BaL 2.02.19 - Schubert: Schwanengesang D.957

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

09.30
Building a Library: Natasha Loges listens to and compares some of the available recordings of Schubert’s song cycle Schwanengesang (’Swan Song’), D.957.

Schubert’s Schwanengesang is a collection of songs that were written toward the end of his life and not published until after his death. It was Schubert’s publisher, Tobias Haslinger, who intriguingly titled the collection Schwanengesang, or Swan Song, thereby giving the impression that the songs were Schubert’s musical farewell to the world. Haslinger said that the songs were ‘the final blooms of Schubert’s creative muse. Schubert took the texts from poems written by Ludwig Rellstab, Gabriel Seidl and Heinrich Heine.

Although Schwanengesang might not be a song-cycle in the vein of Winterreise, it does contain some of Schubert’s greatest music. There are two sets of songs which are linked thematically, telling stories of nature, love, separation and despair.


Available versions:-

B Berchtold, Irina Puryshinskaja
Sophie Bevan, Sir John Tomlinson, Christopher Glynn
Florian Boesch, Malcolm Martineau
Ian Bostridge, Antonio Pappano
Max van Egmond, Kenneth Slowik*
Dietrich Fischer-Diskau, Klaus Billing*
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Alfred Brendel
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Gerald Moore (x3)
Christina Gansch, Robert Murray, Matthew Rose, Malcolm Martineau
Stephan Genz, Michel Dalberto
Christian Gerhaher, Gerold Huber *
James Gilchrist, Anna Tilbrook
Matthias Goerne, Alfred Brendel
Matthias Goerne, Christoph Eschenbach
Günther Groissböck, Gerold Huber*
Werner Güra, Christoph Berner*
Håkan Hagegård, Emanuel Ax*
Ernst Haefliger, Jorg Ewald Dahler*
Dietrich Henschel, Fritz Schwinghammer
Robert Holl, David Lutz
Robert Holl, Roger Vignoles
Wolfgang Holzmair, Imogen Cooper*
Hans Hotter, Hubert Giesen*
Hans Hotter, Gerald Moore
Giorgos Kanaris, Thomas Wise
Jan Kobow, Kristian Bezuidenhout
Istvan Kovacs, Levente Kende*
Benjamin Luxon, David Willison*
Christopher Maltman, Graham Johnson
Thomas Oliemans, Malcolm Martineau
Mark Padmore, Paul Lewis
Christoph Prégardien, Andreas Staier (SACD)
Hermann Prey, Walter Klien
Hermann Prey, Gerald Moore
Hermann Prey, Helmut Deutsch or Leonard Hokanson (DVD/Blu-ray)
Thomas Quasthoff, Justus Zeyen*
James Rutherford, Eugene Asti (SACD)
Michael Schopper, Jos Van Immerseel *
Andreas Schmidt, Rudolf Jansen
Peter Schreier, András Schiff
Bo Skovhus, Stefan Vladar
Nathalie Stutzmann, Inger Södergren
Bryn Terfel, Malcolm Martineau
Roman Trekel, Oliver Pohl
Michael Volle, Ulrich Eisenlohr
Dominik Worner, Christoph Hammer

* = download only

[LeMartinPecheur]

This must be a toughie for Ms Loges since the work as a whole has no inherent unity: no reason at all why one artist should be equally good at the Rellstabs and the Heines. No reason at all to listen to the whole 'work' straight through either, come to that!

PS FWIW I have five complete Schwanengesangs: Hotter/ Moore (EMI 1957) DF-D/ Moore (HMV, early 60s), Shirley-Quirk/ Bedford (1977), Schreier/ Schiff (Decca), and Bär/ Parsons, so far unspun, in the EMI 17-CD Schubert Lieder on Record box. Plus umpteen recordings of the separate songs...

[BBMmk2]

Lieder is one of the art forms that I just cannot “get into”.

[richardfinegold]

My into to this work was Brigette Fassbaender. I am therefore probably one of the few listeners that was imprinted in the songs with a Female voice. I think I added DFD at one point when I realized that should have a male alternative but I never came to like it as much. Fassbaender could really raise the hairs on the back of the neck in ‘Der Atlas’. I like lieder more than BBM but I don’t spend a great amount of time listening to it and so I will view the recommendations with interest

[visualnickmos]

Lieder is one of the art forms that I just cannot “get into”.

Snap - unless it's Richard Strauss or Mahler!

[teamsaint]

For a cold winters day, with the fire going, what better than some great Lieder , Lieder.net open with translations, with all that ultra romantic poetry and beautiful song to warm the heart?

Lovely.

[arthroceph]

No Greindl, sniff.

[BBMmk2]

Snap - unless it's Richard Strauss or Mahler!

Yes! Or English Song!

[gurnemanz]

I have a few complete versions, all with something to offer and I can't resist mentioning a selection of favourites:

I echo the comments above on Brigitte Fassbaender and would add Nathalie Stutzmann who contributes a lovely contralto rendition which really appeals to me (if not probably to everybody).

Michael Volle on Naxos, a current Wotan, has a pleasing mellow baritone. Lovely "Am Meer"

Goerne is definitely essential listening, if idiosyncratic with a 6.25 mins Doppelgänger - two minutes longer than the norm. He throws in Herbst - fair enough to add another contemporary Rellstab setting, since the collection is already a publisher's concoction. Accompanist is Christoph Eschenbach who rather strangely adds an idiosyncratic D960 Sonata to make it a double CD. The boxed Schubert edition is good value.

Fischer-Dieskau's mid-period (1972) version with Gerald Moore would deserve to win with F-D on peak from.

Siegfried Lorenz often gets overlooked (not on the list). He is a fine singer and I really like is voice. I have his complete Schubert box but individual discs are still available.

Good to have the young Bryn Terfel with Malcolm Martineau from 1991 (on the Sain label with Welsh bilingual sleevenotes). Much liked at the time by Lied guru, Alan Blyth, in Gramophone.

Tenor-wise, Schreier and Schiff are superb and potential winners. I like Bostridge with Pappano from 2008 even if he sometimes seems to be trying too hard with his wordpointing.

As mentioned by Martin above, no reason to have the same singer for "Rellstabs and the Heines". In the complete Hyperion, John Mark Ainsley performs the Rellstab settings while Anthony Rolfe Johnson does the Heine songs and Taubenpost. On the huge Michael Raucheisen Man at the the Piano box - you get the cycle put together with the songs shared between the marvellous Peter Anders and Hans Hotter (eg lyrical Anders and Hotter suitably powerful as Atlas).

As pointed out above, it might be tricky to review what is not really a cycle. The songs are most often extracted as individual items - countless Serenades around. And who wouldn't enjoy Harry Plunkett-Greene with a plucky anonymous pianist rattling off Abschied at breakneck speed like a bouncy Irish folk-song?

[teamsaint]

I have a few complete versions, all with something to offer and I can't resist mentioning a selection of favourites:

I echo the comments above on Brigitte Fassbaender and would add Nathalie Stutzmann who contributes a lovely contralto rendition which really appeals to me (if not probably to everybody).

Michael Volle on Naxos, a current Wotan, has a pleasing mellow baritone. Lovely "Am Meer"

Goerne is definitely essential listening, if idiosyncratic with a 6.25 mins Doppelgänger - two minutes longer than the norm. He throws in Herbst - fair enough to add another contemporary Rellstab setting, since the collection is already a publisher's concoction. Accompanist is Christoph Eschenbach who rather strangely adds an idiosyncratic D960 Sonata to make it a double CD. The boxed Schubert edition is good value.

Fischer-Dieskau's mid-period (1972) version with Gerald Moore would deserve to win with F-D on peak from.

Siegfried Lorenz often gets overlooked (not on the list). He is a fine singer and I really like is voice. I have his complete Schubert box but individual discs are still available.

Good to have the young Bryn Terfel with Malcolm Martineau from 1991 (on the Sain label with Welsh bilingual sleevenotes). Much liked at the time by Lied guru, Alan Blyth, in Gramophone.

Tenor-wise, Schreier and Schiff are superb and potential winners. I like Bostridge with Pappano from 2008 even if he sometimes seems to be trying too hard with his wordpointing.

As mentioned by Martin above, no reason to have the same singer for "Rellstabs and the Heines". In the complete Hyperion, John Mark Ainsley performs the Rellstab settings while Anthony Rolfe Johnson does the Heine songs and Taubenpost. On the huge Michael Raucheisen Man at the the Piano box - you get the cycle put together with the songs shared between the marvellous Peter Anders and Hans Hotter (eg lyrical Anders and Hotter suitably powerful as Atlas).

As pointed out above, it might be tricky to review what is not really a cycle. The songs are most often extracted as individual items - countless Serenades around. And who wouldn't enjoy Harry Plunkett-Greene with a plucky anonymous pianist rattling off Abschied at breakneck speed like a bouncy Irish folk-song?

Great Post Gurney. I bet you were chuffed when you saw this listed for BaL.

I rather randomly listened to the Quasthoff yesterday, after having listened to the Bostridge /Pappano. Quastoff's native german is very evident in the comparison, even though I like Bostridge a lot.

It is a strange thing as a "cycle" it has to be said, particularly towards the end, but in any case I'm looking forward to this BaL.
Any thoughts on the Quasthoff recording ? I thought it was superbly and sensitively sung.

[Richard Barrett]

I didn't have much time for Lieder until just over twenty years ago when I played the DFD & Demus recording of Winterreise repeatedly for several days until it got under my skin. Obviously this form is really at the centre of Schubert's output and I don't really see how one could claim to appreciate Schubert's music with any kind of depth unless one has engaged with it. Schwanengesang, as has been said, is a compilation rather than a cycle, but it does really cover the whole range of Schubert's musical personality and I really don't mind it being performed as a unit. As for recordings, in general I tend not to stray very far from DFD or Schreier when it comes to this kind of thing. I see there are a few fortepiano-accompanied recordings in the list, which I wouldn't mind hearing.

[verismissimo]

I appear to have four full 'cycles': Hotter/Moore, Padmore/Lewis, Volle/Eisenlohr, plus a threesome from Berlin recorded in the war (Anders, Schlusnus, Hotter, all with Raucheisen), and a selection by Souzay/Baldwin.

Of these, it's the Volle that I return to most. Superb!

Really, I don't care that it's not a true cycle - it's full of wonderful songs!

[verismissimo]

I find the wobbliness of Padmore hard to take, but Hotter, who became very wobbly in the last years of his career, was just 45 when he made this Schwanengesang with Moore in 1954, and their artistry together is something to behear.

[gurnemanz]

I see there are a few fortepiano-accompanied recordings in the list, which I wouldn't mind hearing.

I have Prégardien with Andreas Staier accompanying on a smooth-sounding copy of a Graf fortepiano. It's a superb disc, full of new things to hear. Prégardien is on good form and puts the songs across brilliantly with many interpretative insights. He also offers occasional ornamentation/embellishments to the line - as does Staier from time to time. These are interesting to hear but personally, I think I could do without them in a recording intended for repeated listening. It is therefore something of a one-off recording and whatever its manifest qualities and importance in the catalogue of interpretations, I would be surprised if it made it as a library recommendation.

[verismissimo]

I think that's quite enough Emperor for the time being …