Wolf, H: Fussreise (No. 10 from Mörike-Lieder)

“It's Maltman's superb breath control which gives shape and sensuous beauty to Debussy and Dupare. And, thanks to Drake's restraining pace, Warlock's Captain Stratton's Fancy' has real swagger. Flanders and Swann's little masterpiece… about the Honeysuckle and the Bindweed, ends the recital in raptuous applause.” BBC Music Magazine, February 2008 ****

“Christopher Maltman… is remarkably skilful in the management of his voice, dealing wonderfully well with Debussy's high tessitura and still plumbing the depths with ease as he does at the end of "Der Wanderer" and "La vague et la cloche". Julius Drake is his perfect counterpart...” Gramophone Magazine, Janurary 2008

“their performances are acutely sensitive to Wolf's musical nerve system. And, best of all, a sense of intimacy, of close confiding with the audience, really does come over - invaluable for private listening...Festival director Sholto Kynoch is a vivid and sentient accompanist.” BBC Music Magazine, September 2011 ****

“Grevilius’s mezzo rises to the challenge of “Seufzer” and Daneman’s soprano brings sweetness to “Zitronenfalter im April”.” Financial Times, 25th June 2011 **

“The team of four singers is first-rate, responsive in every way, and if anything even more remarkable is the work of their pianist, Sholto Kynoch, displaying an exceptional expressive range, not only ideally agile but with the most subtle range of tone and dynamic...Altogether an impressive achievement from an enterprising new company.” Gramophone Magazine, January 2011

“Daneman, Grevelius, Gilchrist and Loges are top-flight lieder singers, with Oxford Lieder founder and pianist Sholto Kynoch offering sensitive support. Richard Stokes provides excellent notes and translations.” The Observer, 22nd May 2011

“Holzmair is at his best in those settings which reveal the soul's innermost questionings; he and Cooper capture the fragile ardour of 'Frage und Antwort', and the chromatic unease within 'I'm Frühling'.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2009

“…more often pleasure is virtually unalloyed, whether in the trance-like wonder of "Im Frühling", the tiptoeing delicacy of "Elfenlied" (a hard song for a man to bring off) or the deft comic timing in "Zur Warnung", evidently relished by the Wigmore Hall audience.” Gramophone Magazine, February 2010

“At last: a reissue of Hotter's 1953 Hugo Wolf recital, which forms the centrepiece of this release, and it's in far better, more immediate sound than on the original LP. Hotter's interpretations of Prometheus, Grenzen der Menschheit, the gloomy Harfenspieler Lieder and resigned Michelangelo settings – Wolf at his greatest – remain virtually unsurpassed. They were surely written with a bass-baritone of Hotter's calibre in mind and, quite apart from his vocal prowess, his verbal insights are once again remarkable, while the account of the naughty monks' exploits from the Italian Songbook remind us of Hotter the humorist. The earlier and later items that complete the CD disclose similar gifts, notably the delightful Der Tambour – and AnakreonsGrab, which, both in 1951 and 1957, matches the Innigkeit of Goethe's poem and Wolf's setting.
Moore is a masterly partner in music that severely taxes the pianist. This disc is a must for Wolf enthusiasts.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Still too little known outside Germany, Roman Trekel brings to his selection of 22 Mörike Lieder a voice of burnt umber, a scrupulous sense of style (including a true legato) and a probing imagination, whether in an eager wondering "Auf einer Wanderung" or a musing unmawkish "Verborgenheit".” Gramophone Magazine, October 2008

“There can be no better advocate of Hugo Wolf than Roman Trekel, now at the peak of his career as a Lieder interpreter, who presents this deeply satisfying recital of the best of the Mörike Lieder.
These inspired songs need, above all, the kind of intense expression and intimate, detailed treatment that Trekel brings them. Performed as convincingly as they are here, they offer a particular frisson of individual accent that no other composer in the genre, whatever their other merits, quite equals: words and music seem as though they were written at one and the same time Trekel achieves an ideal fusion of tonal security, sense of line and word-painting. In a comparatively long and complex Lied such as 'Im Frühling', he and the admirable Oliver Pohl traverse all the points of the expressive compass, and all the nuances of dynamics that belong to them. In that surpassingly sincere and beautiful love-song 'An die Geliebte' they build to the climax from 'Von Tiefe dann zu Tiefen' with a confidence that bespeaks long familiarity with the piece.
Even better is the heartache they bring to 'Peregrina II' and 'Lebe wohl', where Wolf seems to enter into all the poet's suffering at the hands of a beloved. They also find the inner spirituality of the religion-inspired settings, such as 'Auf ein altes Bild' and 'Denk' es o Seele', the latter so compelling for saying so much in such a short time. In a quite different vein, they rise marvellously to the frenzied melodrama of 'Der Feuerreiter', always a challenge to singer and pianist and one that's surely met here.
A truthful recording adds to the disc's merits.
Not so the notes, which omit any exposition of the songs and also English translations. Even so, this is a recital that ought to convert even Wolf heretics to the cause.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010