Mit deinen blauen Augen (Lassen/Casals) - from CDA67831 - Hyperion Records

Reviews

‘[Gerhardt] and the superb Cecile Licad are wholly successful in this endeavour from the outset … he has created a well-contrasted programme … each work is presented with stylish devotion … this is cello playing of exquisite sophistication and bold imagination’ (BBC Music Magazine)

‘There is much more to an encore, as Alban Gerhardt will tell you, than casually capping a recital with an audience-pleaser … listen to Gerhardt in Benjamin Godard’s Berceuse de Jocelyn and there is a paradigm of the exceptional eloquence and discernment that distinguishes the entire disc’ (The Daily Telegraph)

‘Gerhardt's playing [is] less heart-on-sleeve than Casals's own, but wonderfully eloquent and noble: he can be extraordinarily moving in such once-familiar standards as the Berceuse from Godard's Jocelyn, or in Casals's arrangement of Chopin's Raindrop Prelude’ (The Guardian)

‘Let me not turn tedious with a list of Gerhardt's superior skills, his seamless legato, his command of bowing skills, his generous tone even at the top of the A string, his glowing burnished double stops in the Popper/Chopin Nocturne … it goes without saying, though I better say it, that the playing is immaculate from both players, the sequence of pieces on the CD is nicely contrasted’ (International Record Review)

Eduard Lassen was born in Copenhagen in 1830 but was taken as an infant to Brussels where, at the age of only twelve, he enrolled at the Conservatory. In 1851 he won the Belgian Prix de Rome which enabled him to further his studies in both Germany and Italy, and, in Rome itself, to meet and become friends with Liszt. Lassen was later to succeed Liszt as Court Music Director at Weimar, a post he held until his retirement in 1895. As a composer, he was particularly known for his songs. Mit deinen blauen Augen (‘With your blue eyes’) is the fifth of five songs that Lassen dedicated to Duke Ernest of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the brother-in-law of Queen Victoria.

Eduard Lassen est né à Copenhague en 1830, mais a vécu dès son enfance à Bruxelles où il est entré au Conservatoire à l’âge de douze ans seulement. En 1851, il a remporté le Prix de Rome belge, ce qui lui a permis de poursuivre ses études en Allemagne et en Italie, et, à Rome, de rencontrer Liszt et de se lier d’amitié avec lui. Par la suite, Lassen allait lui succéder comme directeur de la musique de la cour à Weimar, poste qu’il a conservé jusqu’à sa retraite en 1895. Comme compositeur, il était surtout connu pour ses lieder. Mit deinen blauen Augen («Avec tes yeux bleus») est le dernier des cinq lieder que Lassen a dédiés au duc Ernest de Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, beau-frère de la reine Victoria.

Eduard Lassen wurde 1830 in Kopenhagen geboren, kam als Kleinkind aber nach Brüssel, wo er sich mit nur zwölf Jahren am Konservatorium einschrieb. 1851 gewann er den belgischen Prix de Rome, der es ihm ermöglichte, sein Studium in Deutschland und Italien fortzusetzen und in Rom selbst mit Liszt Bekanntschaft zu machen und Freundschaft zu schließen. Später sollte Lassen Liszts Nachfolger als Hofkapellmeister in Weimar werden, eine Stellung, die er bis zu seiner Pensionierung 1895 innehatte. Als Komponist war er vor allem für seine Lieder bekannt. Mit deinen blauen Augen ist das letzte von fünf Liedern, die Lassen Herzog Ernst von Sachsen-Coburg-Gotha widmete, dem Schwager der englischen Königin Victoria.

Recording details: June 2010
Concert Hall, Wyastone Estate, Monmouth, United Kingdom
Produced by Andrew Keener
Engineered by Simon Eadon
Release date: June 2011
Total duration: 2 minutes 26 seconds

Cover artwork: Photograph of Alban Gerhardt. Sim Canetty-Clarke

Mit deinen blauen Augen

Alban Gerhardt (cello), Cecile Licad (piano)

Reviews

Introduction