Regular readers will know of my enthusiasm for the singing of the youthful Genz. Having just recorded a recommendable Schumann CD for Claves (5/98), he now announces himself equally at home in Wolf. While the Eichendorff settings aren’t as consistent in inspiration as the later groups, there are enough satisfying songs to whet the appetite for what was to follow, and even the slighter pieces are enlivened by Genz’s imagination in wedding words to notes and finding the spirit of each song.
He provides the requisite bravura to depict scholar, soldier and musician, and matches Wolf’s subtle response to Das Standchen, where an old man recollects his love-making days to the accompaniment of a deft serenade in the piano, skilfully played by Vignoles. He may not match the touch of genius in Kipnis’s account of Verschwiegene Liebe for the Hugo Wolf Society (EMI, 6/98) but his mezza voce almost matches that of his distinguished predecessor. The melancholy of Heimweh and Ruckkehr, an unjustly neglected piece, is conveyed with the softest grain of Genz’s light, sensuously attractive tone, finely caught in the recording.
Fink, who contributes three songs written specifically for a female protagonist, maintains the high standards of interpretation of her baritone partner. Vignoles just once or twice falls below his customary fluency in the piano part, though that may have something to do with the slightly unfocused sound imparted the instrument by the recording. The bonus of Richard Stokes’s typically well-informed notes is vitiated by the maddening way the songs are discussed out of the recorded order. However, these disadvantages are certainly not enough to withhold recommendation for this admirable issue. '