Schubert: Geheimes, D719 (Goethe)

“It comprises 19 songs, all stylishly and beautifully sung by the tenor Werner Güra. The six Goethe settings include such familiar contrasts as Heidenröslein and Ganymed, while Willkommen und Abschied itself, more of a rarity, is heroically sung. The strength of Güra’s tone without any loss of quality has always been his strong point.” Sunday Telegraph, 29th January 2012

“His fresh lyric tenor combines well with Berner’s bright yet warm-toned fortepiano — he twinkles at Goethe’s ironic description of a water nymph as “eine feuchtes Weib”, literally a “damp woman” — while Berner brings drama to the piano parts of Auf der Bruck, Willkommen und Abschied and the haunting, yearning Herbst.” Sunday Times, 12th February 2012

“Berner, playing an 1872 Rönisch fortepiano, shows keen attention to every detail. Güra, outstanding in his unfussy, intense delivery, is a formidable, rousing guide.” The Observer, 26th February 2012

“Gura's strong, unaffected tenor voice is a pleasure to listen to, and Berner, who has an impressive keyboard freedom grounded in reliable technical skill, is a responsive accompanist: they perform as one, although too often their approach to a song somehow misses an essential quality of that particular piece of music.” International Record Review, March 2012 ****

“Gura and his fortepianist, Christoph Berner, have mapped out a trajectory of the Romantic view of human emotional life...At each stage, both musicians show perfect sympathy with Schubert's own engagement, ideal empathy with each other, and a shrewd sensitivity to musical and expressive scale.” BBC Music Magazine, May 2012 *****

“Gura is never dull. 'Der Wanderer' is intensely 'lived', the opening bleak and desiccated...One of the most eloquent performances of all is the last song, 'Nachtstuck'...Here, singer and pianist show an acute sensitivity to harmonic colour that characterises this whole rewarding recital.” Gramophone Magazine, May 2012

“Arleen Auger brings her special quality of chaste intimacy to gentle, small-scale performances of 23 of Schubert's most popular songs” BBC Music Magazine, October 2010 ***

“Bostridge reveals his expanding mastery in the widest variety of expression, with the subtlest range of tone, and with a deliberate hardening of the characteristically sweet voice in some of the more dramatic songs...In all this Drake is the perfect partner, ranging wide in his tonal palette too” Penguin Guide, 2010 edition ****

“Few discs of favourite Schubert songs match this for sheer beauty...[Bostridge] offers fresh revelation in even the best-known songs” Penguin Guide, 2010 edition ****

“A voice more for Schöne Müllerin than Winterreise, Bostridge's fresh, buoyant, beautifully articulated tenor suits these Lieder perfectly. The literary and musical impulses are in perfect equilibrium, and Drake's rapport is absorbing.” BBC Music Magazine, January 2006 ****

“There are unknown treasures here. Anyone who hasn't invested in this vast enterprise might well begin with this volume” Classic CD

“Above all, Tilling is versatile and protean...Her soprano sounds peachier than ever, her diction is clear and her musical instincts are immaculate. This lovely singing is underpinned by Paul Rivinius’s outstanding playing of the equally important piano parts. A must for Schubertians.” Sunday Times, 8th April 2012

“Tilling is a Swedish singer whose enchanting soprano voice and acute musical intelligence are both admirably deployed in this well-chosen selection...The opening song of the recital is the lively, exhilarating 'Bei dir allein!'...Tilling negotiates it without strain and sings it with delightful spontaneity...This is a lovely disc, a treat for all lovers of Schubert's songs.” International Record Review, May 2012

“The al fresco exuberance of 'Bei dir allein' gets this recital off to a delectable start: Camilla Tilling's vernal tone is fresh and smiling, her phrasing both shapely and feurig, as Schubert demands, her response to mood and harmony vivid...Tilling's tonal radiance and free-soaring top notes are priceless assets...a Schubert recital of rare pedigree.” Gramophone Magazine, July 2012

‘They brought their audience’s attention to more details in the Schubert Songs than any artists have before’ The Independent

“…this is one of the darkest, slowest Schwanengesangs on disc: there is a unique menace in the final 'Gute Nacht' of 'Kriegers Ahnung'; and 'In der Ferne' gives full, long weight to those six slow pulses within the last word of each line. Schreier's recital also offers consummate performances of Schubert's Goethe settings...” BBC Music Magazine, May 2006 *****

“The 1991 recital by Peter Schreier and András Schiff is highly desirable, though the sound is not quite on the same level. Schreier was never the most honeyed of tenors; but in the lighter songs of Schwanengesang he compensates for a touch of reediness and a tendency to harden on high notes with the supple grace of his phrasing and his ultra-keen response to the text. Liebesbotschaft is eager and volatile, enhanced by Schiff's wonderfully limpid touch and his care to make the piano's singing left hand match the voice in eloquence (Schubert's original, high, key an advantage, here and elsewhere).
On the downside, Aufenthalt is surely too slow and life-weary, weighed down by recurrent submissive rallentandos. But Das Fischermädchen has a lilting tenderness, Schiff again singing in dulcet partnership with the voice, while in the remaining Heine songs singer and pianist unflinchingly probe the extremes of anguish and bitterness. Die Stadt (the swirling, impressionistic arpeggios eerily insubstantial from Schiff) and Der Doppelgänger are as desolate and disturbing as any performances on disc, the suggestion of a whine, even a sneer, in Schreier's timbre extraordinarily apt here.
After this we get a sharply characterised Goethe group that encompasses the bleakness of the three Harper's Songs (done with characteristic intense immediacy) and ends with an impulsive, dancing Der Musensohn that rightly brings the house down.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Schreier was never the most honeyed of tenors; but in the lighter songs of Schwanengesang he compensates for a touch of reediness and a tendency to harden on high notes with the supple grace of his phrasing and his ultra-keen response to the text. Liebesbotschaft is eager and volatile, enhanced by Schiff's wonderfully limpid touch and his care to make the piano's singing left hand match the voice in eloquence... Das Fischermädchen has a lilting tenderness, Schiff again singing in dulcet partnership with the voice... Die Stadt (the swirling, impressionistic arpeggios eerily insubstantial from Schiff) and Der Doppelgänger are as desolate and disturbing as any performances on disc...” Gramophone Magazine, July 2006