At a concert with this title, Mignonliedern cannot of course be absent. But Hana Blažíková and Andreas Staier also delighted us with a few songs by Fryderyk Chopin and with the Liederkreis opus 39 by Schumann. As a soloist, Staier was able to indulge his heart in the Lieder ohne Worte by Felix Mendelssohn, which fit perfectly into the programme.
Melancholy and intimacy characterize both Schubert's songs about the frail and mysterious creature Mignon and those by Schumann in the cycle in which the longing for love is continually threatened by an uncanny fear of losing it. Blažíková is a performer who conveys the content with great dedication and refined expressivity. The voice is rich in colours and possesses a luscious, full tone. However, she does not adjust her intonation, which sounds typical for a baroque repertoire, to a romantic idiom. For this, the voice seems to be intonated too artificially inward, sounding too little natural. Only in the very beautiful and sensitive Chopin songs does the voice fall into place. Perhaps also because the Polish language is more familiar to the Czech performer?
The pronunciation of German was not entirely perfect, and that will certainly have contributed to the fact that the voice lends itself less to these German romantic songs than to the vocal art from the baroque and renaissance in which Blažíková excels and with which she has made her reputation. Fortunately, there was the very attentive accompaniment of Andreas Staier, who supported the singer with his subtle nuances. Staier is a magnificent performer who once again excelled here on the delightfully soft Erard. His contribution to the programme elevated the listening quality of the entire recital to a very valuable concert that we would not have wanted to miss on this Sunday afternoon.
- WHAT: Sehnsuchtlieder; with songs and works for solo piano by Chopin, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Schumann
- WHO: Hana Blažíková (soprano) and Andreas Staier (pianoforte)
- WHERE: AMUZ, Antwerpen
- WHEN: Sunday 31 March 2019
- PHOTOS: © Josep Molina | Vojtěch Havlík