Alma Mahler (1879-1964)
ALMA Meine Seele – Complete Songs
Elise Caluwaerts (soprano)
Marianna Shirinyan (piano)
rec. 2022, Bozar, Salle Henry Le Boeuf, Brussels
Sung texts available online
Reviewed as download from press preview
Fuga Libera FUG796 [65]
It is well-known that when Gustav Mahler met the young Alma Schindler in November 1901, there was an immediate mutual attraction and they married in March 1902. Alma was already pregnant and Gustav promptly declared that there could be only one composer in the family. Alma was shocked. She wrote in her diary: “How hard it is to be so mercilessly deprived of … things closest to one’s heart.” Certainly Gustav had second thoughts and shortly before his demise in 1911 he helped her to get five of her songs published by Universal Edition. Alma temporarily resumed composing but soon gave up and in due time she destroyed most of her more than fifty songs and piano pieces. Elise Caluwaerts had the good fortune to meet Marina Mahler, Mahler’s granddaughter, in London during the pandemic, and they talked about Alma and her music. Marina also owned some of the original scores. It is frustrating that Alma never dated her manuscripts, making it difficult to establish a chronology, but in all likelihood most of the songs were composed before she met Gustav. For that reason, Elise Caluwaerts and Marianna Shirinyan chose to record this programme with a Steinway from 1899 to achieve as authentic a sound world as possible for Alma Mahler’s music – an Historically Informed Performance! What she composed after Gustav’s death is uncertain, but at least Der Erkennende (tr. 15), a setting of a poem by Franz Werfel, must be classified in that period. Stylistically her songs are, to my mind anyway, steeped in the same pattern, harmonically and melodically, which I interpret as her having very early found her own tonal language. Ever since I first got to know her songs, I have been very fond of them, and I have always wished that she had preserved more of her manuscripts and even had a vain hoped that a handful of them would suddenly be found in some forgotten wastepaper basket. The three posthumously published songs here, the latest from as recently as 2018, Einsamer Gang (tr. 8), no doubt triggered my imagination. Concerning the latter there seems to be only one previous recording available: an album titled “Kokoschka’s Doll” (Champs Hill Records CHRCD150) with mezzo-soprano Rozanna Madylus.
Elise Caluwaerts has obviously penetrated Alma Mahler’s songs in depth, possibly after the encounter with Marina Mahler, and she describes her reaction expressively in her notes: “I was immediately struck by the exceptionally sensitive setting of the text, the dramatic musical gestures, and the passion and sensuality of the musical language. Each song serves the poetry to the fullest. Alma’s composing style is complex, dramatic, bold and at times even provocative; recurrent themes of light and darkness, loneliness and love juxtapose a late-Romantic tendency towards introspection with a wealth of expressive vulnerability. This is a truly great composer at work.” I endorse this description with all my heart.
Her readings are certainly well considered, full of insight and sung with great sensitivity. The dramatic moments are well catered for and in particular the five songs published in 1924 (tr. 13-17) are filled with ecstasy. Track 14, a setting of a Bierbaum poem, is even titled Ekstase, but the most ecstatic is in fact Werfel’s Der Erkennende (tr. 15), and here her intensity is overwhelming. Regrettably her vocalism is not on the same level as the expressivity. Her tone is afflicted by a heavy vibrato that occasionally borders on a wobble. I am still impressed by her supercharged fortissimos, but generally the readings are too compromised for full enjoyment. I am fully aware that listeners react differently to vibrato and my advice to prospective buyers is this: sample before you place your order. You can rest assured that the important piano part – far more than a simple accompaniment – is executed with superb assurance.
At any rate, this is at present the only issue of the really complete songs by Alma Mahler. I do urge readers unfamiliar with them to give them a listen in some form.
Göran Forsling
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Contents
01. Leise weht ein erstes Blühn (Rainer Maria Rilke) 3’59
02. Kennst du meine Nächte (Leo Greiner) 6’50
Posthumously published in 2000 by Susan M. Filler
Fünf Lieder
03. I. Die stille Stadt (Richard Dehmel) 3’15
04. II. In meines Vaters Garten (Erich Otto Hartleben) 6’28
05. III. Laue Sommernacht (Otto Julius Bierbaum) 2’25
06. IV. Bei dir ist es traut (Rainer Maria Rilke) 2’07
07. V. Ich wandle unter Blumen (Heinrich Heine) 1’02
Published in January 1911 by Universal Edition
08. Einsamer Gang (Leo Greiner) 3’59
Posthumously published in 2018 by Barry Millington
Vier Lieder
09. I. Licht in der Nacht (Otto Julius Bierbaum) 4’05
10. II. Waldseligkeit (Richard Dehmel) 2’49
11. III. Ansturm (Richard Dehmel) 2’13
12. IV. Erntelied (Gustav Falke) 5’10
Published in January 1911 by Universal Edition
Fünf Lieder
13. I. Hymne (Novalis) 6’30
14. II. Ekstase (Otto Julius Bierbaum) 3’06
15. III. Der Erkennende (Franz Werfel) 3’25
16. IV. Lobgesang (Richard Dehmel) 3’41
17. V. Hymne an die Nacht (Novalis) 3’58
Published in April 1924 by Universal Edition
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