Hyperion Records

Here are Liszt’s last thoughts on Ständchen (‘Leise flehen meine Lieder’) (‘Serenade—Gently imploring go my songs’, D957/4) from Schwanengesang, effectively his fourth version of it—he had first issued a transcription of it long before he set about preparing the whole of the collection, effectively in two complete versions. In his last years he added to the second version a new cadenza at the coda for his student and biographer, Lina Ramann, further underlining the sense of the closing lines: ‘Bebend harr ich dir entgegen! Komm, beglücke mich!’ (‘Trembling, I await your approach! Come, bring me joy!’).

from notes by Leslie Howard © 1995