Carl Loewe: Complete Piano Music, Volume Three
Known in his lifetime as ‘the north German Schubert’, Carl Loewe (1796–1869) is remembered today chiefly as a composer of songs and ballads. Yet there is a considerable body of piano music that is strikingly innovative in content, expression and harmony, containing the germs of ideas later taken up by composers such as Wagner and Liszt. Loewe was unquestionably a brilliantly original talent, a major figure in ushering in the Romantic era – with the remarkable Four Fantasies of 1854 heard here ‘documenting’ in music the contemporary emigration of German families to the United States. This third volume of Linda Nicholson’s survey of his piano music on historical instruments concludes its first-ever complete recording on any kind of piano.
Linda Nicholson, Erard piano, c. 1839
Listen To This Recording:
Vier Phantasien, Op. 137 (1854) (36:55)
- I. Der Abschied des Auswanderers vom Vaterland (8:58)
- II. Meerfahrt des Auswanderers (12:09)
- III. Die Prairie (11:03)
- IV. Die neue Heimath des Auswanderers (4:54)
Der barmherzige Bruder, Op. 28 – Eine Tondichtung für das Pianoforte (1830)* (5:28)
- Andante con moto (5:28)
Grande Sonate Élégique, Op. 32 (1819-34) (22:04)
- I. Grave con moto – Allegro (7:20)
- II. Andante (3:32)
- III. Presto (3:48)
- IV. Finale: Presto con fuoco – Allegro (7:24)
Three Lieder transcribed for piano solo by Linda Nicholson* (5:10)
- Sehnsucht, Op. 9, Heft III, No. 5 (1816 or 1818) (1:54)
- Die schlanke Wasserlile (1847) (1:35)
- Stille Liebe (1850) (1:41)
*First Recordings
Fanfare Magazine :
‘This is Volume 3 of British pianist Linda Nicholson’s thoughtful and beautifully played exploration of the keyboard repertoire of Carl Loewe, an unduly neglected German composer of the early Romantic era.’
—Peter Burwasser, Fanfare Magazine