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Saturday, September 29, 2018

Antonín Dvořák - Songs & Duets (Genia Kühmeier; Bernarda Fink)


Information

Composer: Antonín Dvořák
  • (01) Gipsy Melodies, Op. 55
  • (08) Moravian Duets, Op. 32
  • (21) Biblical Songs, Op. 99

Genia Kühmeier, soprano (1-20)
Bernarda Fink, mezzo-soprano (8-30)
Christoph Berner, piano

Date: 2012
Label: Harmonia Mundi
http://www.harmoniamundi.com/#!/albums/1798

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Review

Kühmeier and Fink sing home-grown Dvořák

Designed for the amateur domestic market, Dvořák’s settings of Moravian folk poems captivate with their lyrical grace (Dvořák was as adept as Brahms at creating quasi-folk tunes that sound like the real thing), rhythmic piquancy and nonchalant touches of contrapuntal interplay. Encouraged by Christoph Berner’s zesty, colourful accompaniments, Genia Kühmeier and Bernarda Fink give thoroughly delightful performances, combining eager characterisation – say, in the melancholy dialogue of No 7 or the lovers’ tiff of No 12 – with a crucial sense of spontaneous enjoyment.

Framing the duets, soprano and mezzo share the honours in Dvořák’s two best-known solo song collections. Singing in what sounds like idiomatic Czech, Kühmeier catches both the flaring intensity and the nostalgic tenderness of the Gypsy Songs. Her pure, rather ‘instrumental’ tone has now acquired richer, more complex shadings. She floats her high notes exquisitely in a touching account of ‘And the forest is silent’, builds to a climax of passionate intensity in ‘Songs my mother taught me’ and, lustily abetted by Berner, brings a dangerous Zigeuner wildness to ‘The strings are tuned’ – a contrast to Bernarda Fink’s beautifully sung but more contained performance on her all-Dvořák recital (7/04).

Fink’s art, founded on warm, evenly produced tone and scrupulous care for phrasing and verbal clarity, has always had a certain patrician restraint. In the often troubled Biblical Songs, written in New York as Dvořák’s father lay dying in distant Bohemia, she reveals a more impassioned temperament than I had previously suspected, whether in the anxious declamation of No 6, ‘Hear my cry, O God’, or the fervent climaxes of No 7, ‘By the waters of Babylon’. At the other end of the spectrum, Fink finds a joyous brightness within her darkly glowing mezzo for the catchy dance rhythms of the final ‘O sing unto the Lord’, with Christoph Berner – crucial to the success of this whole recital – realising the accompaniment’s cosmic murmurs with fleet-fingered delicacy.

-- Richard Wigmore, Gramophone

More reviews:
BBC Music Magazine  PERFORMANCE: **** / RECORDING: ****
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2012/apr/12/dvorak-duets-fink-kuhmeier-review
http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=709209
https://www.audaud.com/dvorak-zigeunerlieder-gypsy-melodies-moravian-duets-biblical-songs-genia-kuhmeier-sop-bernarda-fink-mezzo-soprano-christoph-berner-p-harmonia-mundi/

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Antonín Dvořák (September 8, 1841 – May 1, 1904) was a Czech composer. He was the second Czech composer to achieve worldwide recognition, after Bedřich Smetana. Following Smetana's nationalist example, many of Dvořák's works show the influence of Czech folk music, such as his  two sets of Slavonic Dances, the Symphonic Variations, and the overwhelming majority of his songs. Dvořák wrote in a variety of forms: nine symphonies, ten operas, three concertos, several symphonic poems, serenades for string orchestra and wind ensemble, more than 40 works of chamber music, and piano music.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton%C3%ADn_Dvo%C5%99%C3%A1k

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Genia Kühmeier (born 1975 in Salzburg) is an Austrian soprano. Kühmeier studied at the Mozarteum University Salzburg and the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna. She also attended masterclasses with Ruthilde Boesch, Marjana Lipovšek and Margarita Lilowa. In 2002 she was awarded first prize at the 8th International Mozart Competition in Salzburg. Kühmeier was a member of the Vienna State Opera, and is a frequent guest of renowned concert halls and festivals. Her discography includes performances under conductors such as Riccardo Muti, William Christie, Seiji Ozawa and Nikolaus Harnoncourt.
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genia_K%C3%BChmeier
http://www.geniakuehmeier.com/

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Bernarda Fink Inzko (born 29 August 1955 in Buenos Aires) is an Argentine mezzo-soprano. Fink studied at the "Instituto Superior de Arte del Teatro Colón" in Buenos Aires. She won First Prize at the Nuevas Voces Líricas competition in 1985 and then moved to Europe. Bernarda Fink has sung with many European leading orchestras and has performed under the baton of well-known conductors. She has performed at the opera houses and theaters all over the world and has recorded for Harmonia Mundi and Hyperion. Fink received the Austrian Decoration for Science and Art in 2005
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernarda_Fink

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  3. https://www.harmoniamundi.com/pdf/Album.php?lang=uk&id=1798

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  4. Hello, friend. Is it possible to reupload this one? Thank you very much!

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