Das Lied von der Erde: Mahler's Autograph Piano Version

Album review

The idea of Das Lied von der Erde in a version for voices and piano sounds like a joke, but consider these factors. First, the chamber version of the orchestral song cycle by Schoenberg is widely known; clearly, Mahler's younger contemporaries saw value in this kind of exercise, and listeners of the composer's day without recourse to recordings certainly would have welcomed this version if it had been available. Second, this version is by Mahler himself; it is not a set of sketches but a fully realized piano version that contains all the essential music in the orchestral score. Third, to hear this version is to realize how, for all the textural encrustations present in the orchestration of the gigantist Mahler, the "bones" of the music are persuasive in themselves; underneath all the histrionics lay a strict contrapuntist (which was one reason Mahler was such an excellent conductor). Lastly, the performances here are very strong. The project was conceived during the COVID-19 pandemic by contralto Claudia Huckle, who feared for the future of orchestral concerts. She has an extremely rich lower register where so much of Mahler's music resides, and one wants to hear her in the full score. Tenor Nicky Spence makes an admirable foil for her, although his voice has a slightly spectral quality in the recording by the Champs Hill label. Both singers effectively scale down their voice production to match the current setting, and the accompaniment by pianist Justin Brown suggests the dimensions of the music nicely. This is more than a niche specialist recording, and it made classical best-seller charts in early 2023.

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