Matthäus von Collin was an influential gentleman in the Vienna of the early 19th century. Tutor of Napoleon's son, professor of History and Philosophy at the University, host of an important cultural salon, part-time poet and friends with Josef von Spaun. We're especially interested in those last three aspects because Collin was one of those middled-aged gentlemen who, after Spaun had introduced them, befriended Schubert, welcomed him to his household, spread his music and introduced him to other influential people. Unfortunately, this relationship didn't last very long because Collin died in 1824, at forty-five; at least, it resulted in five Lieder, one of which we heard a while ago: the beautiful Nacht und Träume, composed after the poet's death.

 

Ladies and gentlemen, the day has come! This is our nineteenth and last post in a series that started two years, eight months and twenty-six days ago: the series on the songs of Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, by Johann Wolfgang Goethe. As you know, those songs are related to what is happening in the novel, but don't really explain it which turns Mignon or the harpist, common characters in recitals, into perfect strangers. So it was a day that I thought of beginning a post series that would put songs into context by explaining the plot of the novel.And that's what I roughly did in my eighteen previous posts. I said "roughly" because, unwilling to challenge your patience, I confined myself to talk about the essential stories and characters, avoiding many interesting people or things; for instance, Therese, who would have deserved more scope. The novel talks [...]

 

We're reaching our third and last post of this mini-series in collaboration with Isabel Villagar and her blog La brújula del canto. As usual, a warm welcome to her readers. As you may remember, we thought of focusing on the most famous Lieder, so famous indeed that we might not know they're Lieder; The seed of the series was an article I posted four years ago. We previously listened to the most famous work of Brahms, his lullaby (one of his lullabies, in fact); Also, the best known work of Haydn, the German National Anthem, and today we're listening to the best-known work of Schubert. And yes, the three of them are Lieder. However, this Schubert's work, despite being his best-known, wasn't written by Schubert. Or not exactly. Or not entirely. Perhaps I should explain myself, shouldn't I?

 

In my previous post of the Wilhelm Meister's series, I told you the story of Mignon that, as we discovered, was also the story of the harpist: they were father and daughter, even though they didn't know it. Wilhelm and his friends learned it almost by chance, when the Marquis noticed a tattoo on the dead girl's arm and identified her as his missing niece. Now we go into Chapter 10 of Book VIII, the last one of the novel. Wilhelm and his friends must decide whether to tell the Marquis what they know about his brother Augustin, the harpist, so they decide to send a letter to ask the doctor who's taking care of him if the harpist would be prepared to hear the news. When they start worrying because they don't get an answer, the doctor arrives at the castle, accompanied by a stranger, a relatively young man, well dressed and looking calm. Wilhelm recognizes him when he hears [...]

 

A few days ago some tweeps had a conversation about the programme of mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato in the song series at the Teatro de la Zarzuela in Madrid (a similar programme to that of Renée Fleming at the Teatro Real some days before) that mixed without complexes song, opera and zarzuela. We wondered in that conversation why some singers, when they have a reputation that allows them to do whatever they want, do "that" and we described the program as meaningless, inconsistent or odd. We ruled out that they don't know how to make a good programme (of course they do!), we asked ourselves if it has something to do with the way they understand showbiz (given that both singers are American), and we point out that maybe it has more to do with singers and promoters' profile (promoters meaning also audience). If Mrs DiDonato and Mrs Fleming were [...]