Klavierlieder

Engelbert Humperdinck exemplifies the destiny of the “one-hit wonder” like few others. His opera Hänsel und Gretel, premiered in 1893, has remained a mainstay at opera houses throughout Germany and the world ever since. But this single international hit drew attention away from the rest of his oeuvre – which remains underappreciated to this day. After all, this supposedly good-natured “Märchenonkel” (“fairytale uncle”) was still a modern, cosmopolitan figure who ranked among the great musicians of his time. Humperdinck won the coveted Mendelssohn Award for composition in Berlin at the age of 25. He was an assistant to Wagner in Naples, Venice, and Bayreuth, studied Spanish and Arabic culture on prolonged scholarly travels, and taught at the conservatory in Barcelona, where he wrote a theory of harmony in Spanish. He was also a member (and, for a time, vice president) of the Royal Academy of the Arts in Berlin, honorary member of the Académie française and the Academia Santa Cecilia in Rome. And his works were included in the repertoires of the likes of Weingartner, Kleiber, Brecher, Blech, and Strauss – the greatest conductors of his time.

Most of his catalogue remains largely unknown: not only his greatest works, such as his depth psychology-inspired fairytale opera Die Königskinder (which was premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in 1910), but also the stage pieces created for Max Reinhard’s Deutsches Theater in Berlin, his chamber music and a great many art songs from every period of his career. These are original pieces, subtle post-romantic art song with Humperdinck’s characteristic, often surprising, expansive harmonies. Of roughly 100 documented songs for voice and piano, about one third have disappeared, while many have not been published and only exist today as manuscripts. Save for a few scattered pieces on so-called “motto CDs,” there are no recordings of Humperdinck’s songs. And virtually no one performs them today. We intend to close this gap with the 29 pieces offered here. Covering a period of nearly 50 years, they are intended to show the breadth of his song-writing spectrum.