mahler song cycles
In meinem Himmel
ALEXANDER STRING QUARTET
KINDRA SCHARICH, MEZZO SOPRANO
FCL 2019
—
TRANSCRIBED FOR STRING QUARTET
BY ZAKARIAS GRAFILO
Commissioned by LIEDER ALIVE!
(Below are excerpts from the booklet — notes on the transcription and liner notes — and the complete list of songs.)
“Grafilo’s sensitivity to Mahler actually comes through particularly well.... Much credit for their expressive impact goes to mezzo-soprano Kindra Scharich, who is equally adept with the lilt of parts of Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen; the quiet anguish of most of Kindertotenlieder; and the explosive beginning and middle of the latter cycle’s final song, In diesem Wetter. Scharich feels as well as sings the music....the singing and emotion here are first-rate, and the Alexander String Quartet is excellent throughout, supporting Scharich when called for, interacting with her when the music so requires, and providing contrast to her vocalizing when that is appropriate. Grafilo’s arrangements almost always lie well on the instruments (no small feat), and...anyone who loves and appreciates the music should easily hear the respect reflected both in the instrumentation here and in the singing....[this] is a version that is very much worth having.”
— InfoDad Reviews (Dec. 2018, FCL 2019 In meinem Himmel)
“Zakarias Grafilo, violinist with the Alexander String Quartet, has transcribed these wonderful song cycles, saying that he ‘Wanted to recreate some of the aural colours from the orchestral instrumentation while maintaining the intimacy of the piano version. I also wanted to integrate the solo voice as a fifth member of the ensemble, weaving in and out of the musical texture not only as soloist, but also as an equal member in this chamber music collaboration.’ His aim is achieved perfectly in these beautiful recordings by the Alexander Quartet with the excellent American mezzo soprano Kindra Scharich.” — New Classics (FCL 2019 In meinem Himmel)
“…transcriber violinist Zakarias Grafilo, gave much thought and effort to preserve some of the aural colours and even the emotional 'innigkeit' of the original… Idiomatic and virtuoso string playing and the singing is simply gorgeous. Young American mezzo Kindra Scharich has a beautiful voice, total emotional commitment and musical imagination that certainly makes worthwhile listening. Her soulful, anguished tone when the rejected lover sings about the two beautiful blue eyes of his lost sweetheart (Die zwei blauen Augen) is simply heartbreaking and I just loved her voice so full of joy in exclaiming Heia! in Ging heut morgen.””
— Janos Gardonyi, The Whole Note (Mar. 2019, FCL 2019 In meinem Himmel)
Notes on the transcription, from Zakarias Grafilo (Excerpted from CD booklet):
The origins of this Mahler project came about during an ASQ road trip in late 2014. At a random truck stop, Paul asked, “What do you think about arranging some Mahler, Wagner and Strauss song cycles for string quartet and voice?” I already had some experience arranging Shostakovich and Brahms, but I had never even considered arranging for string quartet with voice. Not one to turn down a challenge, I said, “Sure, I can see how that might work…let me have a stab at it.” Little did I know that Paul and Kindra had already been discussing the possibility of an ASQ-Scharich collaboration, and the focal point of that collaboration would be these Mahler arrangements.
Sitting down with the Rückert-Lieder and Kindertotenlieder scores, I immediately recognized the challenges I’d be facing. First, I did not want these arrangements to be either orchestral reductions or expansions of the piano accompaniments, but rather, a mixture of both ... I wanted to recreate some of the aural colors from the orchestral instrumentation while maintaining the intimacy of the piano version. I also wanted to integrate the solo voice as a fifth member of the ensemble, weaving in and out of the musical texture not only as soloist, but also as an equal member in this chamber music collaboration. Finally, as with all of my arrangements, I wanted to channel the composer’s “voice” by arranging in a recognizable Mahlerian style and “sound world.” [...]
Many thanks to our resident Mahlerian specialist, Peter Grünberg. Through Peter’s generous help, guidance and knowledge (not only of Mahler in general, but of these cycles in particular), I was able to maintain a sense of continuity and authenticity as I attempted to recreate Mahler’s sound world within a vocal–chamber music context. [...]
Affording audiences (not to mention singers and string quartets) the chance to experience this repertoire in an intimate chamber music setting is not only more practical, but some may feel it is more emotionally fitting to the subject matter as well.
Eric Bromberger's liner notes on the first song cycle (booklet includes notes on all 3 cycles):
Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen
(Songs of a Wayfarer)
In 1883 Gustav Mahler was named second conductor and choirmaster of the opera in Kassel, and during his first season there he and one of the sopranos in the company, Johanna Richter, fell in love. By the following autumn the affair had come to a painful end, and the 24-year-old Mahler transformed his experience into music: In December 1884 – January 1885 he composed a set of songs about an unhappy young man setting out to find himself in the aftermath of a shattered affair. That cycle initially consisted of six songs, and to a friend Mahler described their subject: “The songs are a sequence in which a wayfaring craftsman, who has had a great sorrow, goes out into the world and wanders aimlessly.”
Mahler titled the cycle Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen or Songs of a Wayfarer. The completed version, which consists of only four songs, was at first composed for voice and piano, and was performed in this version; Mahler apparently did not make the orchestral version until about 1892–3. Even in so early a work, Mahler was willing to bend the rules of conventional composition for his own purposes: Each of these songs concludes in a key different from its opening, and such progressive tonality serves to underline the notion of progress by the wayfarer across each of these songs.
The Wayfarer songs are more focused than Mahler’s early description might make them seem — rather than wandering “aimlessly,” the young man eventually achieves some measure of peace in these songs, and so the progress of the cycle is from pain to acceptance. Mahler himself wrote the texts for the four songs, though he adapted the first from a poem in Des Knaben Wunderhorn. In Wenn mein Schatz the young man imagines his beloved’s wedding day and his own grief on that occasion. Mahler builds the two parts of the song on the same musical phrase, which is presented at two quite different speeds. In the course of the song the young man moves out — the beginning of his wayfaring — and encounters the happy sound of trilling birds, yet he cannot partake of that sunshine, and the song collapses in gloom. The second song, Ging Heut’ Morgens, extends the pattern of the first: it begins happily with the young man strolling through shining morning fields and hearing the invitation of the birds to partake of their cheer, but gloom penetrates this sunny world, and the end of the song finds him marooned outside hope. The main theme of this song would become the principal subject of the first movement of Mahler’s First Symphony, begun at exactly this same time and itself inspired by the same failed love affair.
The third song, Ich hab’ ein glühend Messer, is a more conventional song of lost love. It explodes to life — Mahler marks the beginning Stormy, wild — and the text seems a Sturm und Drang stereotype: the lover’s pain is a burning dagger in his heart, and the only possible relief will come with death. Mahler’s exciting setting does much to rescue this song from the conventionality of its text, and he drives the song to a huge climax that collapses suddenly into extraordinary silence (Mahler marks the closing measure quadruple piano). The concluding Die zwei blauen Augen, which incorporates two themes that would reappear in the First Symphony, brings a measure of tentative solace. Once again the young man, haunted by the blue eyes of his love, is on the lonely road, but he finds peace in the shade of a linden tree, traditional symbol of domestic happiness in German folklore. The ending, which trails off into ambiguous silence musically, brings no triumph. But, covered with the snowy blossoms of the linden tree, the wayfarer at last finds a measure of peace and acceptance.
Please see CD booklet for notes on Rückert-Lieder and Kindertotenlieder.
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TRACK LISTING
Lieder eines
fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of a Wayfarer)
1 Wenn mein Schatz Hochzeit macht (When my beloved has her wedding)
2 Ging heut morgen übers Feld (This morning I went out through the fields)
3 Ich hab’ ein glühend Messer (I have a red-hot knife)
4 Die zwei blauen Augen von meinem Schatz (Those two blue eyes of my beloved)
Rückert-Lieder
5 Blicke mir nicht in die Lieder! (Do not look at my songs!)
6 Ich atmet’ einen linden Duft! (I breathed in a gentle fragrance!)
7 Um Mitternacht (At midnight)
8 Liebst du um Schönheit (If you love for beauty’s sake)
9 Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen (I am lost to the world)
Kindertotenlieder
10 Nun will die Sonn’ so hell aufgehn (Now the sun shall brightly rise again)
11 Nun seh’ ich wohl, warum so dunkle Flammen (Now I under-stand why so often you cast dark glances at me)
12 Wenn dein Mütterlein (When your dear mother)
13 Oft denk’ ich, sie sind nur ausgegangen (Often
I think that they have merely gone out to play)
14 In diesem Wetter (In this weather)