Of these two great classical quartets which look forward so much to the heights of the Romantic period, one (“Death and the Maiden”) is almost universally loved. The almost contemporary A minor quartet is sometimes referred to as the ‘Rosamunde’ because of its strong thematic links to Schubert’s incidental music to that play. Both are here played on period instruments, with gut strings, in what is an authentic and thoroughly top-class performance by one of our foremost string ensembles. The Fitzwilliam Quartet has just celebrated its 50thanniversary.Acknowledged as one of the finest British quartets of our age they are equally at home in the classics, playing period instruments, or in the modern and contemporary repertoire, having had personal links with Shostakovich who called the Fitzwilliams “the preferred performers of my quartets”.

“The wide dynamic palette echoes a Schubert who wanted, with these two works, to "clear the flight towards the great symphony". The texture captivates, suggests individualities and unfolds beautiful lines, swinging between mystery, worry and melancholy.”
– Fabienne Bouvet (Classica)

Tatiana Nikolaeva's prophesy about her pupil Nikolai Lugansky - "He is the next one"- has come true. Lugansky is now regarded as one of the major pianists from the Russian Piano School, enjoying a dazzling career across all the continents, playing with the most important orchestras and conductors in world renowned concert venues. He is universally praised for his sincere interpretations, his honesty, his deep burning passion and (last but not least) his limitless and unbelievably perfected technique. This Schumann program offers two major large scale works, played with grandeur and nobility, and a dazzling performance ofsynthesize the fiendishly difficult Toccata. Splendid sonics are featured on this recording dating from the mid-nineties.

When in March 2018 the first bars of Schubert's "Unfinished" reached the recording equipment, this was not the everyday life of musicians who fulfilled their daily tasks, but the birth of a new body of sound: the KlangKollektiv Wien. Under the baton of R�my Ballot, musicians from Vienna's leading orchestras gathered to celebrate the music of Viennese Classicism and collectively rediscover it. In order to take into account the unique sound culture of this young ensemble, the producers of this recording at Gramola insisted on using even the highest quality analog recording device. In each bar of the Symphony No. 1 D 82 and the "Unfinished", the consonant love of music is felt, with which the KlangKollektiv Vienna embarks on it's self-imposed mission.

Classical Music

Brilliant Classics proudly present 5 new albums in this series: QUINTESSENCE, attractively priced compact box sets containing essential core classical repertoire in outstanding performances. Aimed at attracting both the discerning classical connoisseur and the classical newcomer it presents the pillars of classical music: Brahm’s Complete Symphonies & Concertos, Beethoven’s Complete Piano Trios, Mozart’s Music for Violin, Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, Orchestral Suites & Violin Concertos and Schubert’s Piano Trios, String Quintets and String Quartets. World class performers include Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra with Jaap van Zweden, Hungarian Chamber Orchestra with Kristóf Baráti and conductor Heinz Bongartz as well as the Berliner Sinfonie-Ochester with Günter Herbig.

This outstanding performance was recorded as part of the Philharmonia Orchestra’s 70th concert season. Led by Honorary Conductor for Life Christoph von Dohnanyi, this recording was taken live at the Royal Festival Hall in October of 2015. Believed by many to be Schubert’s greatest symphony, this work is interpreted by Dohnanyi beautifully, and with grandeur and intensity.

In this the first of a series of three recordings of Schubert’s great song cycles for Chandos, Roderick Williams and Iain Burnside bring their formidable talents to bear on one of the pinnacles of classical lieder. In November 2015, Williams decided to immerse himself in an intensive three-year period of studying and performing the three song cycles by Schubert, following an invitation from the Wigmore Hall to perform them- with Iain- in their 2017/18 season. The process has involved not just performances in concert around the globe, but open rehearsals, master-classes, workshops, and radio broadcasts. Roderick Williams has documented all of these experiences in great detail in his fascinating Schubert Cycle Project blog. He writes: “Somewhere along the way I came to a decision; that my eventual performances at the Wigmore would not be the ultimate goal of my study; rather, the study itself, the act of preparation would be my focus. It is possible that other singers might find the process interesting, even if only to share some of the grind that is most often done alone; it is also possible that others might be intrigued, especially audiences, perhaps even (fellow) students.”

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REVIEW:

This is a beautiful and thoughtful account of Die schöne Müllerin. Roderick Williams’ approach is supremely intelligent and apart from the interpretative care he takes, his singing per se will give enormous pleasure.

– MusicWeb International

The extant music for violin by Franz Schubert fits comfortably on two discs, and Ariadne Daskalakis released the first disc of her survey in 2019, to critical acclaim. The disc included works for violin and piano as well as three pieces with orchestral accompaniment, in performances described in The Strad as having ‘a litheness and shimmering delight that capture the music’s innate charm and dance-like vivacity with a beguiling sureness of touch.’ The second installment focuses on the chamber music with piano, and once again Daskalakis is joined by Paolo Giacometti, playing a fortepiano by Salvatore Lagrassa. The instrument, of the Viennese school, was built around 1815 and is thus almost exactly contemporary with the sonatas recorded here, the ones in D major and A minor dating from 1816 and the Sonata in A major from the following year. Schubert, who was around 20 years old at the time, had learned the violin from an early age, but the sonatas were probably intended for his older brother Ferdinand, who led the family string quartet in which Franz played the viola. The disc opens with a later work, however – the so-called Rondeau brilliant, from 1826. As the nickname indicates, the B minor Rondo is virtuosic, composed for Josef Slavík who before his early death was hailed as Paganini’s successor by the Viennese critics. In her liner notes, Ariadne Daskalakis describes the piece as ‘in turn dramatic, playful, gentle, seductive and wild’ and together with Paolo Giacometti she brings out each of these aspects.

A few weeks before Schubert's death in November 1828, the last two piano sonatas, A major D 959 and B flat major D 960, were written, which together with the C minor Sonata D 958 belong to the "Sonata Triad" - which can probably be called the crowning achievement of his piano work. Schubert's first draft shows how the thirty-one-year-old worked on these works simultaneously; also, the counting of B flat major as Sonata No. 3 is by Schubert's hand. The sonatas are thus cyclically arranged by the composer and have many compositional similarities. Schubert dedicated this triad to his famous contemporary, the virtuoso pianist and Mozart student Johann Nepomuk Hummel. However, it was not published until 1839 - 11 years after Schubert's death, by which time Hummel had already passed away, and so the dedication was transferred to Robert Schumann by the publisher Diabelli & Co. While the Impromptus or Moments musicaux were always very popular, the sonatas led a shadowy existence for a long time. In both sonatas we experience a wealth of different characters and contrasting emotions. The arc of tension leads from the greatest brightness to the deepest darkness, from powerful verve and chromatic turmoil in the Allegro of the A major Sonata to cantabile immersion and tenderness in the Molto moderato of B flat major. In the slow movements - the F minor Andantino in A major as well as the Andante sostenuto in C sharp minor in B flat major - a shattering sadness seizes us - indeed we experience deepest resignation and mental abyss. The wanderer Schubert is drawn to the abysmal.

Christopher Glynn continues his series of late Schubert song cycles in English, joined by celebrated soloists Sir John Tomlinson, Sophie Bevan, Julian Bliss and Alec Frank-Gemmill. Titled by the works first published following Schubert’s death, ‘Swansong’ D 957 sets the words of poets Ludwig Rellstab, Heinrich Heine and Johann Gabriel Seidl in songs that cover a variety of different emotional states. The lighthearted ‘Love Message’ with its rippling accompaniment, addresses a murmuring brook with the hope of true love. The bone- chilling ‘Doppelganger’ with its stark, slowly tolling chords, finds the protagonist crazed with a nocturnal vision of himself agonizing at the empty doorstep of his lost love. Renowned for his clear diction and powerful voice, Sir John Tomlinson brings his insight and nuance to these profound works. Reminiscent of the scoring for The Shepherd on the Rock and composed in the same year, ‘On the River’ combines soprano, clarinet and horn in a setting of a poem by Ludwig Rellstab. Originally given to Beethoven who did not live long enough to set it, Schubert took up the words in a work that is a subtle homage to the composer. The 1828 work The Shepherd on the Rock sets words by Wilhelm Muller and German playwright Helmina von Chezy, and was composed in gratitude to the soprano Anna Milder-Hauptmann. Here performed by Sophie Bevan and Julian Bliss, it tells the story of a shepherd lamenting the distance between him and his beloved before a reflection on loneliness and grief. The final section celebrates the arrival of spring in a hopeful conclusion.

Schubert’s Schwanengesang here contains an extra song, Herbst D945. That song was not published as part of the posthumous compilation that Haslinger brought out and called “Swan Song”, but is another Rellstab setting from Schubert’s last year, as are the first seven songs of the original publication. Herbst was lost at that stage, as the only copy was written into a friend’s autograph album, and not rediscovered until the end of the 19th century. It might even have been a try-out for Aufenthalt which sits fifth in the published sequence, and which it resembles. Herbst follows that song on this disc, since as the baritone claims in the booklet “it is sometimes included in performance.” I don’t think it matters very much, but I have a slight preference for the cycle as it was first published. As Martin Chusid observes in his fine book on the cycle, “Whereas Herbst is a very good song, Aufenthalt is superb.”

That is not the only point of textual interest in this Schwanengesang. In preparing the work baritone James Rutherford and pianist Eugene Asti had to decide what keys to put these (originally high voice) songs in, and decided to put every song down a minor third, preserving the key relations at least. They even claim this might be the first time on disc this has been done (but one would need to listen to an awful lot of recordings to be quite sure). Of course this deepens and darkens the songs, which suits some more than others, the heavier songs like Der Atlas and Die Stadt tending to sound very imposing in these keys. And although BIS describe Rutherford as a baritone, he sounds more of a bass-baritone here. But then he has sung Hans Sachs at Bayreuth and Vienna, and the cast list in my score of Die Meistersinger says simply “Hans Sachs – Bass”.

The opening song Liebesbotschaft lacks a certain tripping lightness, but the next one Kreigers Ahnung suits Rutherford’s very fine voice perfectly, and one notices his impeccable German diction from the start. The third song, Frühlingssehnsucht shows that his large voice can deploy a lighter manner, and he really relishes the text. Ständchen, is the best known of all these songs and benefits here from a restrained but still ardent treatment. Following Aufenthalt with Herbst feels slightly like viewing a sketch after the finished painting, but both songs are so well done it seems churlish to complain. With the long (six minutes), slow and anguished In der Ferne the low voice makes its mark, as does the pianist in Abschied, with just the right tempo - a canter, not a gallop, that allows the singer to articulate the text. The performance of the Heine songs in the second part are if anything even more successful than the Rellstab ones, reaching a powerful climax with the rising hysteria of Der Dopplegänger. A properly charming account of the last song Schubert ever wrote, Die Taubenpost, closes a very satisfying version of Schwanengesang.

The four extra songs filling the disc are all favourites, and all are well sung and played. The SACD sound is excellent, and the useful booklet notes are by the distinguished American Schubert scholar Susan Youens, no less. But of course Schwanengesang is the main thing, and there are many fine accounts to choose from. If you want Herbst embedded in the cycle, and in a really fine performance, then it is included by Goerne in both of his splendid versions (Decca and Harmonia Mundi), and by Schreier (Decca), but Fischer-Dieskau (DG), Bostridge (Warner), and Gerhaher (Arte Nova) omit it. Of the few women to record the cycle, Fassbaender (DG) has it in but Stutzman (Erato) does not. The best solution might be that of Holzmair (Decca) and Pregardien (Challenge) who add it to the CD as an extra, but not within the cycle, which also happens on the last volume (No.37) of the Hyperion/Graham Johnson version. That has the two parts of the cycle shared between two tenors, John Mark Ainsley and Anthony Rolfe Johnson. There are now so many good recordings of this cycle – all of those mentioned above are worth hearing, and several are worth owning. Goerne on Decca (live, with Brendel) is still my choice of the lower voice options, and Bostridge among the tenors. Fassbaender’s disc is a quite exceptional performance. But the long list of those worth really hearing now includes this fine version too.

– MusicWeb International (Roy Westbrook)

·         The first ever German album of Natalie Dessay (Her first Schubert album – Her first Lieder album)·         4 Lieder have never been sung by a woman before·         Recorded with Philipp Cassard (piano) in Berlin, Siemensvilla on November 28th – December 3rd, 2016·         From Schiller and Goethe to Heine, the Schubertian Lied, which is based on the best German poets, is a reflection of the intimate thoughts of the composer who realizes an outstanding fusion between the poetic verb and the musical lyricism.

One of the truly iconic works in the repertoire for string quartet, Franz Schubert’s Death and the Maiden is named after the song which has lent its theme to the second movement. At the end of Matthias Claudius’s poem, which Schubert had set as a 20-year-old in 1817, Death cradles the Maiden in his bony embrace. And her fear, in the first verse, of encountering his tomb-cold touch is mirrored by his desire for her in the second. In Schubert’s lifetime, death was a constant presence in everyday life and even a young person like himself would have encountered it at close quarters – in fact, his own mother had passed away when he was only 15. When Schubert returns to the song in 1824 and starts work on the string quartet, death has nevertheless grown even more real: in the meantime he has become acquainted with pain and disease during the bouts of the syphilis that he knows will kill him. He turns the song into a set of variations, preceding it with a ferocious Allegro, and following it with a Scherzo and a Finale that have been described as ‘the dance of the demon fiddler’ and ‘a dance with death’. The acclaimed Chiaroscuro Quartet performs the work on gut strings, which brings out the vulnerability and desperation even further. The players then let us down gently with the youthful String Quartet No.?9 in G minor, a work in which the minor key offers Schubert the opportunity to play with light and shadows, rather than full-scale drama.

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REVIEWS:

With their ‘period’ sound world (gut strings, Classical bows, sharp articulation) allied to hungry tempos and phrasing that vaults across the bar line, Schubert’s darkest quartet seems more than ever a study in the inexorable power of rhythm. Their unvarnished sonorities (vibrato minimal or non-existent) make Schubert’s harmonic clashes all the more excruciating. It is also, properly, a drama of uncomfortable extremes.

– Gramophone

Light and shade abound in performances of brisk, fierce beauty.

– The Strad

In life and music, Grammy Award-winning tenor Karim Sulayman is a master storyteller. Where Only Stars Can Hear Us is a journey through the songs of Franz Schubert, a composer who was able to capture joy and sorrow in a single moment like no other. Karim’s voyage traverses themes of darkness and yearning, guided throughout by moonbeams and shining stars. His partner is historical keyboardist Yi-heng Yang who plays on a fortepiano built by Joseph Simon in Vienna in 1830, adding an air of authenticity from Schubert’s time. “lucid, velvety tenor and pop-star charisma” (BBC Music Magazine) “a pianist of “astonishing skill and vividness” (The New York Times)



REVIEWS:

Sulayman is always engaging, with an appealing honesty to his approach and a vividness to his storytelling. His light, silvery tenor is in many ways suited to much of the programme’s theme, but the flipside is a paleness and shortness of sap and sweetness; nor does the tenor’s German always feel entirely natural. Adjust to the tone, though, and there’s still a great deal to enjoy in these performances.

– Gramophone

This Schubert has its priorities straight. Text comes first in Sulayman's interpretations. The small inflections in his timbre convey textual themes equally well to audiences of all German-speaking levels. From the seemingly bratty child in Erlkönig (RIP), to the poignantly longing fisherman of Des fischers Liebesglück, he is an actor first.

His voice is clear and transparent. He barely covers his sound, allowing every ounce of that underlying emotion to shine through.

Both performers treat these lieder as chamber music. It's unclear who leads the stretches that come so often throughout the album, but whenever one part pushes, the other follows. Yang's slightly delayed cadences gain weight with a quick breath from Sulayman. Sulayman stretches a phrase climax, Yang rolls a chord to help accent. The two work symbiotically, melding the intense drama from each of their parts into a composite, deeply affecting pathos.

– Classical Music Geek

Schubert wrote eleven complete sonatas between 1817 and 1828. He also composed movements for several sonatas which he left unfinished. Sonata in A minor D. 784 is one of the most important singular works in Schubert's output that stays apart from his previous and later sonatas. It is an austere, almost minimalistic work that achieves a profound and lasting impact. It is one of the darkest and most unsettling pieces he ever wrote and one of the most confessional. This relatively short sonata, by Schubert's standards, is one of the most authentic, prophetic and enigmatic works ever written. Sonata in A major D. 959 was writte in 1828, the last year of Schubert's life, very rapidly alongside the sonatas in C minor and B-flat major, just a few month before his death. The speed, quality and quantity of Schubert's output in the last year of his life are a marvel. In his last year, Schubert wrote some of the most important work that sums up his ideas, inspiration and ambitious as a composer. These incredible works were written by the artist at the peak of his creative powers with clarity and precision. In these works, including the last three sonatas, Schubert points the ways to resolving the perennial conflicts of existence: his final message seems to be that of acceptance and reconciliation. Towards the end of his life, Schubert was learning to accept death as a promise, as a blessing.

SCHUBERT Fantasies: in C, “ Grazer”; in C, “Wanderer.” 3 Klavierstücke, D 946. Variations on a Theme by Hüttenbrenner • Michael Endres (pn) • OEHMS 731 (73:31)


Michael Endres, one of today’s leading German pianists, received his early training in Munich and then at Juilliard with Jacob Lateiner. He has won prizes in numerous competitions, including the International Schubert Competition in Dortmund, and his recordings include impressive accounts of the complete piano works of Ravel as well as a fine three-CD survey of Schumann’s works. I have not yet heard his complete sonatas of Mozart and Schubert (the latter on a six-CD set for Capriccio), but this disc makes me eager to do so. Here, his unforced playing and engaging musicality make him a perfect Schubertian. The “Grazer” Fantasy, probably written in 1818, is a lovely work that was not discovered until 1962. It opens and closes with an original and lyrical idea, some components of which get used in the substantial central polonaise. The textures are varied and the writing includes some virtuosic passages. Endres is a most persuasive advocate of this work, responding to its mood swings and holding the episodes together in a seamless manner. The rarely heard Hüttenbrenner Variations , also from around 1818, is of less interest, for the writing tends to be formulaic and lacking in character. Endres plays it intimately and sympathetically.


The Klavierstücke are among Schubert’s last works, and they are technically challenging and often musically arresting. In the first, Endres plays with real urgency without forcing his sound, and the contrasting material is ethereal, as if composed without bar lines. Beautiful balances and noble sentiment characterize the second, which is musically and pianistically the most original of the set, with its highly dramatic episode. And I like the way he eases into No. 3 and lingers a bit during the lovely Trio section; the final page couldn’t be more exciting. Endres’ subtle interpretation is on a par with the excellent ones by Uchida and, more recently, Perianes.


There are many very fine recordings of the great “Wanderer” Fantasy—by Curzon, Richter, Pollini, Brendel, Perahia, and Kissin, among others—and Endres’ belongs to that elite group. He has the technique to vary his sound, even during the most intense and loud passages; and in the more lyrical moments he plays with a flexibility that seems just right, never exaggerated. His left-hand octaves are equal to anyone’s in the notorious passage near the end of the first section. The slow variations flow with unusual continuity and control of texture. The tight rhythms of the Scherzo are contrasted with perfect ease in the Trio. The finale benefits from a less clangorous approach than usual, making the brilliant closing pages all the more welcome. Here, as in the demanding conclusion of the Scherzo, he takes no prisoners, and the playing is immensely exciting. I look forward to hearing this fine pianist’s survey of Schubert’s sonatas and to his hoped-for recording of the eight impromptus.


FANFARE: Charles Timbrell


The sensitive, refined, and somewhat understated qualities of Michael Endres' 1990s Schubert sonata cycle released on Capriccio similarly inform these 2008 recordings. He plays down the dynamic surges, hurling accents, and dramatic contrasts others have brought to the D. 946 triumvirate, focusing instead on tonal beauty, sophisticated pedaling, and melodic strands that often remain buried within accompaniments.

Those who seek virtuosic power from the Wanderer Fantasy's daunting keyboard challenges might complain that Endres scales down the work's monumental dimensions, and indeed, he sounds relatively small-scaled next to Richter, or even Perahia. Yet Endres' technical aplomb allows him to keep an even keel throughout the finale's unwieldy textures and to play the first section's rapid octaves absolutely in tempo, as written.

In addition to his poetically phrased and thoughtfully unified Hüttenbrenner Variations, Endres shines best in the Grazer Fantasie. The central Alla Polacca's salon-like patterns charm and scintillate, as do the finale's shimmering scales. It contrasts to bigger-boned, more overtly urgent interpretations (Peter Rösel, for example, or Lili Kraus' superb world-premiere recording once available on a Columbia/Odyssey LP). If you fancy intimate Schubert playing, give this disc a try.

--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

Violin music isn’t what one normally associates with Franz Schubert, but he did in fact receive his first violin lessons as a young boy from his father. At the age of 11 he was accepted as a member of the choir of the imperial court chapel, and as such became a pupil at the Stadtkonvikt school. There he joined the excellent student orchestra, eventually assuming the role of leader. Among his examiners was the court Kapellmeister Anton Salieri, who took a keen interest in Schubert’s compositions. Schubert left the school in 1813, but continued working with Salieri for a few years longer, possibly on some of the pieces recorded here – the Rondo, Konzertstuck and G minor Sonata all hail from 1816 while the Polonaise is from the following year. These early, unpretentious violin compositions were probably intended for Schubert’s older brother Ferdinand, who led the family string quartet in which Franz played the viola. Composed in 1827, when Schubert had already written his symphonies, string quartets, piano sonatas and hundreds of songs, the closing Fantasy in C major is another matter. A substantial piece in four sections, it contains challenging writing for both instruments, demonstrating what a master Schubert himself was on both. On this and its soon-to-be-released companion disc, Ariadne Daskalakis has gathered all of Schubert’s works for violin. Equally at home on baroque and modern instruments, she has chosen to perform them in a historical context, joined by Paolo Giacometti on a fortepiano by Salvatore Lagrassa from c. 1815 and the period band Die Kolner Akademie conducted by Michael Alexander Willens.

Edward Gardner leads the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra in Schubert’s Symphonies Nos. 2 and 6 in this second volume in the acclaimed series. Chief Conductor of the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra since October 2015, Edward Gardner has led the musicians on multiple international tours, which have included performances in Berlin, Munich, and Amsterdam, and at the BBC Proms and Edinburgh International Festival. He was recently appointed Principal Conductor Designate of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, his tenure commencing in September 2021. In demand as a guest conductor, during the previous two seasons he made his debut with the New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, and Wiener Symphoniker, as well as at The Royal Opera, Covent Garden in a new production of Káťa Kabanová, praised by The Guardianas a ‘magnificent interpretation’. He returned to the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Philharmonia Orchestra, and Orchestra del Teatro alla Scala di Milano. In April 2019, he conducted the London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Lincoln Center in New York.

•Pianist Jura Margulis recorded the present Schubert CD on a modern grand piano equipped with the built-on “sordino pedal” extension. Around the mid-19th century, this possibility of altering and extending the sound had largely disappeared from the canon of various pedal functions, but it was retained in Vienna until the early 20th century. Composers call this function “sordino” because the sound modification is related to the mutes of the string instruments.

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In their second album for Resonus, the Gould Piano Trio returns with a recording of Schubert’s Piano Trios. Apart from a very early single movement written when he fifteen years of age, Schubert came to the piano trio late in his short career and left only two full-length works in the form, written in 1827–8. By the time Schubert came to write his piano trios, the form had taken on a new stature thanks to work from composers such as Beethoven. Here, Schubert’s Trios in B-flat major and the ‘Notturno’ in E-flat major are joined by the delightful Valses nobles D969, composed for solo piano and heard here in a world premiere recording in this arrangement for trio by Julius Zellner.

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From the elated dream to the bitter reality: to provide a proper rendering of Franz Schubert’s music, with its enormous range of expressions including all the intermediate tones, the instrument of choice must be the Fortepiano, if only for its similitude to the pianos used during Schubert’s lifetime. The model used in the present recording is based on the grand piano of the Viennese master Conrad Graf, an instrument that Schubert himself owned. Its six pedals allow Schubert’s music to be played with multifaceted pliancy and depth. The skillful use of all these pedals, which in modern instruments have been reduced to two or three, opens up a multitude of sound facets, similar to doors that open up to a multitude of rooms, each decorated in its own particular way and with its own particular style.

Admittedly, Franz Schubert's biography offers little in the way of great adventures, love affairs, glamour and long journeys. Jörg Handstein – in what is now his tenth audio biography in the successful BR-KLASSIK series - devotes himself here to a composer with an altogether quieter life. Schubert's story still remains an exciting one: no famous composer before him had ever chosen to lead a life in which his musical activities were supported solely by a private circle of friends. This did not succeed without resistance, setbacks, great disappointments and personal tragedies. Schubert's unhappiness in love, his terrible illness, and probably also his early death were, ultimately, the price he paid for this unconventional life. He bravely stood his ground, however, countering an age of cultural and political paralysis with his great and bold art. In this audio biography, Schubert’s creative path can be followed in around 130 musical examples – something impossible in any biography in book form. Alongside Udo Wachtveitl (narrator) and Robert Stadlober (Schubert), many other voices bring the composer’s world and his circle of friends to life. Schubert’s conventional image is encumbered by two clichés. On the one hand, we have the warm-hearted, sentimental man, known to his friends familiarly as Schwammerl (“mushroom”), churning out endless songs and beautiful melodies, and on the other, the incessantly tortured outsider, with music primarily conveying a sense of “brokenness” and “alienation”. This audio biography allows Schubert to speak for himself as often as possible. Despite the sparse documentation, a far more nuanced picture emerges – and the well-known Austrian actor and rock musician Robert Stadlober finds richly contrasting colors for it. We discover a different Schubert here: single-minded, argumentative, philosophical, reflective, and with a wide range of interests. That is also what makes his life story so exciting.