Liederabend

In less than a week the Liederabend (song program) I am preparing will be presented two evenings in a row. This is, of course, the main reason for my being here at AIMS. The eleven singers and three pianists I have been coaching have all been working hard and all are on track to do this program. (I wish a few were a bit more solid in the memory of their pieces, but that's par for the course.) We are all excited about doing it. The students appreciate the fact that much of the program is unknown; I'd venture to say that two thirds of the twenty-two songs programmed will be unfamiliar to the audience. But what treasures await them! There are two songs by Schubert that are rarely done: "Lied eines Schiffers an die Dioskuren" and "An die Leier". Both have melodies that seem to have fallen out of heaven, the kind of exquisite lyricism that only Schubert could have come up with. The same goes for "Suleika I", a substantial Schubert song that is not often performed. The one example of 20th century style is Wolfgang Fortner's "Hyperions Schicksalslied". I'll bet few listeners will know that either. Fortner, a contemporary of Hindemith, wrote in a similar style. The first half will end with the spectacular coloratura tour de force "Amor" from the Strauss Brentano Lieder. The second half of the program includes two rarely heard Schumann songs, and of those I am particularly fond of "Lied der Suleika". Of the two Brahms songs programmed, "Die Schale der Vergessenheit" will be a revelation; it's a mature piece with drama and sweeping Brahmsian lines. There are half a dozen Wolf Lieder, three of them settings of Goethe's translations of Persian poetry. They are perhaps the most obscure pieces on the program. I adore the song "Als ich auf dem Euphrat schiffte", a gem of a song in two pages. In the poem a man is floating down the Euphrates in his boat; his ring of betrothal slips off his finger into the water; the sun rises through the trees and he wakes up from his dream. He says: "Sag Poete, sag Prophete! Was bedeutet dieser Traum?" -- Tell me Poet, tell me Prophet, what is the meaning of this dream? The program is framed by two settings of Goethe's "Kennst du das Land", Beethoven's at the beginning and Wolf's magnificent version at the end. The official title of the program is: "Kennst du das Land? -- Sehnsucht nach Italien, Griechenland und dem exotischen Osten" (Do you know the far-off land? Yearning for Italy, Greece and the exotic East).