Orchesterlieder

Two outstanding contemporary voices, nestled within a magically ecstatic soundscape, and an opulent exploration of paths that were taken from the starting point of Richard Wagner’s «Tristan und Isolde» in Vienna, that city of music, as the 19th century turned into the 20th. Fabien Gabel and the Tonkunstler Orchestra whisk us away to a time when orchestral richness and brilliance first came into their own. With «Tristan», Wagner erected an eternal monument to life’s unquenchable yearning for loving union. Songs and Lieder by Alexander Zemlinsky and Alban Berg, which grew out of this Romantic longing and imagining, are offered by Kate Lindsey and Nikola Hillebrand: two splendid singers who have already caused a sensation among the Tonkunstler public, together for music by Felix Mendelssohn and singly with works by Richard Strauss and Gustav Mahler. An additional beguiling rarity is the «Symphonische Nachtmusik» («Symphonic Night Music») by Joseph Marx. This work takes the «O sink hernieder, Nacht der Liebe» from «Tristan» and dissolves it into wondrously light, gracefully affectionate summer breezes and scents with late Romantic and Impressionist flair.