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Track(s) taken from CDJ33051/3

Erlkönig, Op 154 No 4

First line:
Wer reitet so spät durch Nacht und Wind?
composer
author of text

Gerald Finley (baritone), Marianne Thorsen (violin), Graham Johnson (piano)
Recording details: October 2004
All Saints' Church, East Finchley, London, United Kingdom
Produced by Mark Brown
Engineered by Julian Millard
Release date: October 2005
Total duration: 3 minutes 3 seconds
 

Reviews

‘This enterprising, often revelatory set should intrigue and delight anyone interested in the development of the Lied’ (Gramophone)

‘Since making music with friends was Schubert's whole raison d'etre, this 3-CD box is an inspired idea … led by the soprano Susan Gritton, the performances are pure A-list’ (The Independent)

‘Anyone who loves lieder will find here a rich, diverse, and delightful offering. There isn't a bad song among the 81 songs by 40 composers who wrote during Schubert's lifetime, and there's a lot of fine music here by well-known and also practically unknown composers and poets. The singing is consistently excellent… anyone interested in this genre will find here a broad-ranging and generous collection’ (American Record Guide)

‘If 81 songs are too many to mention individually, sufficient variety exists and enough songs are receiving a first recording for this set to be indispensable for anyone interested in the genre’ (International Record Review)

‘Graham Johnson once again demonstrates that he has few peers today in his combined function as scholar-musician’ (Fanfare, USA)
Spohr was first and foremost a violinist. His most popular songs in the repertoire today are his Deutsche Lieder, Op 103, with piano and clarinet accompaniment, but it is entirely logical that he should have written a group of lieder with violin obbligato. These are the Sechs Deutsche Lieder, Op 154, composed in 1856 and published the following year. Of the six songs this is the only Goethe setting. The writing for the violin is fiendishly difficult and poses a problem of balance that can only be solved by the finest violinist prepared to play in a truly ghostly fashion. Spohr must have been only too aware that there had been so many celebrated settings of this lyric that it was almost impossible to present a new viewpoint. His idea was clearly to use the violin to represent the beguilingly sweet and unearthly voice of the Erlkönig.

comparative Schubert listening:
Erlkönig D328. October (?) 1815

from notes by Graham Johnson © 2006

Other albums featuring this work

Schubert: The Complete Songs
CDS44201/4040CDs Boxed set + book (at a special price) — Download only
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