Liebes Kind 2023

One of the leading mezzos of our day in a Schubert recital which offers seventy minutes of pure pleasure. The twenty-one songs recorded here are among Schubert’s finest, from ‘Erlkönig’ (written in the composer’s annus mirabilis of 1815) to ‘Leise flehen’ (which dates from his final summer).

When on 12 May 1764 Wilhelm Friedemann Bach tended his resignation as Music Director and Organist at Halle a brilliant musical epoch came to an inglorious end. From the time of Samuel Scheidt the position of organist of the Halle Marktkirche had always been occupied by outstanding virtuosi and composers, and with W. F. Bach the last of them quit the service. The twenty or so surviving Halle cantatas by Wilhelm Friedemann Bach form a long-neglected body of music which is in many respects unparalleled. They represent extraordinarily individual attempts to emulate the musical achievements of his great paternal teacher and model, and to develop them further. Thus this son of Bach arrived at solutions to problems in his works which strive repeatedly towards grace and pathos, brilliance and originality, artistic diversity and natural simplicity.