About this Artist

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Editorial Reviews

Understandably, many people will skip ahead on this volume of Graham Johnson's Schubert edition to the three "Harfner" songs from Goethe's "Wilhelm Meister (D. 478)." Who can blame them? The "Harfner" songs are among the greatest of Schubert's Goethe settings and three of his most moving and most despairing songs. And beyond that, they are among the three greatest tests of a singer: technically, their long lines and sustained tones are hard enough, but interpreting their lonely melancholy so that the performance takes the audience into the hopeless world of Goethe's "Harfner" and leaves them shivering in fear and sorrow is far harder. Christoph Pregardien pulls in the audience and leaves it in blackest despair. This is good: without mawkishness or morbidity, Pregardien's compassionate performance is among the best set of the "Harfner" songs ever recorded. The remainder of the recital from the austere and severe "Das Grab (D. 377)" by the London Schubert Chorale through the exquisite "Der Jüngling an der Quelle (D. 300)" to the one-more-for-the-road drinking song "Skolie (D. 507)," the volume is pure delight. Johnson's accompaniment rivals Gerald Moore's in sympathy for the singer and his program notes are hardly a word too long at something like 30,000 words. James Leonard, All Music Guide

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