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Catching up with Mojca (and her cute rabbit teeth)

Posted by Chris from Lafayette (A) on March 23, 2017 at 11:29:12

I forget who it was here who posted a link to a live performance on uTube - a concert performance of an opera IIRC. One of the singers, whom I'd never heard before, was soprano Mojca Erdmann, now considered pretty hot property in Europe - and I can certainly see why. At the same time, many of her available recordings have frustrating (for me) aspects to them, such as the participation of Daniel Barenboim, or the collaboration with various HIPsters. It's SO hard to find one of her recordings where there isn't some distraction - and, believe me, I do NOT want to be distracted from Mojca!

Anyway, I finally was able to get a CD-quality (16/44.1 FLAC) download (from Presto Classical) last night of Hugo Wolf's Italian Songbook. Some of the songs within this collection are of course veritable "standards" of German Lieder, and yet the collection as a whole is possibly problemmatical: most of the songs are less than 2 minutes long and some are even less than l minute! Add to this Wolf's frequent use of a Wagnerian harmonic palette, and you have something very unusual. In fact, I wish Wolf would have expanded many of these songs, even through repetition! But what we have here is veering almost to the Webernesque, at least in terms of length. I often think that it would have been great if Wagner and Wolf could have collaborated in writing music: Wolf could have restrained Wagner's excessive impulse towards grandiosity, and Wagner could have enlarged Wolf's miniaturist scope so that we would have perfectly proportioned compositions which maintained listener interest throughout! ;-)

In any case, getting back to Wolf, some singers see the brevity of these songs as a challenge to characterize them to the max in their short amount of time. And you know whom I'm talking about in particular: yes, Dame Olga Maria Elisabeth Friederike Schwarzkopf! I CANNOT STAND that woman's singing - particularly in German Lieder. She CANNOT leave things alone - as if she's saying, "Ooh! Look what I can do with this word!" (or this nuance, or whatever). Listening to her, one is always aware of how she's always striving after effect after effect - so pretentious! (As Trump would say, "So sad!")

Fortunately for me, most singers of this repertoire (after Schwartzkopf) abandoned this highly precious, artifical style of singing. And Mojca is a magnificent example of a kind of "less is more" philosophy which presents Wolf's songs in the best light possible - nothing at all affected. She has one of those pure, focused voices, which the Germans love so much, and she's smart enough to know not to push it beyond its capabilities. Wolf has already done the characterizing in the music, and he doesn't need Schwartzkopf's brand of arch overrefinement from his singers. Another nice thing about this recording is that the balance between voice and piano does not artificially favor the voice (as on too many Lieder recordings, especially from the past). And Huber plays very well indeed - beautiful tone quality, while avoiding the over-characterization of some accompanists. (I won't mention any names!)

I'm a happy camper with this set - now, if only Mojca would choose worthy collaborators (like Huber) in her future recordings before she gets too old, she would really build a treasurable legacy!

Oh! Maybe you're wondering about Christian Gerhaher's contribution to this set? (The songs are evenly divided between the two singers.) Well. . . uh. . . I have to admit that I haven't listened to his tracks yet - but I will!

Edits: 03/23/17

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