Description
This recording is dedicated to two voices in Romantic music history that are almost forgotten today: Heinrich Stiehl (1829-1886) and Carl Schuberth (1811-1863). Both were highly regarded musicians in their day: one as an organist, teacher, and composer in Leipzig, St. Petersburg, and the Baltic region, the other as an internationally acclaimed cello virtuoso. Their works are exemplary of a musical 'second tier' that shaped the musical life of the 19th century, but whose quality can only be rediscovered today. The focus is on Heinrich Stiehl's Sonata for Pianoforte and Violoncello in A minor, Op. 37. Carl Schuberth is represented with two works that impressively demonstrate his melodic inventiveness and virtuoso approach to the violoncello: the Grand Nocturne elegiaque, Op. 6, for two cellos and piano, and the Grande Sonate for cello and piano in D major, Op. 43, a late work that combines orchestral sonority with balladic gestures. This music is interpreted by Martin Seemann and Bettina Messerschmidt (violoncello) and Mira Lange on the historic fortepiano by Streicher & Sohne (Vienna 1864). The historically informed performance practice lends the works a transparent, colorful sonority and allows their romantic expression to be experienced in all its complexity.
