Pianist Jenny Lin is joined by contralto Sara Couden on this album of Artur Schnabel’s Complete Vocal Music, a follow up to her 2019 release of Schnabel’s Complete Works for Solo Piano. Both artists have received widespread critical acclaim for their prior performances. “Sara Couden deployed her huge and fluid mezzo-soprano to glorious effect in a range of vocal showcases —now tender and probing, now extravagantly athletic.” (Opera Chaser) “Lin’s artistry is informed by a curiosity as voracious as it is insatiable. She is also a pianist of the first caliber, with a rock-solid, multivalent technique that serves as a richly cultivated imagination.” (Gramophone)

REVIEW:

If Schnabel’s settings don’t radically re-invent the Romantic art song, they’re nevertheless sophisticated, lyrical, artfully crafted, and emotionally resonant. His engagement with the texts and the sensitive music he wrote to complement them makes for rewarding listening, especially when Lin and Couden give themselves so fully to the performances. Fluid, vivid, and probing, their interpretations make the songs always feel as if they’re directly connecting with the listener.

-- Textura