Swan Songs by Christian Immler

Various composers

Christian Immler

Swan Songs

Price: € 19.95
Format: CD
Label: CAvi
UPC: 4260085534029
Catnr: AVI 8553402
Release date: 07 September 2018
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Label
CAvi

UPC
4260085534029

Catalogue number
AVI 8553402

Release date
07 September 2018

Album

Artist(s)

Composer(s)

About the album

SWAN SONGS (Schwanengesänge)
“What remains? And to what extent are composers, when they compose, aware of how urgent that question is? In my opinion, these are the main themes that confront us in a “swan song” (a composer’s last work – or, as in the case of our recording, the last opus in his vocal output). In the second part of Schwanengesang – in the songs based on poems by Heine --- Schubert attains an unprecedented economy – or rather concentration – of means: the demands thereby made on the performer are literally “unheard of”. The text and the music express themselves so directly that the listener can find no refuge in musical solace.

Brahms’s Vier ernste Gesänge, written in 1896, one year prior to his death, paint an entirely different picture. I find that they reveal his inner struggle for personal truthfulness, his hope to attain an all-subliming love after so many years of painstaking sacrifice, while somehow managing to retain a certain kind of faith. To his friends he admitted that he thought he had composed “entirely godless songs” in Op. 121, although their texts “thank God, can be found in the Bible”.

His audience wanted to hear “religious songs”. That is what they seem to be on the surface, and the agnostic composer’s admirers have been ever since supposing that Brahms had waxed religious.

Samuel Barber’s last vocal work, the Three Songs Op. 45, has fascinated me ever since my student years, because of the songs’ multi-facetted style, their refined text and the music’s melancholy, morbid beauty. The second song, A Green Lowland of Pianos – the “funny one”, as Barber put it – elegantly whisks us off into an entirely different universe, a surreal décor in which it seems entirely natural that black pianos to listen every evening to frogs!

As ambiguous as life itself, and undoubtedly as scintillating and multi-facetted as Leonard Bernstein’s own personality: that is how his swan song, Arias and Barcarolles, presents itself. This musical potpourri of daily-life situations acted out by singers (usually based on the composer’s own poems) makes an explosive Broadway entrance in the first song.”

Artist(s)

Christian Immler (baritone)

From the Tölzer Knabenchor as a boy alto soloist to singing as a baritone at major concert halls, festivals and opera houses, German baritone Christian Immler has spent many years making and recording music of the highest quality all around the world. He studied with Rudolf Piernay and won the International Nadia et Lili Boulanger Competition in Paris. Christian has worked with such conductors as Harnoncourt, Minkowski, Rousset, Herreweghe, Bolton, Harding, Nagano, Conlon, Parrott, Corboz, Suzuki, Pichon, Dantone, Antonini, Reuss, Hengelbrock, Bernius, Christie and Alarcón performing at places such as the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Salzburg, Aix and Lucerne Festivals and the BBC Proms. On stage he appeared at Opéra Comique Paris, at the Grand Théâtre Genève, at New Israeli Opera and at the Boston Early Music Festival. A keen recitalist, Christian...

He studied with Rudolf Piernay and won the International Nadia et Lili Boulanger Competition in Paris. Christian has worked with such conductors as Harnoncourt, Minkowski, Rousset, Herreweghe, Bolton, Harding, Nagano, Conlon, Parrott, Corboz, Suzuki, Pichon, Dantone, Antonini, Reuss, Hengelbrock, Bernius, Christie and Alarcón performing at places such as the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Salzburg, Aix and Lucerne Festivals and the BBC Proms.

On stage he appeared at Opéra Comique Paris, at the Grand Théâtre Genève, at New Israeli Opera and at the Boston Early Music Festival. A keen recitalist, Christian has been invited to perform at the Wigmore Hall, the Frick Collection in New York, the Paris Philharmonie, the Salzburg Mozarteum and the Tonhalle Zurich, the latter with pianist Helmut Deutsch with whom he released the album entitled Modern Times.

His more than 50 recordings have been awarded prizes such as the Echo Klassik, the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik, several Diapason d’Or, Diamant d’Opéra, France Musiques’ Enregistrement de l’année and a 2016 Grammy Nomination. Much in demand for worldwide masterclasses, Christian is Professor of Voice at the Kalaidos Fachhochschule in Zurich.

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Danny Driver (piano)

Christoph Berner (piano)

Anna Stephany (mezzo soprano)

Anglo-French mezzo-soprano Anna Stéphany was born in the North East of England, and studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. In 2018 Anna made her debut solo recording alongside the Labyrinth Ensemble on Alpha Classics featuring works by Luciano Berio, Falla and Ravel. She was a member of the ensemble at Zürich Opera House between 2012-15 where she made her debut in rols of operas by Mozart, Offenbach, Verdi, Monteverdi and many more. On the concert stage Anna has performed with some of the world’s finest orchestras. Recent appearances include the BBC Proms with the London Philharmonic Orchestra / Jurowsky, with the Royal Liverpool Orchestra, Bremer Philharmoniker, Gabrieli Consort, Handel & Haydn Society, Philharmonia Orchestra / Esa-Pekka Salonen, with William Christie und the Danish...

Anglo-French mezzo-soprano Anna Stéphany was born in the North East of England, and studied at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. In 2018 Anna made her debut solo recording alongside the Labyrinth Ensemble on Alpha Classics featuring works by Luciano Berio, Falla and Ravel. She was a member of the ensemble at Zürich Opera House between 2012-15 where she made her debut in rols of operas by Mozart, Offenbach, Verdi, Monteverdi and many more.
On the concert stage Anna has performed with some of the world’s finest orchestras. Recent appearances include the BBC Proms with the London Philharmonic Orchestra / Jurowsky, with the Royal Liverpool Orchestra, Bremer Philharmoniker, Gabrieli Consort, Handel & Haydn Society, Philharmonia Orchestra / Esa-Pekka Salonen, with William Christie und the Danish National Symphony Orchestra, Balthasar Neumann / Thomas Hengelbrock etc.

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Silvia Fraser (piano)

Silvia Fraser has appeared in concert with Renaud Capuçon und Françoise Pollet, worked closely with Pierre Amoyal and has had numerous media appearances, including BBC television and radio. She appeared internationally including New York, Vienna, Paris and London‘s Royal Festival Halland Wigmore Hall; The New York Times described her recital together with Christian Immler as „a harmonious conversation between pianist and baritone“. Laureate of the 1st International Swedish Duo Competition, recipient of a prestigious Wingate Scholarship and the Goodhew Scott Junior Fellow at the Royal College of Music, Silvia has long been interested in the duo repertoire and is co-artistic director of Rencontres Musicales Lémaniques together with violinist Yuuki Wong. Having been pianist and coach at the world-renowned Chetham’s School of Music, she is now the official pianist...

Silvia Fraser has appeared in concert with Renaud Capuçon und Françoise Pollet, worked closely with Pierre Amoyal and has had numerous media appearances, including BBC television and radio. She appeared internationally including New York, Vienna, Paris and London‘s Royal Festival Halland Wigmore Hall; The New York Times described her recital together with Christian Immler as „a harmonious conversation between pianist and baritone“.
Laureate of the 1st International Swedish Duo Competition, recipient of a prestigious Wingate Scholarship and the Goodhew Scott Junior Fellow at the Royal College of Music, Silvia has long been interested in the duo repertoire and is co-artistic director of Rencontres Musicales Lémaniques together with violinist Yuuki Wong. Having been pianist and coach at the world-renowned Chetham’s School of Music, she is now the official pianist for Renaud Capuçon’s class at HEMU Lausanne.

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Composer(s)

Samuel Barber

The American composer Samuel Barber is one of the most celebrated 20th-century composers. He was never a part of the musical avant-garde, and wrote instead pieces in a Romantic idiom, characterized by rich harmonies and complex rhythms. His most beloved work is het lyrical Adagio for Strings, an arrangement of the slow movement of his String Quartet, that can be heard in both concerts and films. His Knoxville: Summer of 1915 for soprano and orchestra is also regularly performed.
Barber became interested in music at an early age, and was very talented indeed. At the age of seven he wrote his first composition, a short piece for piano. Two years later he knew that he was meant to be a composer. During his studies he wrote a number of successful compositions which put him into the spotlight of the American musical life. He made his international breakthrough during his travels through Europe in 1935-1936 with his colleague and partner Gian Carlo Menotti.
Barber’s compositions were performed by leading conductors such as Dimitri Mitropoulos, George Szell and Leopold Stokowski. He also received commissions by famous artists and authorities. Barber was commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera to compose a new opera for the opening of its new building in 1966. The premiere of this work, Antony and Cleopatra, was plagued with technical problems that overshadowed Barber’s music. The critics rejected the work, which sent the composer into a depression. After his recovery he continued to compose till the end of his life.

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Franz Schubert

Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer. Schubert already died before his 32nd birthday, but was extremely prolific during his lifetime. His output consists of over six hundred secular vocal works (mainly Lieder), seven complete symphonies, sacred music, operas, incidental music and a large body of chamber and piano music. Appreciation of his music while he was alive was limited to a relatively small circle of admirers in Vienna, but interest in his work increased significantly in the decades following his death. Felix Mendelssohn, Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt, Johannes Brahms and other 19th-century composers discovered and championed his works. Today, Schubert is ranked among the greatest composers of the late Classical and early Romantic eras and is one of the most frequently performed composers of the early nineteenth century.
It was in the genre of the Lied that Schubert made his most indelible mark. Prior to Schubert's influence, Lieder tended toward a strophic, syllabic treatment of text, evoking the folksong qualities engendered by the stirrings of Romantic nationalism. Schubert expanded the potentialities of the genre like no other composer before.

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Johannes Brahms

Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria. His reputation and status as a composer is such that he is sometimes grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven as one of the "Three Bs" of music, a comment originally made by the nineteenth-century conductor Hans von Bülow.
Brahms composed for symphony orchestra, chamber ensembles, piano, organ, and voice and chorus. A virtuoso pianist, he premiered many of his own works. He worked with some of the leading performers of his time, including the pianist Clara Schumann and the violinist Joseph Joachim (the three were close friends). Many of his works have become staples of the modern concert repertoire. Brahms, an uncompromising perfectionist, destroyed some of his works and left others unpublished.
Brahms has been considered, by his contemporaries and by later writers, as both a traditionalist and an innovator. His music is firmly rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of the Classical masters. While many contemporaries found his music too academic, his contribution and craftsmanship have been admired by subsequent figures as diverse as Arnold Schoenberg and Edward Elgar. The diligent, highly constructed nature of Brahms's works was a starting point and an inspiration for a generation of composers. Within his meticulous structures is embedded, however, a highly romantic nature.

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Leonard Bernstein

Leonard Bernstein was one of the most iconic American composers and conductors of the 20th century, and was among the first American musicians who gained worldwide recognition.
He actually made his breakthrough as a conductor by chance, when he suddenly had to stand in for the ailing Bruno Walter for a concert by the New York Philharmonic in 1943. The concert, which was broadcast live on radio, received critical acclaim from the press. Bernstein would soon become a sought-after guest conductor.
From 1958 till 1969, Bernstein was principal conductor of the New York Philharmonic, with which he performed amongst others the complete symphonies of Mahler, which sparked a renewed interest in the music of the Austrian composer in the United States. He was also an advocate of the music of American composers, in particular that of his close friend Aaron Copland. Bernstein recorded nearly all of his orchestral works, and paid much attention to his music in his popular television series Young People’s Concerts, in which he introduced a young audience to classical music.
As a composer, Bernstein is primarily known for his accessible theatre works such as Wonderful Town, Candide and The West Side Story, which still is his most popular work. He also composed three symphonies and several shorter chamber works. In his music he fused elements of Jewish music, theatre music and jazz with those of composers like Copland, Stravinsky and Gershwin.

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