Robert Schumann: Works for Piano (Recordings 1956-1959)

Wife of Robert Schumann, Clara Wieck Schumann was a great piano virtuoso. She also was a wonderful composer of piano works. Korean-born pianist Junghwa Lee brings these works to life with vital performances. Junghwa Lee performs actively in solo recitals, chamber concerts and lecture recitals, and has frequently appeared in concerto performances as a soloist including those with the Korean Symphony Orchestra, Salina Symphony Orchestra, Hutchinson Symphony Orchestra and Greeley Philharmonic Orchestra among others. Lee has presented solo performances in Korea, Holland, France, Hungary, Romania, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Chile, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan, China, the United Kingdom and the United States, including appearances at the Arts Center Concert Series at National Chiao Tung University in Taiwan, Shenyang Music Cultural Exchange Exhibition Between China and Foreign Countries Festival in China, Beethoven 32 Sonatas Recital Series in Singapore, the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series at the Chicago Cultural Center and her New York debut recital at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall as a winner of Artists International’s Special Presentation Award.

The cathedral organist Daniel Beckmann from Mainz has assembled original organ works by Schumann and works for the pedal piano, which the composer worked intensively on in Dresden in 1845. The instrument used was built in 1836 by Bernhard Dreymann for St. Ignaziuskirche in Mainz and represents very well the upheaval in German organ building away from the baroque tradition and towards the romanticism. Daniel Beckmann was appointed as the principal organist at the age of 29 at Mainz Cathedral by Cardinal Lehmann in 2010. In this capacity he is responsible for the liturgical and non- liturgical organ music in the cathedral. Prof. Beckmann initiated the Internationaler Orgelsommer, an international organ festival and the monthly Orgelmatin�e. Currently, his focus is on the major renovation of the cathedral organs. In 2014, Daniel Beckmann started teaching an international organ class at the Mainz School of Music, an integral part of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz. An active concert activity has led him to well-known organ and music festivals in Germany and abroad. Daniel Beckmann has been awarded several prestigious prizes: the 1st prize at the International Organ Competition of Saint-Maurice (Switzerland/2009), a scholarship of the "Deutscher Musikwettbewerb" (Berlin/2005), the membership of the 50th National Selection of Young Artists of the "Deutscher Musikrat", the Kulturpreis des Kreises Olpe 2011 (cultural award of his home county Olpe) and the nomination as first "Mainzer Stadtmusiker" (2016).

Classical Music

SCHUMANN Symphonies: No. 2; No. 4 • Christian Zacharias, cond; Lausanne CO • MDG MGD 940 1745-6 (SACD: 64:51)


This is the first time I have ever heard these symphonies played gracefully by a chamber orchestra. What makes them so beautiful is that Christian Zacharias does not employ his orchestra’s limitation of size as an excuse for delivering spiky phrasing and rude noises. (Roger Norrington! Beware of Dog!) What I encounter instead in these performances is the delicacy of Schumann’s piano suites and the fine ear of a pianist who knows this music must dance. In fairness, the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra is not that small—perhaps 50-strong here—but usually the temptation would be to overcompensate with smaller-dog tensile energy.


Happily we find instead kinder, gentler versions of big-orchestra Schumann. This approach works best in the inner movements of both symphonies, but also especially well in the danceable opening allegro of the Fourth. Taken a bit faster than usual, the Adagio of the Second Symphony could actually propel a couple gracefully around the room. In the outer movements we get similar tea-dance spirit, but at the slight expense of something larger and more exciting. This is such smooth, euphonious cozy Schumann; it is almost Dvo?ák.


Schumann, of course, was obsessed by the sound of disembodied trumpets during the composition of his Second Symphony. And there is more metaphysical fear and Wagnerian mystery to be captured in its introduction than heard here. Christoph Eschenbach evoked this hauntingly in his Bamberg cycle for Virgin in the early ’90s. And Ernest Ansermet, just up the road in Geneva, didn’t do badly with it, either. Small forces have difficulty with the stasis of mood and mystery. In particular, tremoli with a large complement of strings can evoke the infinite nature of things. But in reduced numbers, they demystify and can pester like flies at a picnic.


So I shall not argue that Zacharias has exhausted the possibilities found in these symphonies, just that the beauty of his approach will surprise you, in delicious but unobtrusive surround sound. If there is perhaps more grit, force, and sheer amorous passion to be found in the Second Symphony, well, Clara Schumann would certainly have thought so. As a small symbol in her diaries reveals, she and Schumann had sex virtually every day for 10 years! I always suspected girls loved Schumann!


FANFARE: Steven Kruger

Schumann brings out the best in baritone Christian Gerhaher on this striking recording with pianist Gerold Huber

Frage is the opening chapter of Christian Gerhahrer’s project to record all of Schumann’s songs. For Gerhaher himself, this release represents the fulfillment of a long-cherished dream and, as he himself emphasizes, is “probably the most important project of my entire life.” Since Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau’s pioneering recording of the 1970s no other singer has devoted himself so comprehensively to Robert Schumann’s complete lieder output. Frage will focus on one key cycle. The twelve Kerner Lieder op. 35 are combined here with the op. 49 and op. 89 cycles as well as with the Sechs Gesänge op. 107 and the Vier Gesänge op. 142. This project will include his long-time collaborator and pianist Gerold Huber and fellow singers Julia Kleiter, Wiebke Lehmkuhl, Sybilla Rubens, Camilla Tilling and Martin Mitterutzner.

-----

REVIEWS:

What makes the duo so special is the combination of highest refinement, supreme intellectualism—preferably stern and terribly serious, shot through with a strong sense of the melancholic—with total artlessness and simplicity. Throughout the recital the pervading sense of miniature drama is chilling. If—and probably only if—you listen to and understand the text, Gerhaher and Huber can cause goosebumps with a single syllable (like, say, “Tod”), accompanied by a ghostly draining of color, a Gerhaher hallmark. Schumann lovers and Lied-aficionados will instead paraphrase Karajan: “Everything else is gaslight”.

– ClassicsToday

Even the supposedly straightforward Romanzen und Balladen, Op 49 acquire an extra dimension in their capable hands. It’s typical of the care that has gone into performing every song; there is no sense of any kind of routine on this album.

– Guardian (UK)

"A choice Robert Schumann song recital featuring baritone Paul Armin Edelmann and pianist Charles Spencer.
Mr. Edelmann maintains an international operatic and recital stage presence, winning critical acclaim worldwide.
Charles Spencer, a much sought-after accompanist, is Professor of Lied Interpretation for singers and pianists at the Hochschule für Musik in Frankfurt.
""Paul Armin Edelmann is the perfect song-poet...a wonderfully balanced and seamless voice... - FonoForum"

Robert Schumann (1810-1856) had a special fondness for the cello. He studied the cello as a child, and picked the instrument up again as a young adult after an accident injured his hand and he was unable to perform as a concert pianist.; Although Schumann held the cello dear, he only composed two works that still remain: Op. 129 Cello Concerto, and the Five Pieces in Folk Style which is performed on this album.; Although many of the compositions on this recording were not originally scored for cello, cellists, in their eagerness to perform Schumann’s music, have made lovely arrangements and transcriptions.

This 2014 recording saw Robin Ticciati and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra embark upon their first symphonic cycle together in a performance which earnt widespread praise. Sir Simon Rattle commented, ‘Robin makes a clear case for how the revised version can retain the radical edge of the 1841 version. Still it sounds like a fireball and I take my hat off to him.’ Schumann: The Symphonies also won a prestigious Edison Award, received several five star reviews and featured in multiple critics’ ‘Best of 2014’ lists worldwide, including The Sunday Times Top 10. When Ticciati and the SCO performed the Third Symphony at the 2017 BBC Proms, the critics were equally effusive. The symphonies are very close to Robin Ticciati’s heart; Schumann is one of his favourite composers and has often spoken about how important poetry, colour and story are in Schumann’s music. The SCO’s smaller forces bring a lightness of touch and a clarity to the counterpoint; under Ticciati they achieve a sense of movement that no previous recording has.

-----

Ticciati clearly knows how he wants this music to go and his strong partnership with the Edinburgh players enables him to shape readings notable for their energy and individuality. Throughout the performances are characterised by a woodwind sweetness that is becoming a trademark of this orchestra.

– Gramophone

Classical Music

This new release features three of the greatest piano works by Schumann, superbly performed on fortepiano. DAVID HYUN-SU KIM has distinguished himself as one of the most thoughtful and distinctive musicians to emerge from the newest generation of American pianists. His concerts have been praised as “emotionally expansive” and “idiomatically perfect,” his interpretations as “spectacular,” and his Schumann playing has been singled out as “splendid and moving … His Florestan was elegantly calamitous, and his melodies representing Eusebius were like a dear friend whispering arcane truths to only you.” A sought-after pedagogue and adjudicator, David has taught at Yale and Harvard Universities. His students have gone on to win prizes in international competitions and been accepted for graduate study at Eastman, Oberlin, the University of Michigan, CCM, Indiana University, and similar institutions.

Volume One was warmly received by critics and pianophiles alike. Jacob Lateiner's reputation was massive in his lifetime but he did not make very many studio recordings. This release and it's previous volume correct that anomaly with great distinction. Noted as a Beethoven interpreter, this album combines the Greatest of his Beethoven interpretations with the most famous of works by Schumann, Ravel and Liszt.

AllMusic praised The Benvenue Fortepiano Trio’s “intensity, commitment, and unfettered navigation of Schumann’s scores.” This release is the third in the ensemble’s series dedicated to the works of Robert Schumann (1810-1856). This volume features Schumann’s most influential chamber work, the Piano Quintet in E flat Op. 44. The piece, which was premiered in 1843, is remembered for it’s “extroverted, exuberant” character. It is considered one of Schumann’s finest works. The ensemble performs here on period instruments, which enhances the recording by creating the intimate atmosphere for which this chamber music was written. Fanfare Magazine writes that the atmosphere creates “an enlightened view of the music.” The Benvenue Fortepiano Trio is pianist Eric Zivian, performing here on a Franz Rousch 1841 fortepiano, violinist Monica Hugget, performing on a 1770 Dutch, and cellist Tanya Tomkins, playing on an 1811 Joseph Panormo.

Rarely has a relationship between two people been as happy and artificially fruitful as that between Clara and Robert Schumann: a long, contested love, torn apart tragically early on, yet in little more than a decade of working together they have created what one would like to call the heart of German Romanticism - conjured up by a brilliant composer, promoted by his congenial interpreter, who ultimately grew up to become a great composer herself. Judith Jáuregui's first album for Ars Produktion, a live recording with works by Debussy and others, was received very positively by the critics. Her interpretations were praised for their pianistic sovereignty and her playing was convincing with its extroverted nature and freshness. On her second album she plays together with the symphony orchestra Camera Musicae (OCM) under the direction of Tomàs Grau.

We have already introduced you to some of his symphonic music, chamber music, and songs, and a very positive review written in response to the first album will make you eager to hear more. Voilà: The first album with piano works by Georg Schumann, who was the director of the Sing-Akademie in Berlin and a professor of composition at the Prussian Academy of the Arts! Today he is being discovered as a late Romanticist, but during his lifetime he was regarded as a Neoromanticist. Although Georg Schumann was not a descendant of Robert Schumann, he was from the same productive Saxon cultural landscape and from a highly musical family. Early in his life he developed into a brilliant pianist who already as a youth was able to perform challenging piano concertos. It is thus not surprising that the »master of the keys« also composed quality character pieces, impressive “atmospheric pictures,” and more works for the piano. This release traces Schumann’s path from his first piano compositions through to his more mature late works; in them we not only hear influences from Wagner, Liszt, and Chopin but also witness his gradual discovery of his own personal style.

Robert Schumann’s songs are not only one of the high points of musical Romanticism, they also represent a unique marriage of words and music. Not since Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau’s pioneering recording in the 1970s has there been a singer who has explored Schumann’s entire lieder output in such detail. As one of the foremost lieder singers of our day, Christian Gerhaher has gone even further than Fischer-Dieskau and together with his brilliant pianist Gerold Huber has realized one of his dearest wishes after more than three decades of intensive engagement with Schumann’s music.

Their 11-CD edition of Robert Schumann: The Complete Songs will be released on September 3, 2021 and will be available digitally as well. A co-production between Sony Classical and BR-KLASSIK, with the support of the International Song Centre Heidelberg, initiated by the Heidelberger Frühling music festival, this set features 299 songs – almost the whole of the composer’s lieder output. The approach adopted by Christian Gerhaher and Gerold Huber is artistic and biographical rather than encyclopaedic. Schumann famously focused on lieder composition during two periods in his life: 1840–41 and 1849–53. By analogy with this focus, the first six CDs are devoted to the earlier period, the remaining five to the later years. Within this arrangement, Gerhaher and Huber have consciously eschewed a purely chronological or purely thematic approach, their aim being to preserve what for Schumann himself was the essential unity of his song cycles and to embed the individual songs within a chronological and thematic inner context. The songs that Schumann wrote during his youth and that were not published during his lifetime have not been included in this project. Also omitted are the melodramas and the works that deviate from classical song form or that are a part of much longer works. In the wake of these recordings, Gerhaher has also subjected his earlier Schumann releases to a critical overhaul. The bulk of the songs that appeared in his earlier albums Dichterliebe and Melancholie in 2004 and 2007 respectively have been re-recorded (among these songs are Dichterliebe op. 48 and the Sechs Gedichte und Requiem op. 90); conversely, other earlier recordings, including the Eichendorff Liederkreis op. 39, have been taken over into the present set. This unique project acquires an extra appeal as a result of new recordings of the cycles for female voice, the rarely heard duets and trios and works for several voices such as the Spanisches Liederspiel op. 74, in which Schumann raised the medium to a whole new artistic level. Among the other eminent artists featured in this edition are Sibylla Rubens, Camilla Tilling, Julia Kleiter, Wiebke Lehmkuhl, Martin Mitterrutzner, Christina Landshamer and Anett Frisch.

The extensive booklet includes all the song texts together with an introduction by the German musicologist Laurenz Lütteken, while Gerhaher himself has set down his personal thoughts on the individual songs. A detailed index completes the documentation. These recordings were supported by the Robert Schumann Research Centre in Düsseldorf.

REVIEWS:

A wonderful achievement and a marvel of sustained artistry: subtle, intelligent performances, impeccably prepared and movingly executed.

– Gramophone (Editor's Choice, October 2021)

It’s undoubtedly a fine, constantly rewarding set, with every song delivered with the fastidious attention to detail and to the individual coloring of each phrase that has always been a feature of Gerhaher’s lieder singing.

– Guardian (UK)

Robert Schumann's three Sonatas for violin and piano were all composed between 1851 and 1853. They - especially No.3 - have to some extent suffered from the same neglect and incomprehension that has been the fate of other works from this period in the composer's life, only a few years before he died in a mental institution. During the same years a number of other works for the violin saw the light, including the Violin Concerto and the Fantasy for violin and orchestra. The concertante works were written for the violinist Joseph Joachim, but it may have been a letter from Ferdinand David, concert master of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, that provided the initial impulse to compose chamber works for the violin: 'I am uncommonly fond of your Fantasiestücke for piano and clarinet; why don't you write something for violin and piano? ... How splendid it would be if you could write something of that kind, that your wife and I could play for you.' Here the performers are Ulf Wallin and Roland Pöntinen, a team who recorded their first disc for BIS in 1991, and whose partnership has been described as 'masterfully cultivated ensemble playing' on website ClassicsToday.com. Wallin's credentials in Schumann must also be regarded as firmly established, after his recently released recording of the violin concerto, the Fantasy and the arrangement for violin of the cello concerto. The reviewer in Daily Telegraph found it 'hard to imagine more sympathetic and insightful performances of these wonderful pieces', and his colleague on the German website Klassik-Heute agreed, describing Wallin as 'violinistically brilliant and musically perceptive'

Import Hybrid-SACD pressing.

For the first four years of their marriage, Robert and Clara Schumann kept a joint diary, a project which Robert described as ‘a record of our wishes and our hopes, and the means whereby we may convey to one another any requests we may have to make, for which words may not suffice...’ In the imaginative recital Album für die Frau, Carolyn Sampson and Joseph Middleton combine songs by both composers into something similar – the depiction of a relationship seen through the eyes of both parties. Using the eight songs from Robert’s song cycle Frauenliebe und –leben to poems by Adalbert von Chamisso as the framework, they add songs as well as some piano solos in order to create a fuller and more complex picture. The result seems to suggest that the experiences of our ‘Frau’ are richer than Chamisso and Robert Schumann imagined: while love, marriage and motherhood dominated much of Clara Schumann’s life, Robert’s death in 1856 signaled the start of a four-decade widowhood during which she resumed her stellar career as a pianist. As a team, Carolyn Sampson and Joseph Middleton have released a number of acclaimed discs, including ‘Fleurs’, featuring flower-themed songs by composers from Purcell to Richard Strauss and Britten, ‘A Verlaine Songbook’, exploring settings of the poetry of Paul Verlaine, and ‘A Soprano’s Schubertiade’, a Schubert anthology.

REVIEW:

Amid formidable recorded competition, Sampson is close to the top of the Frauenliebe pantheon. It is high time Joseph Middleton made an album of solo Schumann piano music.

– Gramophone

SCHUMANN Symphonies: No. 1; No. 3 • Christian Zacharias, cond; Lausanne CO • MDG 940 1772-6 (65:34)


When Schumann’s orchestral music is discussed what almost inevitably comes up are his difficulties dealing with orchestration, especially later in his career. In assessing Schumann’s “skills” as an orchestrator, Felix Weingartner was blunt, if not brutal: “…he did not know how to handle the orchestra, either as director or as composer. He worked almost always with the full material but did not take the pains to elaborate the parts according to the character of the separate instruments. With almost childlike stupidity he expected to attain fullness and strength by doubling the instruments. Therefore the instrumentation is heavy and inflexible; the color gray against gray; the most important themes, if played according to his directions, sometimes cannot be heard; and a true forte is almost as impossible as a true piano …Schumann’s symphonies are composed for the pianoforte, and arranged—unhappily not well at that—for the orchestra.”


Schumann ran into difficulty at the very first rehearsal of the First Symphony. The first two measures of the opening fanfare were originally a third lower but Schumann discovered that, since the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra performed on “natural” horns and trumpets, the next-to-last pair of notes had to be played by “stopping” the instruments, resulting in a sound that Schumann compared to “a violent cold in the head.” Mendelssohn, who was conducting, suggested moving the passage up a third and Schumann assented. Interestingly, even with valved instruments now in use, most conductors, at least on recordings, stick to Mendelssohn’s solution. Many conductors handle the “thickness” that Weingartner complained of by following his advice and thinning out the orchestration; some, on the other hand, either reorchestrate to bring out important themes or stick to Schumann’s orchestration but make adjustments in the sectional balance.


Conducting the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra, Christian Zacharias has an ensemble that, with something close to 50 players, is approximately the same size as Mendelssohn’s Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra so no thinning out is probably necessary. Although I wish the horns were a little louder, one hears much interesting detail that is often lost when the symphonies are played by a large orchestra using Schumann’s orchestration (most of the problems emerge in the later symphonies which Schumann composed during and after his bad experience conducting an orchestra in Düsseldorf). Zacharias’s “Spring” Symphony is a relaxed, moderately paced performance. Tempo-wise, it inhabits the middle of the pack and, for my taste, challenges the very best ones, my favorite of which is Peter Maag’s, with the Bern Symphony Orchestra. I wouldn’t have minded a little more playfulness in the finale—he’s pretty straightforward here and in the “Rhenish,” with the most grudging observation of ritardandos and other such tempo adjustments. Both performances abound in snappy rhythms, giving them a kind of buoyant “innocence” that I found quite charming. MDG has provided clear, detailed sound. There are a good many strong performances out there but these two carve out a special niche for themselves. I’ll bet Weingartner would have approved.


FANFARE: James Miller

Classical Music

Based on a fairy tale about the Peri of Persian Mythology, Schumann’s Das Paradies und die Peri is an innovative form of dramatic cantata for solo voice, choir, and orchestra. The piece is an oratorio in three parts, with text by Emil Flechsig and Schumann based on the story by Thomas Moore, Lalla Rookh. This recording is from 1981. It features the Leipzig Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester conducted by Wolf-Dieter Hauschild, along with some of the greatest soloists including Magdalena Hajossyova and Marga Schiml.

With these two rarely played works of Robert Schumann, Christoph Spering proudly introduces himself to OehmsClassics. He is able to enthrall audiences, especially at lecture-concerts in Cologne, with the background and secrets of music history and through clear and humorous presentations, creating a link between entertainment and education at a high standard of excellence. OehmsClassics is delighted over this collaboration and anxiously awaits the second publication of this year: The version of Gluck's Iphigenie in Aulis adapted by Richard Wagner.

In the days before sound recording, orchestral music was often arranged in versions for piano duet as a way for the public to hear, play and enjoy music by the great composers of the day. As a result, the number of arrangements made available soon exceeded that of original piano duet compositions. Robert Schumann, who loved to play duets together with his wife Clara, often supervised and occasionally created many of his own arrangements in the form. This is the penultimate album in this seven-volume series containing all of Schumann’s orchestral works arranged for piano duet. Mariko and Volker Eckerle founded the Eckerle Piano Duo in 2006. The cleverly conceived concert programs of the German-Japanese duo are very popular with critics and audiences alike. Along with central works of the piano duet repertoire, the Eckerle Piano Duo regularly plays rarely heard pieces and works together with other musicians, actors and ballet companies.

Classical Music

Nino Gvetadze finally takes on Robert Schumann’s music, a repertoire we think she is especially fit to. She chose three great works from the golden years 1838-9. Three different works, but all with strong autobiographical connections. Nino is one of Challenge pivotal artists and this is her third release on Challenge, after the successful Chopin (CC 72768) and Scott (CC 72819). BBC Music Magazine: There's always a sense of a musing, meditative intelligence exploring their layers of meaning in the very act of playing, as if she is spontaneously creating the Music under her fingers.

The insatiable demand for sheet music for domestic use in the 19th century meant that popular works were widely disseminated in piano duet form. Robert Schumann's own arrangements of the 'Spring' Symphony (in collaboration with his wife Clara Schumann) and the Fourth Symphony balance playability and fidelity to the original with tremendous skill. Clara considered the Fourth Symphony to be 'another work from the innermost depths of Robert's soul', a symphony that has become one of the most quintessential of the Romantic era. This is a highly collectible set of Schumann's works in arrangement for piano duet, appearing here in world premiere recordings for versions of symphonies arranged by the composer himself along with his wife Clara. Vol. 1 (8.572877) was considered 'extremely well done' by Fanfare. Vol. 2 can be found on 8.572878, Vol. 3 included the Third Symphony 'Rhenish' and is on 8.572879, while Vol. 4 (8.572880) which was considered a 'handsome account off our symphonic works' by the Audio Video Club of Atlanta, and of the Second Symphony: 'The whole work works extremely well in this arrangement; it is also interesting to compare the details which are brought out by the arrangement - Clara and Robert clearly knew exactly what they were doing. I am very much looking forward to the next volume'.(MusicWeb International)

For her new album, cellist Sol Gabetta has turned her attention to works by Robert Schumann. She is accompanied in his renowned cello concerto by period instruments of the Kammerorchester Basel and in the three sets of chamber works for cello and piano she teams up with Bertrand Chamayou playing an original fortepiano. As an admirer of Gabetta’s playing and having enjoyed her previous releases, I set about listening to this album with much enthusiasm.

Gabetta performs with passion throughout and excels with playing of conviction in the passages requiring brilliant virtuosic display. I enjoyed the generous Romanticism of the central movement marked Langsam with Gabetta expressing the characteristic songlike lyricism imbued in the score. At times, the writing feels like a love letter to Clara. In the closing movement, Sehr lebhaft, Gabetta’s striking playing is decisive with a sense of urgency. Playing a Giovanni Battista Guadagnini, Parma (1749) cello, Gabetta has been provided with recorded sound which is a touch too close for my taste. The Kammerorchester Basel, under Giovanni Antonini’s direction generally does full justice to Schumann’s orchestral writing but I find the louder passes slightly harder to judge as some of the detail is lost.

Gabetta has also included here three captivating sets of Schumann’s pieces for cello and piano, all written in 1849: the Five Pieces in Folk Style (Fünf Stücke im Volkston) for cello and piano, Op. 102, the Adagio and Allegro in the original version for cello and piano, Op. 70, and Three Fantasy Pieces (Fantasiestücke) in the original version for cello and piano, Op. 73. Here, Gabetta plays a Matteo Goffriller, Venice (c. 1725) cello and is accompanied Bertrand Chamayou using a fortepiano by J.B. Streicher, Vienna (1847). Gabetta’s performance is passionate and again her rich sounding cello is closely recorded and is balanced to slightly dominate the fortepiano. Although Chamayou’s fortepiano is of the period, I find it hard to enjoy its woody sound.

The booklet essay, entitled ‘Violoncello Works by Robert Schumann’ and written by Ruth Seiberts, is commendable.

– MusicWeb International (Michael Cookson)

Classical Music

With vol. 8, pianist Florian Uhlig reaches the midway point of his widely acclaimed, much admired first truly integral Schumann recording project. - This new CD deals with the dual nature of the composer and writer, finding it's finest expression in the David's b�ndlert�nze (1st version, op. 6). - The typical romantic play of rubrics, musical ciphers and pseudonyms can also be found in the Carnival, op. 9. - Additionally, Mr. Uhlig has collected some related miniatures that Schumann either rejected or were never included in subsequent printed editions, at least three being world premiere recordings.