In Flanders' Fields Vol. 88 - The Core of All Things

About Robert Holl’s art of the lied, the Austrian composer Karl Heinz Füssl (1924–1992) wrote: “Robert Holl is not only a singer, but also a composer par coeur, from the heart, out of passion in the true sense of the word (i.e., in Schönberg’s sense, “one who must compose”). He has a mind of his own; witness the way in which he combines his carefully chosen texts (Trakl, Lenau, Storm, Eichendorff ) into “cycles” and involves the accompanying instrument, giving it solo intermezzos, so that the piano speaks when the voice is silent. And just as he puts together his own song cycles, so too he proceeds when choosing songs of “his” composers. Unlike most singers’ choices, his is not based on the climax principle. No, beginning and end are spanned by one large arch.” Robert Holl elucidates this as follows: “As a composer of lieder, my aim is to give voice to the quintessence of the poet in a musically effective way.” And of his setting of poems from Adagio by Felix Timmermans (1886–1947) he says: “For me, Felix Timmermans is the soul of Flanders.”