***** Once again a Schumann cd review? Why not, especially since Clara is combined here with work by her husband Robert, for all the attention the composer receives on the occasion of her two hundredth birthday is well deserved!
Only five songs by her are sung, but they are each pearls of art song. O Lust, O Lust a folk-song-like lied inspired me for the title of this piece. The text is by the hardly known Hermann Rollet, from whose Jucunde Clara composed six songs in 1853. Rollett was actually a pharmacist but also poet and his interest in music brought him repeatedly into contact with Ludwig van Beethoven. The other songs are set to texts by familiar text providers such as Heinrich Heine and Friedrich Rückert. Tenor Kyle Stegall adapts his voice to the changing moods: from hectic-dramatic (Die Lorelei) to tender-lyrical (Liebst du um Schönheit) and melancholic (Ich stand in dunklen Träumen). He demonstrates that Clara Schumann encompasses the entire spectrum of the Romantic lied. Thus every encounter with her art song makes one realize that she need not take a back seat to her male contemporary colleagues.
Twice Liederkreis
From Robert Schumann we are presented with the two versions of Liederkreis. The Liederkreis op. 39 based on poems by Joseph von Eichendorff expresses a feeling of intense happiness with the underlying fear of possible loss thereof, for the dark side that would later evolve into Schumann's spiritual inferno. Kyle Stegall succeeds wonderfully in expressing the diverse themes: alienation, nocturnal mystery, threat, remembrance and prophetic reverie in the intonation of his beautiful clear tenor voice. He places extreme melancholy in the fearful song Auf einer Burg, where the monotony of the pianoforte accentuates the fear of the sad knight. A magnificent interpretation of the cycle with a delightful apotheosis in Frühlingsnacht. Like a soft waterfall the piano rejoices, nature is all joy, the closing verse is a triumphant "Sie ist dein". The sometimes bitter tone of Heine in op. 24 is handled flawlessly by the duo Stegall-Zivian. The best-known song Mit Myrten und Rosen provides the title for the cd.
The voice of Kyle Stegall is clear and slightly nasal, he has distinct articulation and dares to vary accents and tempo in service of the mood of the song. It does not surprise me that he has been guided in the lied repertoire by singers such as Christoph Prégardien and Ian Bostridge and pianists such as Malcolm Martineau and Julius Drake. You can hear it! Add to that Eric Zivian plays a delightfully soft-sounding pianoforte – a Viennese instrument from 1841 – and this cd is a perfect example of how you can be pleasantly surprised by the discovery of musicians who are (not yet) among your favorites. Of course guided by repertoire that a lied lover can never get enough of.
- WHAT: Myrtle and Rose. Songs by Clara and Robert Schumann
- WHO: Kyle Stegall (tenor) and Eric Zivian (fortepiano)
- RELEASE: Avie AV2407[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRWe84J763M&list=OLAK5uy_lSOC0OzXHq-CEqcQmiGPIrkFSMARKe0G4&index=3&t=0s[/embed]