Christoph & Julian Pregardien

Father & Son Christoph & Julian Pregardien Reissue edition

An intriguing project, whose programme is based on among others Schubert's Lieder arranged for two tenors and piano, and traditional songs of for instance Friedrich Silcher. Christoph Prégardien is well-known as one of the great living masters of the Lied. His son Julian Prégardien has just issued his first CD. BBC Music Magazine: a 'first and highly auspicious Lied album'. Very gentle and thoughtful, improvisational and communicative arrangements for two voices.

The conditions under which Schubert's art of the song developed into a kaleidoscopically incandescent spectrum that crossed over genres and the institutionally set, historical boundaries disappear today as a rule under the pedestal that the late nineteenth century began to erect for the composer. The traces of improvisational practice were increasingly lost within a music culture that stylised the printed manuscript into a quasi sacred object. A particularly successful way of leading back to a fundamental impetus in Schubert's art of the song is through an approach towards the songs that takes the moment of spontaneous performance seriously as a communicative act, without denying the work character of Schubert's music. The idea of 'one' universal human voice seems to materialise with particular intensity in the commingling of two voices of similar timbre, which can permanently interchange and double their identity. Based on our knowledge for instance of the Schubertiade reminiscences of 1868, remembered and noted down by Moritz von Schwind, can we not imagine that the 'Schubert singers' Johann Michael Vogl and Karl von Schönstein might indeed have sung alternately (or even in unison)?