Hanns Eisler - Lieder (Orfeo)

Songs form the greatest part of Hanns Eisler´s work. They range from songs with piano in the late Romantic tradtion to political songs for the masses. For all their stylistic differences, Eisler´s songs have two things in common: for one, they are distinguished by a sovereign mastery of a very rich musical palette of colours, and for the orther, the relationship between text and music is very deliberately organized, at times in mutual conflict.

This album offers songs from two phases in Eisler´s output. The first group comprises works written between 1917 and 1926. They are unpublished songs from Eisler´s apprenticeship plus the first published "Six songs op. 2", which are still indebted to the Viennese School. With the "Zeitungsausschnitte op. 11" and the "Lustige Ecke" Eisler finally distanced himself from his teacher Schönberg.

After an interval of about a decade in which the composer wrote mainly political music, he again turned, after his emigration, to the genre of songs with piano. The songs of this second phase are introverted, diary-like elegies that have as their subjects the situation of alienation in exile and reflections on Germany.

This album was recorded in April and June 1998 at Kleiner Sendesaal in Berlin, with Michaela Kaune (soprano), Dietrich Henschel (baritone) and Axel Bauni (piano).

Tracklist:

1 - 4		Frühe Lieder (Rilke, Trakl, Klabund, Kramer)
5 - 10		Galgenlieder
11 - 12		Zwei Lieder (Bethge, Trakl)
13 - 18		Sechs Lieder op. 12 (Claudius, Bethge, Klabund)
19 - 28		Zeitungsausschnitte op. 11
29 - 30		Lustige Ecke
31 - 36		Hölderlin-Fragmente
37 - 41		Anakreontische Fragmente

Hanns Eisler - Lieder (Orfeo)
(256 kbps, cover art included)