Weber: Nein! länger trag' ich nicht die Qualen…Durch die Wälder (from Der Freischütz) (Max's Scene)

“Vogt has an attractive if slender voice, and for him to sing on this album called Heroes seems a bit odd, since he is more suited to tender regrets than to thrilling outbursts of tone. He shows a Lieder singer's sensitivity to words, and is almost ideally suited to Lohengrin's narration, perhaps the high-point of his recital.” BBC Music Magazine, July 2012 ***

“[Vogt] offers the gentlest presentation of [Siegmund's] music that I've heard, and notably touching it is. He impresses even more with Lohengrin's narrative, where stage experience pays dividends...Vogt phrases exquisitely, and though the gentleness of sound is again evident, the strength of the character's convictions throughout is clear.” International Record Review, July/August 2012

“his Siegmund, naive and ecstatic rather than virile and forceful, is striking. Vogt's vocal ease and cleanness of line is appealing in Weber and Wagner, and he proves an accomplished, elegant Mozartian.” The Guardian, 12th April 2012 ***

“Were the position of World's Top Tenor available, there may be no stronger candidate at present than Kaufmann. For the most part this recital is a triumph.” Gramophone Magazine, April 2008

“This is an exciting disc, for it shows that at long last there is a German tenor whose voice is rich and warm enough to encompass the Romantic Italian reportoire, while being as much at home in French and in his native German operatic traditions. He is, in other words, a successor to Fritz Wunderlich and more besides. Possibly the high point is his singing of the 'Prize Song' from Die Meistersinger, which sounds as if it is being composed as he sings it...” BBC Music Magazine, April 2008 *****

“One of the most important, and versatile, singers of our age” The Times

“The more delicate critical constitutions among us will recoil at the very idea of there being any- thing so distasteful as a World's Top Tenor, but were such a position available and the title to be competed for, there would probably be no stronger candidate at the present time than Jonas Kaufmann.
Kaufmann's voice, warm and full–bodied in its middle register, has an excitingly brilliant top. It has a Latin richness, and the elements are well integrated. The German component (his home town is Munich, though you might have thought Vienna more likely) accounts for the broader musicianship that shapes his phrases and fashions his tone as an instrument sensitive to modulations of sense and sound. The recital opens with Rodolfo's La bohème narrative, and fine as that is, the Flower Song from Carmen, which follows, is still better. Deeply touching in the sincerity of its appeal, it is nevertheless offered as song, its lyrical inviolate, the B flat of 'et j'étais une chose à toi', a climax not of volume but of devoted tenderness. And the recorded sound catches him most truly in this. Along with the Rigoletto, Don Carlos and Manon arias, it brings him before us as remembered 'in the flesh', whereas elsewhere some element in the tonal balance (an over–insistence on upper frequencies perhaps) somehow blurred the individuality.
The Traviata disappoints: too heroic in the recitative, almost completely unsmiling in the aria (he should hear Gigli). For the most part, though, this recital is a triumph.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“…far from being depressing, the programming here, both thoughtful and vividly imaginative, serves to stimulate the senses and lift the spirit. A fresh and unmannered introductory performance of Bach's 'Komm, süsser Tod' leads with both tonal and spiritual ease into an equally direct rendering of 'Urlicht' from Mahler's Second Symphony - artfully and beautifully accompanied by Gees. with a quietly impassioned and sensitively paced performance of Mahler's valedictory 'Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen', the final track fades into thin air, concluding an anthology to savour slowly, and return to many times.” BBC Music Magazine, February 2010 ****

“Such a programme demands exceptional resources in its singer, and there is probably no one presently more suited than Christoph Prégardien. His tenor, always centred as a high baritone, extends into the bass range right down to the low D of "Der Tod und das Mädchen". He can also call upon a silvery spiritual quality which serves well in songs such as Brahms's "Feldeinsamkeit" and as a final blessing over the whole recital in that last phrase of Mahler's "Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen". Michael Gees is one with the singer in the dedication of his own skills and in the imaginative sympathy that informs his touch.” Gramophone Magazine, March 2010