Rachmaninov: The Muse, Op. 34 No. 1

“To the gentlest songs… Rodgers brings as much gracefulness and subtlety as ever, and timbre as exquisitely fragrant and fine-grained.” BBC Music Magazine, Christmas 2009 ****

“A treasure trove of Russian song that will reward repeated listening for years.” Gramophone Magazine, November 2009

“The songs push Mattila to her expressive limits as cries of rapture curdle into shrieks of pain and spasms of rage intrude on erotic memories. Its impact on the audience can be gauged from the near hysteria that erupts at the end…Her accompanist, Martin Katz, deals superbly with some of the most fearsomely difficult piano writing in the entire song repertoire.” The Guardian

“Best of all is the highly expressive Quatre Instants by Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho, dedicated to Mattila and showing how the singer is prepared to extend her range into new music to quite stunning effect.” Financial Times

“Following the Saariaho, passion is torn to tatters in the Rachmaninov group, with perhaps the strongest advocacy of the two Pushkin settings (Oh, do not sing tome and The Muse) since Söderström. Then, instead of making this the final item, Mattila ops for the gentler, even light-hearted, envoi of the Dvorák songs - superbly done, with a real wit and character. Nothing but praise then for the soprano, with generous, untiring and subtly detailed concentration over a longish time span in heavy repertoire, or for her accompanist (Katz is a real listener to what his singer does).” Gramophone Magazine, August 2007

“A frame of applause and ecstatic ovations greet what is one of Karita Mattila's most exciting discs yet… The repertoire takes Mattila's voice into thrilling new regions; and Martin Katz's piano is the voice's equal at every turn.” BBC Music Magazine, July 2007 *****

“This set opens with a powerful dramatic outpouring, Letter to KS Stanislavsky. In fact it's a formal letter of apology, for unavoidable absence from a gathering, which Rachmaninov sent for Chaliapin to sing to Stanislavsky; and one of the most touchingly elegant phrases is simply the date on the letter, October 14, 1908.
Perhaps he was showing a rare touch of irony in using his full lyrical powers in such a context; but at any rate, the piece nicely prefaces the two collections of his last phase of song-writing, before he left Russia for exile.
Some of his greatest songs are here, coloured in their invention by the four great singers whose hovering presence makes the disposition of this recital between four similar voices a highly successful idea. The Chaliapin songs go to Sergei Leiferkus, occasionally a little overshadowed by this mighty example (as in 'The raising of Lazarus', Op 34 No 6) but more often his own man, responding to the subtly dramatic, sometimes even laconic melodic lines with great sympathy for how they interact with the words, as with the Afanasy Fet poem 'The peasant' (Op 34 No 11). Alexandre Naoumenko inherits the mantle of Leonid Sobinov, and though he sometimes resorts to a near-falsetto for soft high notes, he appears to have listened to that fine tenor's elegance of line and no less subtle feeling for poetry. Pushkin's 'The muse' (Op 34 No 1) is most tenderly sung, and there's a sensitive response to line with 'I remember this day'.
Maria Popescu has only two songs, 'It cannot be' and 'Music' (Op 34 Nos 7 and 8), but she has a light tone and bright manner. Joan Rodgers is exquisite in the most rapturous and inward of the songs (the great Felia Litvinne was the original here). Of the Op 38 set, Rachmaninov was particularly fond of 'The rat-catcher' (No 4), and especially of 'Daisies' (No 3), which she sings charmingly, but it's hard to understand why he did not add 'Sleep'. He might have done had he heard Rodgers's rapt performance with Howard Shelley, the music delicately balanced in the exact way he must have intended between voice and piano as if between sleep and waking.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“The whole set of four discs is in fact something of a voyage of discovery into the art of this superb mezzo. Though she is indeed full of expression in the Aria Antiche there is no over emoting...she is technically and tonally at an exceptional level...One can hear something Ferrier-like in the middle and lower registers of her voice...Her Ravel has the requisite histrionic projection.” MusicWeb International, September 2004