Robert Schumann - Myrthen (Christian Gerhaher; Camilla Tilling)

Information

Composer: Robert Schumann

• Myrthen, Op. 25

Christian Gerhaher, baritone
Camilla Tilling, soprano
Gerold Huber, piano

Date: 2019
Label: Sony Classical
https://www.sonyclassical.de/alben/releases-details/myrthen

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Review

For the second volume of their Schumann project, Christian Gerhaher and Gerold Huber turn to Myrthen, the wonderful wedding present Robert produced for Clara in 1840. It also sees the first contribution to the project by a ‘guest’ artist, and it’s maybe difficult, given the remarkable interpretative universe they create (as showcased especially in the Gramophone Award-winning Vol 1 – 2/19), not to see Camilla Tilling as a sort of interloper.

Happily, though, she’s a fine singer, her soprano bright and appealing (if occasionally a little glassy), and her interpretations well-turned and, especially as the cycle progresses, deeply touching (listen to her ‘Hochländisches Wiegenlied’, for example). She kicks off with a fresh performance of ‘Widmung’ and takes no time to find her place in Gerhaher and Huber’s world, working together beautifully with the pianist, whose rubato in such hits as ‘Der Nussbaum’ and ‘Die Lotosblume’ is meltingly seductive. If she doesn’t quite match, to my mind, the instinctiveness of Dorothea Röschmann’s fresh, impulsive and heartfelt singing on her recording with Ian Bostridge and Graham Johnson, Tilling nevertheless offers an effective, satisfying complement to Gerhaher’s own approach.

And there are certainly no disappointments from the baritone, who recaptures the wonderful feeling of studied spontaneity that made the first volume of the series so special. The slighter numbers are dispatched with a wit that is underpinned by an overall seriousness of purpose, and the forceful rhetoric of ‘Talismane’ is captured more successfully than by Bostridge and Johnson, whose slightly slower tempo adds an unwanted hint of portentousness.

The two Venetian Songs are gloriously relaxed; ‘Du bist wie eine Blume’ is almost unspeakably tender, as is ‘Zum Schluss’. And at the heart of the cycle Gerhaher and Huber present a supremely moving and powerful performance of the remarkable ‘Aus den hebräischen Gesängen’. Myrthen on its own might seem like short measure, but this is a rewarding second volume to what is growing into a superb series and certainly a top choice for this wonderful cycle.

-- Hugo Shirley, Gramophone

More reviews:
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2019/Dec/Schumann_Myrthen_19075945362.htm
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/oct/24/schumann-myrthen-review-gerhaher-huber-tilling
https://www.ft.com/content/7d4d4fd4-f0df-11e9-bfa4-b25f11f42901
https://www.allmusic.com/album/schumann-myrthen-mw0003323460

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Robert Schumann (8 June 1810 – 29 July 1856) was a German composer and influential music critic. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest composers of the Romantic era, and left an array of acclaimed music in virtually all the forms then known. Schumann's published compositions were written exclusively for the piano until 1840; he later composed works for piano and orchestra; many Lieder (songs for voice and piano); four symphonies; an opera; and other orchestral, choral, and chamber works. Schumann suffered from a lifelong mental disorder, and died in 1856 without having recovered from his illness.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Schumann

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Christian Gerhaher (born July 24, 1969, in Straubing) is a German baritone and bass singer. He studied with Paul Kuën and Raimund Grumbach at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München, and Lied with Friedemann Berger. He also took master classes with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Inge Borkh. In concert Gerhaher has collaborated with Helmuth Rilling, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Neville Marriner, Philippe Herreweghe, Heinz Holliger and Trevor Pinnock, among others. He also frequently performs and records Lieder with pianist Gerold Huber, his decades-long accompanist.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Gerhaher
https://www.gerhaher.de/

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Camilla Tilling (born May 18, 1971 in Linköping) is a Swedish soprano. She studied at the Högskolan för scen och musik in Göteborg (1997–98) and at the Royal College of Music in London, where she graduated in 1998. Her opera debut was the role of Olympia in Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann in Göteborg in 1997. Since then Tilling has appeared at such venues as the New York City Opera, Covent Garden, La Monnaie, the Metropolitan Opera, and La Scala, as well numerous festivals. Her first solo recording is Rote Rosen, Lieder by Richard Strauss, accompanied by Paul Rivinius, was released in 2009.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camilla_Tilling

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