Wolf, H: An die Geliebte (No. 32 from Mörike-Lieder)

“The opening Schubert group demonstrates the baritone's natural and unaffected delivery - an ability to hold words and notes together in one single gesture - and his finely tuned vocalism, founded on a lightly rounded but always expressive tone. He sounds equally at ease in the French half of the programme. ...'En sourdine' flows beautifully...and the light humour of 'Le Papillon et la Fleur', Fauré's Op. 1 No. 1, is flawlessly conveyed in Martineau's enchantingly lithe pianism.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2009

“Hugo Wolf is at his most welcoming in "Der Knabe und das Immelein" and Keenlyside is at his most responsive in "An die Geliebte". Keenlyside is at his best in "Notre amour" - and very French. In… Malcolm Martineau: he has a collaborator in whom the life of texts as well as the music is experienced and communicated unfailingly.” Gramophone Magazine, November 2009

“you’re being invited to step into a more gently nuanced and delicately observed world, where the expressive weight of each phrase is being judged to perfection, with not a gram of emotional excess...this is such a successful document of the occasion that you might honestly end up feeling that you were [there]… and can be again, and again.” Andrew McGregor, bbc.co.uk, 22nd December 2009

“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

“As the palette of voices is varied, Kynoch is able to group the Lieder thematically without risking tedium...Gilchrist alert to [the songs'] volatility and drama; Daneman capturing every elusive and sensuous breeze of emotion and tale-telling; Grevelius discovering the inner angst darkening the songs; and Loges the Sehnsucht of late-Romantic yearning.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2011 ****

“[Kynoch] is among the finest accompanists around. Sophie Daneman’s bright soprano is always a pleasure to hear but here she is not always ideally steady and her vibrato is at times too prominent. Her floated pianissimos sometimes make me forgive some of the unsteadiness...Best of all, to my mind, is Anna Grevelius. Her voice is a flexible instrument, beautiful and even from top to bottom, and with a wide range of nuance and expressivity.” MusicWeb International, June 2012

“The four excellent singers...show a vivid understanding of the texts (translated in helpful CD notes by Richard Stokes). Sholto Kynoch steers the performances with secure, expressive playing, especially in dark moods – "Der Jäger" (Gilchrist) – or in the sardonic wit of the last song, "Abschied" (Loges).” The Observer, 9th October 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

“Wolf's songs require the finest judgement of shifting tones of voice, the closest of close focus. That's just what the 18 selected settings (out of 53) of the poetry of Eduard Mörike receive here. All but one is accompanied by the minutely sensitive Hertha Klust, Fischer-Dieskau's coach and chosen accompanist at the time.” BBC Music Magazine, September 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

“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