Rösler: An die Entfernte

The Art of Magdalena Kožená is an anthology of her finest performances, documenting both the range of her voice and the breadth of repertoire to which she can bring authority, from early baroque of Monteverdi and Strozzi to sacred arias by Bach, opera arias by Handel, Vivaldi, Mozart, Gounod, Bizet and Auber, as well as orchestral songs by Mahler. To all she brings an absorbing emotional depth and maturity of her interpretative abilities.

Unique to Kožená are the songs rooted in Bohemia and Moravia by Dvořak and Janáček. She still feels closely connected to her Czech roots. “It’s music that stays in your body forever”.

This is Magdalena’s own selection of her favourite songs and arias, sung in French, Italian and German as well as in her mother tongue.

28-page Booklet, including new liner notes from Nick Kimberley.

Bohemia at the end of the 18th century and the early 19th was teeming with highly skilled composers and musicians, centred around the city of Prague. Charles Burney described it as ‘the conservatory of Europe’. He also found that rural areas were rich in musical activities, especially in schools.

The majority of the composers wrote for their particular instrument, and the names of Dussek and Kozeluch in particular have survived to this day. They along with Vorisek are the best known composers on this fascinating programme of songs from this golden age of Czech music.

At this time, songs by Bohemian composers were nearly always set in German or Italian. Czech was considered a peasant language, and German was of course the language of the ruling Hapsburg dynasty. Many of the songs produced by composers such as Dussek, Vorisek (and their contemporary Tomasek) show that their influence was not lost upon Schubert.

Magdalena Kožená, one of the most acclaimed recitalists of today, presents a personal collection of songs she has known since childhood and that form some of her earliest musical influences.

A haunting collection of songs by Czech composers such as Dvorák, Janácek, Martinu, Schulhoff and Eben, all deeply rooted in the rich Czech folk song tradition.

Like Magdalena explains in the press/booklettext about the songs on the album: “They are just the sort a mother would sing to her baby. My mother is not a professional singer, but she loved to sing and knew a lot of songs! There is a particular tradition of singing to children in our country, much stronger, I would say, than one sees any more in the West. It was really important that in each family these songs would be handed down, taught to the children.”

Kožená’s musical partners on the album include her long-standing recital partner Malcolm Martineau, and soprano Dorothea Röschmann, who joins her in Dvorák’s Moravian duets. This is Magdalena Kožená’s most personal album so far, exploring the richness of her cultural background and her own musical memories.