Alexis (Georg Wilhelm Heinrich Häring 1798-1871), an “alternative” Erlkönig. Read more about that here  

More spooky events in Robert Schumann’s Belsatzar op 57 (1846). This time the scene is a grand party in a palace, but an unseen hand writes a curse on the wall.  Prégardien’s singing was restrained, creating the drama is growing tension, holding back rather than bursting out. The last line was all the more chilling because it was delivered with understated calm. “Belsazar ward aber in selbiger Nacht von seinen Knechten umgebracht”.  A quick return to water spirits with Franz Liszt’s Die Loreley, S273 (1843).  Though Liszt is now established in the Lieder canon, his songs reflect his greater interest in pianistic expression.  Where Liszt write a lovely part describing the tumbling waves, the setting of the vocal line is rather more laboured.  Fortunately, Prégardien’s artistry injects convincing elegance.

Schumann’s genius as a composer to poets is demonstrated by his Liederkreis op 39 (1840) to poems by Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff, written the same year as his Liederkreis op 24 to poems by Heinrich Heine.   Two very different poets, two very different ways of settingb text.  Although Schumann, Heine and Eichendorff were more or less contemporaries, Eichendorff mined a vein more attuned to early Romantic values, where folk wisdom, albeit idealized, still  had much to offer.   Songs liie Waldesgresräch and Im Walde deal with mysteries of the forest, the forest being code word for what we’d now call the subconscious. Like all good Romantics, Eichendorff was an explorer. Songs like Fruhlingsfahrt and Der frohe Wandersman show that  Eichendorff was fascinated by wilder shores even while he praises domesticity. Though genuinely devout, his homilies are talismanic, for he intuits that creativity can be dangerous. An artist is driven by something greater than his own free will.  Happy Wanderer? No way.  Prégardien’s timbre is darker these days, but artistry grows with experience. 

Julian Prégardien Schubert Songs Wigmore Hall

The Wigmore Hall's complete Schubert song series continued with Julian Prégardien and Christoph Schnackertz, in a recital deferring from May.  Well worth the wait, because Prégardian is good, his singing enhanced by very strong musical instincts. In Lieder, sensitivity and musical intelligence are as important as voice. A good recital, is one where you come away feeling you've gone deeper into the repertoire thanks to the performer, as opposed to watching celebrity for celebrity sake.

Julian Prégardien has musical thinking in his genes, and it shows.  His father's voice is a divine  gift from God, but Julian, still only 33, has a gift for communication and, even rarer, an enthusiasm for music itself.  Hence the wonderful Schubert Im gegenwärtigen Vergangenes, an unusual work where the lead tenor's part is demanding enough for a top-quality singer, but the song works best as a quartet.  Prégardien's voice led, enhanced by the filigree created first as a duet with the second tenor Kieran Carrel - keep an ear out for him -  further developed by the entry of the two baritones, Phil Wilcox and Niall Anderson.  Schubert's multi-part songs are glorious : a pity they don't get more big-name singers and high-profile gigs. At the end of the recital, Prégardien was joined by Ben Goldscheider for Auf dem Strom D943 (1828, Rellstab). Valve horns were relatively new at the time, and Schubert's writing for the instrument tends to dominate the song, to the detriment of the voice part.

Im gegenwärtigen Vergangenes is based on one of Goethe's Hafiz poems from the West-östlicher Divan. Hence the theme Bilder aus Östen, highlighting the perfumed sensibility of Goethe's invocation of exotic, distant lands of imagination, an aesthetic particularly suited to lithe-toned tenors.  Prégardien and Schnackertz began with the rar(ish) fragment Mahomets Gesang D549 (1817) following it with Versunken D715 (1821)  where the piano part trills circular figures,  as if, through the music, the poet is running his fingers through someone's curly locks.  Prégardien brings out the flirtatious intimacy in the song, often lost in more formal "Germanic" baritone approaches. Perhaps the text might apply to fondling a child, but it could equally describe foreplay.  Friedrich Rückert was even more of an orientalist than Goethe, and also translated Asian texts. His volume   Östliche Rosen (1822), a response to the West-östlicher Divan. was his first of many forays into exoticism.  Sei mir gegrüsst D741 (1822) with its lilting tenderness expresses feelings that could apply in any culture.  The person being greeted is lost, but  "zum Trotz der Ferne, die sich, feindlich trennend"  the poet reaches out. Thus the gentle, rocking refrain. The tenderness in Prégardien's delivery suggests lullaby, a caress in music.  Similarly, the unforced expressiveness in Prégardien's Dass sie hier gewesen D775 (1823), another Rückert setting where subtlety is of the essence. 

A beautifully phrased Am See D124 (1814) led to four settings of Johan Peter Uz (1720-1796).  Die Nacht D358, Gott im Frühlinge D 448 and An Chloen (fragment) D363, and Der gute Hirt D449,  all from 1816.  In a complete song series, someone has to draw the short straw, but Prégardien and Schnackertz gave the rather slight songs good treatment. For Uz, the shepherd in Der gut Hirt was clearly Jesus. For Schubert, the shepherd could be a generic Romantic shepherd. The piano part suggests elegant repose, with a typically Schubertian undertow.  The alternating lines in the vocal part are fetching, too, sometimes soaring expansively, sometimes quietly reverent. 

Hearing Schubert's Uz settings with his settings of Mayrhofer demonstrates the way Schubert responded to personal relationships as much as to poetry.  Prégardien and Schnackertz brought out the  delicacy of Geheimnis D491 (1816) which needs an intimate touch - it's about a secret, after all, a whisper, not a shout.  In Schlaflied D527 (1817) the vocal line rocks from high to low, taxing the singer. Prégardien, fortunately, made the flow even, so it felt natural, like the movement of a cradle.   Prégardien has a gift for  songs that need sensitive treatment. He negotiates the changes, letting the line flow illuminated by an understanding of what the words mean, even when the texts aren't particularly distinguished. Lieder is poetry. If words had no meaning, the songs wouldn't be Lieder.  The challenge ius to grow an interpretation from within.

Then to the challenge of Atys D585 (1817) and Lied eines Schiffers an die Dioskuren D360 (1816) much more sophisticated songs, which gave Prégardien more opportunity to show dramatic power. These songs were/are his father's speciality: Prégardien père will never be equalled, nor should he be. Julian Prégardien gave the songs a personal touch, which I appreciated, for Lieder is about the individual and the way he or she reaches an audience.  Being the child of someone so good and so well known is a double-edged sword. You grow up in a musical environment but you have to face pressures of expectation which other young singers aren't burdened with.  To stand on the stage at the Wigmore Hall, scene of so many Christoph Prégardien triumphs, must be daunting indeed.  That takes guts.  Prégardien fils is very good and deserves to be respected for himself.  Though he's still young, Prégardien has already forged a substantial career. 

For his encore, Julian Prégardien sang Nacht und Träume D827 (1825, Matthäus von Collin), beautifully and masterfully executed, the long lines stretching expressively. I thought I saw a tear run down Prégardien's face, which someone else confirmed.  We were touched.  Nice to see a singer, not as an instrument, but as a human being. 

Christoph Prégardien Wigmore Hall complete Schubert Songs

Another highlight of the Wigmore Hall complete Schubert Song series - Christoph Prégardien and Christoph  Schnackertz. The core Wigmore Hall Lieder audience were out in force.  These days, though, there are many young faces among the regulars, a sign that appreciation of serious Lieder excellence is alive and well at the Wigmore Hall.   Prégardien is a perennial favourite, who has been singing at the Wigmore Hall for at least 25 years. Prégardien's programmes are thought-provoking.  His choice focussed on Schubert's settings of Schiller and Mayrhofer, which are Prégardien specialities, but this time he included songs that are less well known, to stimulate the audience's appreciation of the composers craft.  Schubert set 44 songs to texts by Schiller,  of which three were  settings of Der Jüngling am Bache. His first, D 30, dates from as early as 1812.  Prégardian sang the version D192 from 1815. The brooks still runs cheerfully in the piano part, but now the more contemplative approach emphasizes Schiller's image of flowers crushed in fast-flowing waters, an allusion to impermanence and to unfulfilment.  The agile lucidity of Prégardien's timbre captures much of the whimsy of the first version, though the later song is more emotionally rewarding. Later in this Wigmore Hall series, no doubt we'll hear the third version, D 638 (1819), even more poignant. 

For a  moment, though, we remained in charm mode, with Schubert's settings of Ludwig Hölty (1748-1776).  Der Liebende D207 1815 recaptures the sprightly lyricism of the first version of  Der Jüngling am Bache. "Beglückt, beglückt, Wer dich erblickt", bright, sharp consonants, which Prégardien articulated so they sparkled. "Wem süsser Blick, und Wink und Nick Zum sussern Kusse winket". Utterly delicious.  Der Traum D218 1815 feels almost like folksong with its paired phrases suggesting the fluttering of a bird : "Mir träumt, ich war ein Vögelein".  Prégardien captured the lilting charm in the song with delicate but deft clarity.  The sentiments of Die Laube D214, 1815, is decidedly period. "Schauer wird durch meine Nerven haben" and "Wann ich auf der Bahnder Tugend wanke". But Pregardien's respect for the song as song gives it dignity. 

Thus were we prepared for more Schiller. Hoffnung D251 1815 is relatively straightforward compared with D 637, a darker and more beautidul setting of the same poem,. but it made a good transition to the Schiller ballad Ritter Togenberg D397 1816.  Again, the subject is rather "of its time". a knight, rejected by a maiden, goes on the Crusades where he "Schreckt den Muselmann". When he returns, the girl has become a nun. So the knight spends the rest of his life in a hut near the convent until the girl dies and becomes an angel. Strophic ballads aren't that easy to carry off but they are one of Prégardien's great strengths. He sang with direct, unfussy commitment, so the tale felt totally plausible. Context aside, emotions are universal.  

In his programme notes, Richard Stokes quotes Albert Einstein on Die Liebesgötter D 446 1816, to a poem by Johann Peter Uz, as "Anacreontic doggerel". "Cypris meiner Phyllis gleich, sass von Grazien umgeben....mich berauschten Cyperns Reben". Cypris's grapes have made the poem drunk. As a poem this is a howler.  The poet sees nymphs fleeing "mit leichtem Fuss allen Zwang betränkter Kettern flatteren von Fuss zu Fuss und von Blonden und Brünetten". Yer Prégardien makes the song feel right, though he smiled benevolently when singing the florid phrases. If we can take 18th century paintings of Classical Antiquity, we can perhaps take .Uz (1730-1796) on his own terms. In any case, the poem is more risqué than it seems since nymphs hang out with satyrs, and wine frees inhibitions. 

Prégardien and Schnackertz then paired Der Hirt D 490 1816 and Bei dem Grabe meines Vater D496 1816. Both deal with loss. In the first, the poet (Mayerhofer) looks at the tower where his beloved lives now that she's married. In the second, to a poem by Matthias Claudius, the poet mourns his father in conventionally dutiful terms.  Both settings are rather dispassionate, and don't draw from Schubert his finest moments, but we need to hear them to appreciate Schubert's work as a whole. That's the point of a complete song series. In that context, Schubert's songs to Mayrhofer shone all the more brightly.

Five more Schubert settings of Mayrhofer followed :  Der Alpenjjäger, D524 1817, Nach einem Gewitter D561 1817, Tröst  D671 1819, Nachstück  D D672 19, Nachtviolen D752 1822 and Alflösung D 807 1824, all of which Prégardien has performed many times in the past and still does with characteristic grace and intelligence. 

This review also appears in Opera Today

Schubert's anti-Fathers Day Rant

Franz Schubert's Anti Father's Day Rant  ? Leichenphantasie D7  (Corpse Fantasy) to a luridly Gothic poem by Schiller :

Mit erstorb'nem Scheinen 
Steht der Mond auf totenstillen Hainen
Seufzend streicht der Nachtgeist durch die Luft
Nebelwolken trauern, Sterne trauern Bleich herab, 
wie Lampen in der Gruft. Gleich Gespenstern, 
stumm und hohl und hager, 
Zieht in schwarzem Totenpompe dort 
Ein Gewimmel nach dem Leichenlager
Unterm Schauerflor der Grabnacht fort. 

(In dying light, the moon rises over deathly-silent groves, ghostly night-spirit's wails float through the air.  Dense mists mourn, stars pale in sorrow like lamps descending into a tomb. Ghosts, silent, hollow and gaunt. watch the deathly march of mourners behind the coffin draped in mourning crepe for the night burial) Schubert's setting is slow and deliberate, imitating the slow tread of the pall bearers, Yet every now and then, the vocal lines leaps upward, like a scream.

Unsteadily walking on crutches an old man follows the cortege. In the silence, he hears the word "Father" come from his dead son's mouth. "Son" ! he thinks in his heart. Twice, the line Eiskalt, eiskalt liegt er hier im Tuche (Ice cold, ice cold, he lies here in his shroud) reminding us that the son is dead. The father reminisces about his son's youthful promise. Mutig sprang er im Gewühle der Menschen,Wie ein jugendlich Reh. The song grabbed life with the energy of a roebuck, as proud as a stallion.  Sparkling figures in the piano part suggest the joy this herrlichen Jungen gets from being alive. Yet something's not quite right .Klagen ertränkt' er im Goldener Reben, Schmerzen verhüpft' er im wirbelnden Tanz. Schubert decorates the word "Goldener" but why does a lad like that need to drown his sorrows  ?  But now he's Gramentbundner, in Walhallas Ruh!, buried under grass, in Valhalla's Rest. Schubert infuses the word Valhalla so it sparkles., and the word "Ruh! ends in sudden silence. 

Wilder, darker chords remind us that the boy, his father and friends will meet no more in life Wiedersehn dort an Edens Tor! (to meet again at the gates of Eden) Nimmer gibt das Grab zurück. What the grave takes it does not give back.

Yet there's more to this song than 19th century death fantasy. Why is the young man being buried at night  ?  and with no mention of Christian rites ? Death's no fun, but why the air of horrified doom  ?  Did the lad kill himself, the ultimate mortal sin  There are hints in the text about chasing girls, and also, possibly something less publicly acceptable. Da wir trunken um einander rollten, Lippen schwiegen, und das Auge sprach (then we drank and rolled about together, lips silent but eyes speaking)  Maybe that's why the father is so shattered. Even if the hint of high jinks is non sexual, the implication is that the son is reproaching his father from beyond the grave. Schubert was only 14 when he wrote this song,.  It's 1811, his opus 7. Thousands of teenagers before and since have rebelled, and admonished their parents by doing themselves in. "You'll be sorry when I'm gone". But they don't get a chance to retract. Maybe the teenaged Schubert, who scrapped with his Dad, identified with the boy. Schiller's poem, on the other hand, raises other issues.

I've heard two exceptionally intelligent performances of this long and difficult song. Goerne sang it as part of a programme about father/son conflicts.  Prégardien included it on his disc of Schiller settings. It's part of a series of settings of Goethe, Schiller and other poets, and essential listening.   Both Goerne and Prégardien have done it at the Wigmore Hall.

Christoph Prégardien Wigmore Hall

Christoph Prégardien made a welcome return to the Wigmore Hall.  He's long been a favourite among Wigmore Hall audiences,  Thirty years ago I heard him there, singing Hugo Wolf. The audience was in raptures, Hearing him now feels like greeting an old friend. Prégardien is such a master that he delivers even familiar repertoire like six Schubert Goethe songs and Schumann's Dichterliebe with grace and conviction.

This time round, he was accompanied by Daniel Heide, a young pianist new to me.  Hearing Prégardien and Heide together added to the experience. Accompanying Lieder is an art in its own right, it's not like being a star soloist. Interaction is everything.  Heide listens sensitively to the subtle colours in Prégardian's phrasing. He's learning from one of the best. His introduction to Wandrers Nachtlied 2, D 768 (Über allen Gipfeln ist Ruh') was mysterious, setting the right tone of reverent ambiguity. This song isn't landscape painting!  A sudden change of pace and mood in Willkommen und Abschied, D 767 to chase the clouds away and prepare us for real highlight of the concert, Schumann's Dichterliebe  op 48.

Dichterliebe gets performed so often that some Lieder specialists won't go unless the performance is something special. It's been a cornerstone of Prégardien's career, so I welcome any opportunity to hear him singing it.  As one would expect, a very solid performance, well-articulated, executed with the thoughtfulness and finesse characteristic of Prégardien's style.  Daniel Heide's playing impressed, too. Rich preludes and postludes, so important to Schumann's approach to song. In this collection of songs, it's not the flashy and showy that really count.

 The two critical songs that test any performers, are Am leuchtenden Sommermorgen and  Ich hab' im Traum geweinet. Both songs are surprisingly "inner", creating a psychological ambiguity that's way ahead of its time. Imagine how Schubert might have developed had he lived to further immerse in Heine!  The strange, nebuolus glow of haze of a summer morning gives rise to the strange haze of the dream the poet experiences through a veil of tears.  Gradually we're prepared for the truly strange and exotically lovely Allnächtlich im Traume. when the poet sleeps, a vision of his love appears, saying words of wisdom. Perhaps he's too terrestrial, because he's forgotten them by morning.  Heide's postlude to Die alten, bösen Lieder captured Heine's sense of cheeky irony.

The encore was Schumann, too, Mit Myrthen und Rosen from Liederkreis op 24, another Prégardian speciality.

January at the Wigmore Hall

Back to real music at the Wigmore Hall in January! On Saturday all day, Apartment House presents an eclectic programme. Interesting, even though I don't know any of the works featured I might go.

Absolutely unmissable is Matthias Goerne's recital on 7/1, with Lief Ove Andsnes. Amazingly challenging programme mixing Mahler songs with Shostakovich's Suite on verses of Michelangelo Buonarroti. Goerne's approach to both composers is highly original and perceptive. Definitely an event for serious fans of song and good repertoire. It's been sold out for months.It could tie in well with the four-part Wigmore Hall series on Russian music with Roy Stafford which runs each Thursday this month.

EIGHT TOP CONCERTS IN A ROW! Angelika Kirchschlager and Jean-Yves Thibaudet do another very strong Brahms and Liszt programme on 20/1. The very next day Christoph Prégardien and  Michael Gees do an interesting programme which mixes big names like Schubert and Wolf with less well known contempraries like Loewe and Franz Lachner, whom Prégardien has done so much to promote. Search this site for more on Lachner.Very interesting baroque and early music, too. On 22nd  La Nuova Music presents Francesco Conti's 1732 opera Issipile prepared for the Hapsburg court. Top soloists, which will make the evening very worthwhile indeed. And on 23rd the acclaimed Jack Quartet performs Ferneyhough, Anderson and others. On 24/1 Sara Mingardo sings Venetian baroque, and on 25th the Nash Ensemble, with Latonia Moore, Kim Cresswell and Roderick Willliams do American songs (Barber, Ives, Copland, Gershwin) - probably way above the usual. Luca Pisaroni sings Beethoven, Reichardt and Brahms with Wolfram Rieger on 26th and on 27/1 Florian Boesch sings Schubert and Wolf with Malcolm Martineau. I might also go to Mauro Peter's debut on 28/1 and to Classical Opera Haydn/Mozart on 30/1. That's ten recitals in eleven days, or eleven if you include Peter Grimes at the ENO on 29th. . I can't even contemplate the chamber music recitals, and other things that otherwise would be very tempting. I might as well camp on the pavement.