Kling leise, mein Lied, S301 First version (Liszt) - from CDA67782 - Hyperion Records

Reviews

‘Polenzani is evidently a tenor of the finest quality: a lyric voice, sweet and ingratiating, with the capacity to ring out excitingly, gloriously easy on high but with a perfectly adequate body to the tone in its middle and lower registers. He is firm and even, pleasingly expressive … he sings with warmth, intelligence and conviction, matching the superb playing of his pianist Julius Drake’ (Gramophone)

‘Polenzani remains an extraordinarily communicative Lieder singer, possessed of an agile and flexible voice of tremendous versatility. In the most intimate of these settings, as well as in the quasi-operatic ones, Polenzani and Drake create performances that are at once thoughtful, richly atmospheric and never less than compelling … this auspicious inauguration of the series whets the appetite for more’ (International Record Review)

‘This stupendous disc, issued ahead of the Liszt bicentenary next year, marks the start of Hyperion's survey of his complete songs, still a grey area for many despite past attempts by major artists such as Brigitte Fassbaender and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau to rehabilitate them … as with so much of his music, their difficulty in performance is to be found in their emotional and expressive extremes. The challenges are more than met here, with Polenzani doing things in songs such as Der Fischerknabe or Pace Non Trovo that you never thought were possible for a human voice, while Drake's intensity is total and unswerving’ (The Guardian)

Kling leise, mein Lied was composed on 30 March 1848 to words by a prolific Austrian journalist and writer Johannes Nordmann, whose Gedichte of 1846 had garnered the censors’ disapproval for political reasons. One of Liszt’s favourite singers in Weimar, the tenor Franz Götze, particularly pleased the composer with his performances of this somewhat paradoxical lover’s serenade (the persona declares that he does not wish to awaken the beloved from her dream). For the simplified second version, Liszt eliminated the most erotic verse about the sweetheart’s nightgown clinging to her limbs and breasts. In the idiosyncratic formal structure, tailored to the composer’s reading of the poem, the refrain to the title words is set to a beautifully tender cantilena, while an interior section in a different metre and tempo (a song-within-a-song) touches upon one key after another in Liszt’s typically adventurous manner, however gentle the atmosphere.

La première version de Kling leise, mein Lied a été composée le 30 mars 1848 sur un texte d’un prolifique journaliste et écrivain autrichien, Johannes Nordmann, dont les Gedichte de 1846 avaient suscité la désapprobation des censeurs pour des raisons politiques. L’un des chanteurs préférés de Liszt à Weimar, le ténor Franz Götze, a particulièrement plu au compositeur avec ses interprétations de cette sérénade quelque peu paradoxale d’un amoureux (le personnage déclare qu’il ne souhaite pas tirer la bien-aimée de son rêve). Pour la seconde version simplifiée, Liszt a éliminé les vers les plus érotiques sur la chemise de nuit de la bien-aimée collant à ses membres et à ses seins. Dans la structure formelle caractéristique adaptée à la lecture que le compositeur a faite de ce poème, le refrain sur les paroles du titre est mis en musique sur une cantilène d’une tendresse magnifique, alors qu’une section interne dans un mètre et un tempo différents (une mélodie dans la mélodie) aborde une tonalité après l’autre dans ce style novateur typique de Liszt, même si l’atmosphère est douce.

Wir hören Kling leise, mein Lied in der ersten, am 30. März 1848 komponierten Fassung zu Worten des fruchtbaren österreichischen Journalisten und Schriftstellers Johannes Nordmann, dessen 1846 veröffentlichte Gedichte aus politischen Gründen das Missfallen der Zensurbehörde erregt hatten. Liszt war besonders angetan von der Interpretation dieses etwas paradoxen Liebhaberständchens (der Sänger erklärt, seine Geliebte nicht aus ihren Träumen wecken zu wollen) durch einen seiner Lieblingssänger in Weimar, den Tenor Franz Götze. In der vereinfachten zweiten Version ließ Liszt die höchst erotische Strophe aus, in der das Nachtgewand der Angebeteten sich an ihre Gliedmaßen und Brüste schmiegt. In der idiosynkratisch formalen Struktur, die Liszt seinem Verständnis des Gedichts anpasste, ist der Refrain zu den Worten des Titels mit einer wundervoll zarten Kantilene vertont, während ein innerer Abschnitt in unterschiedlichem Tempo und Taktmaß (ein Lied im Lied) ungeachtet der zarten Atmosphäre in Liszts typisch abenteuerlicher Weise Note nach Note anrührt.

Recording details: February 2010
All Saints' Church, East Finchley, London, United Kingdom
Produced by Mark Brown
Engineered by Julian Millard
Release date: November 2010
Total duration: 6 minutes 19 seconds

Cover artwork: Photograph of Matthew Polenzani. Sim Canetty-Clarke

Kling leise, mein Lied, S301 First version

Matthew Polenzani (tenor), Julius Drake (piano)

Reviews

Introduction