Free CD Giveaway: Schubert's Winterreise with Jonas Kaufmann and Helmut Deutsch

Update: Congratulations of Yusuf Nasrullah, who has just won the CD!

Of all the great song cycles, Schubert’s Winterreise is the one that has the greatest capacity for repeated listenings, with its bittersweet emotions, unanswered questions, and downward trajectory of the protagonist. There is no doubt that something unimaginably profound happens in the final song, but as to what that might be and where it leads after the end of the cycle is left up to the listener.

Jonas Kaufmann and Helmut Deutsch’s new recording on Sony Classical is sure to fascinate for a long time to come. Helmut Deutsch’s pianistic colors are bolder in scope than what you’ll find in many recordings and strongly driven by poetical details. Kaufmann’s use of Wilhelm Müller’s text brings to life the psychological narrative, and the degree of specificity of poetic imagery (and artistic risks!) give an excellent account of the cycle.

To commemorate the relase of this memorable recording, Sony Music have graciously offered to give away a copy of the Kaufmann/Deutsch Winterreise to one lucky Collaborative Piano Blog reader.

A huge thanks goes to Sony Classical for sponsoring this latest Collaborative Piano Blog giveaway.  So here we go...

Competition Rules and Regulations

1. Send an email to collaborativepiano [at] gmail dot com with a) "Winterreise CD Draw" in the subject line and b) a link to your favorite Collaborative Piano Blog article about art song in the body of the article. Not just any article, but it has to be a link to an article about art song.

2. Only one entry per person and per email address will be accepted.

3. The deadline for entries is Sunday, April 27th at 10pm EDT. After that I'll randomly draw one entry from the pool of accepted responses and announce the winner on the morning of Monday, April 28th.

4. After that, I'll email the winner of the CD and send it to them at my expense. The winner will have 48 hours to respond to my email, after which I'll pick another winner.

WTO's Winterreise Podcast

Kim Witman at the Wolf Trap Opera blog has created an illuminating 5-part podcast of Schubert's Winterreise that gives a quick 37-minute walk-through of the cycle, its poetics, and musical journey. The recording that Kim uses is a 2010 Sydney Festival performance of bass-baritone Ryan McKinny and pianist Sharolyn Kimmorley.

Kim's assertion that "winter still has many beautiful things to teach us" will fall on many deaf ears at this time of year. I'm ready for spring to come to southern Ontario and its late arrival is completely unacceptable.

Anderson and Roe Play Der Erlkönig...in the Steinway Factory

From their upcoming album on the Steinway label, here are Greg Anderson and Elizabeth Roe playing Franz Schubert's Der Erlkönig arranged for piano duet:





More Erlkönig on the Collaborative Piano Blog:

Anne Sofie von Otter with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe
Rammstein
Erlkönig Hacks for the Schubertian Pianist

Schubert Across the Classical/Romantic Spectrum

At today's piano teacher workshop at the Royal Conservatory in Toronto, I watched a brilliant masterclass given by Marc Durand. The final pianist on the program played the Schubert Impromptu in G flat major Op. 90 No. 3, and Durand talked about the various approaches to Schubert's piano music. Although Schubert's piano music was closer to the classical tradition of Mozart and Beethoven than much of his other music (lieder, for example), pianists traditionally stake their claim either on the classical or romantic side, or somewhere in the middle. Durand likened this axis to a political one, with the classical left wing being held firmly by Alfred Brendel:



The center is held by pianists such as Murray Perahia or Clifford Curzon, embracing the strengths of both styles:



The right wing viewpoint is espoused by pianists such as Maria João Pires, whose playing of the G flat Impromptu can be rather Schumannesque at times:



With the Canadian federal election looming on Monday and the NDP's Jack Layton swiftly gaining in popularity, perhaps a left-wing, Mozartean reading of Schubert might be appropriate at this time of the year...

Thomas Oliemans and Malcolm Martineau Recording Schwanengesang in London

Thomas Oliemans and Malcolm Martineau are releasing a CD of Schubert's Schwanengesang next month (I'll update with more info once it becomes available). Here they are recording and talking about Schubert in All Saints Church in London earlier this year:

What's With the Three Suns in Die Nebensonnen?

One of the most puzzling songs in Franz Schubert's Winterreise is the second from the end, Die Nebensonnen, in which the near-delusional and exhausted narrator sees not one, but three suns, and longs for darkness.

For those who have ever wondered what Schubert's Die Nebensonnen was all about, its explanation is much simpler and less symbolic than many people think. What the narrator in Die Nebensonnen is looking at is a Sundog, which is an optical phenomenon created by sunlight on ice crystals which forms a solar halo, several points of which are illuminated. You can read more about sundogs at the Wikipedia article on the subject. You can also find some more great sundog pictures and a video posted today on English Russia.


(Image is a Wikipedia Featured Picture by Erik Axdahl)

Anne Sofie von Otter Sings Erlkönig on YouTube

This performance of Franz Schubert's Erlkönig features Anne Sofie von Otter with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe conducted by Claudio Abbado. Those darned octaves are sooooo much easier on violin.



Previously on The Collaborative Piano Blog: Erlkönig Hacks for the Schubertian Pianist

Franz Schubert: Lieder (Songs), Volume 1 - 92 Songs Composed by Franz Schubert (1797-1828), edited by Max Friedlaender. Collection for high voice and piano. Text language German. 275 pages. Published by C.F. Peters. (PE.P00020A) See more info...

Erlkönig Hacks for the Schubertian Pianist

No other composer had such an auspicious Op. 1 as Franz Schubert--his Erlkönig literally stood the lieder tradition on its head. Legions of pianists have tried over the years to overcome its technical challenges, often to no avail.

Hugh Sung recently wrote an article on possible ways to lessen the strain on the right arm with some clever finger substitutions. In addition to listing the traditional 3-2-1 redistribution of the octaves, he figured out what Gerald Moore's solution was (via the embedded Youtube of DFD/GM performing the song). I agree with Hugh's two possible solutions, although I have only tried the more traditional 3-2-1 substitution.

I can't help thinking back to an Erlkönig class that Gwendolyn Koldofsky gave in the summer of 1989 at the Academy of the West. She prefaced her discussion by stating that she didn't know what all the fuss was about--Erlkönig was just another Schubert song! As shocking as that comment may seem in light of the E-King's technical demands, I believe Madame K was totally right in saying what she did. If you fear a song for a purely technical reason and set it apart from all others, you'll have more problems with it than if you were to just learn it, figure out a technical solution, and play the darned thing. And don't forget that the singer's main challenge is how to differentiate the multiple narrators and will need help from the piano in the tonal color department.

My take on all this? The key to playing this song well and a minimum of pain is in the warmup. Ideally, I like to take a full half-hour to warm up before actually playing the song up to tempo. Play the song cold and you're doomed to a tense right wrist and susceptible to possible injury.

Here are some possible warmup ideas:

• Prior to even trying to play the song, do some sort of octave work in the preceding weeks. RCM Grade 10 octave scales in all keys will work, as well as slowly working through the first volume of the Kullak School of Octave Playing. Hanon exercises #51 and 53 are also useful.
• On the day you need to play the song, set aside half an hour before the rehearsal, lesson, or recital to warm up specifically for Erlkönig.
• Start by playing the song at tempo at the dynamic of piano to mezzo-piano, with regular eighth notes in the RH instead of triplet eighths. Keep the wrist as relaxed and loose as possible, with a larger up-down wrist motion than you normally would use.
• Graduate to playing the full triplet figure as you warm up, but at slower tempos. Keep the wrist motion going.
• When you're warmed up, speed up the tempo. You'll need less wrist motion than at slower tempos, but keep the essence of the wrist movements to minimize tension.
• Finally, play the song. I generally move around more than usual playing this song since sitting completely still tends to get me a bit tense in the upper body.

This method works whether you do the 3-2-1 substitution, the Moore substitution, or play octaves all the way through.

My final advice: spend a lot of time on the words and really know the translation. Erlkönig is a Schubert lied, not an etude. Make sure what you do at the piano still fits into the story--it's only another Schubert song, with its characters, story, imagery, and language.

School of Octave Playing, Volume I By Theodor Kullak. For Piano. Piano Collection. Kalmus Edition. 0. Masterwork. Book. 40 pages. Published by Alfred Publishing. (K03597) See more info...