Schubert Winterreise

Record and Artist Details

Composer or Director: Franz Schubert

Label: Deutsche Harmonia Mundi

Media Format: CD or Download

Media Runtime: 68

Mastering:

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Catalogue Number: RD77055

Tracks:

Composition Artist Credit
Winterreise Franz Schubert, Composer
Andreas Staier, Fortepiano
Franz Schubert, Composer
Michael Schopper, Bass

Composer or Director: Franz Schubert

Label: Deutsche Harmonia Mundi

Media Format: Cassette

Media Runtime: 0

Mastering:

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Catalogue Number: RK77055

Tracks:

Composition Artist Credit
Winterreise Franz Schubert, Composer
Andreas Staier, Fortepiano
Franz Schubert, Composer
Michael Schopper, Bass
Schopper possesses a firm, vibrant voice. Though he describes himself as a bass, the quality seems to me more that of a bass-baritone. His reputation has been made in baroque music, so it is hardly surprising to find his approach to this much-recorded cycle both direct and unsentimental and in that, if not much else, his performance equates with that by Haefliger (Claves/Pinnacle). Indeed this is another reading to engage and hold one's attention through its unity of concept. Schopper has obviously thought himself thoroughly into the cycle's meaning, judged its tempos sensibly, and managed to conceive each song as a unity. Thus ''Erstarrung'' is notable for its sustained forward movement and its clipped, incisive diction. In ''Auf dem Flusse'', he begins in a hushed voice, singing pp but finds the range and power for projecting the anguish of the climactic close. He is also adept at catching the three very separate moods in ''Fruhlingstraum'', but here and as the cycle progresses, certain basic faults begin to worry me: too often Schopper expands a note after first touching it softly, a tic that becomes irritating. Sometimes as in ''Irrlicht'', his tone can sound dry and unsupported, or as in ''Die Nebensonnen'' unevenly produced. In ''Ruckblick'' and occasionally elsewhere, his attack becomes aggressively emphatic. I don't want to exaggerate these faults as they are often the obverse of the intense feelings Schopper wants to convey—and quite rightly so.
His partner is very much at one with him in approach. One notes the emphasis given to the staccato rhythm in ''Wasserflut'', the boldly illustrative treatment of the falling-leaf motif in ''Letzte Hoffnung'', and the almost deliberate avoidance of legato throughout. As this would suggest, a bleak, unvarnished reading is the result. Haefliger's is just as moving while being rather less overtly complaining, a shade more resigned, and his restrained and moving utterance has the edge over Schopper. Similarly, Dahler strikes me as the more mature player. Schopper really comes into closer contention with Bar's bitterly complaining, raw interpretation with Parsons on EMI. Bar is the more convincing because his is technically the more assured performance. The new CD is well balanced as a recording, but slightly too reverberant for such an intimate work.'

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