CONCENTUS MUSICUS WIEN


Aparté - 1 CD - AP189 - (p) & (c) 2018

Franz Schubert (1797-1828)






Lieder in der Orchesterfassung von Johannes Brahms und Anton Webern


- Tränenregen (Die Schöne Müllerin, D 795, Nr. 10) · Anton Webern - Ziemlich langsam
4' 55"
- Der Wegweiser (Winterreise, D 911, Nr. 20) · Anton Webern - Mäßig
4' 06"
- Memnon (D 541) · Johannes Brahms - Sehr langsam, schwärmerisch
3' 34"
- Geheimes (D 719) · Johannes Brahms - Etwas geschwind, zart
1' 30"
- Ihr Bild (Schwanengesang, D 957, Nr. 9) · Anton Webern - Langsam
2' 30"
- Gruppe aus dem Tartarus (D 583) · Johannes Brahms - Etwas geschwind
2' 48"
- Du bist die Ruh (D 776) · Anton Webern - Langsam
4' 05"




Symphonie Nr. 7 h-Moll "(Un)Vollendete", D 759


- Allegro moderato
14' 06"
- Andante con moto
10' 31"
- Scherzo: Allegro-Trio · Vervollständigung von Nicola Samale und Benjamin-Gunnar Cohrs 2015
6' 57"
- Finale: Allegro moderato · (Entr'acte Nr. 1 aus der Schauspielmusik zu Rosamunde, Fürstin von Zypern, D 797)
11' 19"




 
Florian Boesch, Bassbariton
CONCENTUS MUSICUS WIEN
Thomas Fheodoroff
, Konzertmeister
Stefan Gottfried, Dirigent

 






Enregistré
Grande Salle, Musikverein, Vienna (Austria) - 27-28 aprile 2018

live / studio
studio

Direction artitstique
Nicolas Bartholomée

Prise de son
Nicolas Bartholomée & Maximilien Ciup


Montage, mixage, mastering
Maximilien Ciup

Prima Edizione CD
Aparté - AP189 - 1 CD - 66' 24" - (p) & (c) 2018 - DDD


Note
Recorded by Little Tribeca
Cover: Drawing by Martha Griebler (1948-2006) by courtesy of the Estate of Martha Griebler © Matthias Griebler














Whenever I attempted to sing of love, it turned to pain.
And again, when I tried to sing of pain, it turned to love.

This quotation, from Franz Schubert’s prose sketch "Mein Traum" - “My Dream” - expresses the essence of what makes his music so special: the often almost unbearable tension between happiness and despondency, heaven and the abyss, love and pain.
During his lifetime Schubert was famous above all for his lieder, in which text, voice and piano blend so perfectly, and time and again composers were inspired to make orchestral arrangements of his songs.
Those of Johannes Brahms were written for his friend and colleague, the prominent baritone Julius Stockhausen, who played an important part in promoting Schubert‘s music by giving the pioneering complete performances of his song cycles, often with Brahms at the piano.
Anton Webern's lieder arrangements, on the other hand, were made with no specific purpose in mind, other than immersion in the composer's "so genuinely Viennese" musical world. At that time he was just beginning to study with Arnold Schoenberg. He orchestrated the piano part, often only sketchily, using a fine, delicate palette, with subtle touches of colour and unusual timbre combinations (note, for example, the ghostly effect obtained by the use of muted horns).
These arrangements afford a completely new listening experience, while giving us a taste of the work of composers who, for over a century, had a substantial influence on artistic life in Vienna.
The same existential intensity is also to be found in Schubert's instrumental music: music without words, but with a “musical discourse" approaching the ineffable.
Schubert’s Symphony in B minor (D 759) will always be shrouded in mystery. ls it really "unfinished"? What are the reasons for its having come down to us in this form? Did Schubert's aforementioned "Dream" play a part in the process by providing a "programme"? Apart from the two complete movements with which we are familiar, there is also an autograph draft of a complete third movement (Scherzo, D 759/3), including everything Schubert needed for its later elaboration, and even a complete orchestration of its opening bars. Furthermore, it is quite likely that the first entr’acte from Schubert’s incidental music to Rosamunde (D 797/1), dating from the same period, was intended to serve as the symphony's Finale: this monumental movement, lasting almost four hundred bars, is also in B minor, and it bears many noticeable similarities to the symphony. Indeed, many motivic relations link both the Scherzo and the entr'acte with the symphony’s first two movements. There is much to indicate, therefore, that we do in fact have a complete symphony, one that explores extreme tonal and emotional contrasts. A symphony on a par with Schubert's Great C-major!
This is the first CD that the Concentus Musicus Wien has recorded since the death of Nikolaus Harnoncourt, who, in the course of countless musical voyages of discovery, had such a decisive influence on of its musicians. Here the ensemble sets sail for new Romantic shores...
Stefan Gottfried
Translation: Mary Pardoe