Hyperion’s Brahms song survey reaches its sixth volume with this release and also alights, in Ian Bostridge, on a singer who was a key figure in the two other major German Lieder series for the label presided over by Graham Johnson. The tenor is entrusted with some gems: ‘Wie bist du, meine Königin’ at the end of the complete Op 32 set certainly counts as one, as do the exquisite ‘Sommerabend’ and ‘Mondenschein’ from Op 85, as well as, to my mind, the whole of Op 96. Those following the series have little need to hesitate, not least due to the reliably intelligent and sensitive accompaniment Johnson supplies: beautiful playing and witty, informative writing at piano and computer keyboards respectively.

Bostridge’s fans have no need to hesitate either, and the virtues of his distinctive Lieder-singing art are very much in evidence, even if the voice itself occasionally sounds a touch raw. There’s characteristic intelligence applied throughout, and a sense of every word having been mulled over and weighted accordingly. But that, to my mind, also represents a drawback in Brahms. His songs, as represented here, are more gentle and mellow on the whole than Schubert or Schumann, but Bostridge just doesn’t seem able to relax in such lighter numbers as ‘Ständchen’ and ‘Salamander’. And listen to the more straightforward lyricism Andreas Schmidt brings to his performance of the Op 32 songs in Vol 2 of CPO’s complete series (6/00) to hear how less can be more – not least in the way a native German speaker can have a more easy-going, less hand-wringing and overwrought way with the words. I was also moved to sample once more the generous, rolling phrases Robert Holl (an ealier artist in the Hyperion series) brings to the three Heine songs in Op 96 and the Op 85 pair on his Decca recital with András Schiff (6/93). In the latter we also find Bostridge struggling with the lower tessitura of ‘Sommerabend’ (not a problem, obviously, for the bass Holl), even if the transitions in ‘Mondenschein’ are exquisitely managed.