Robert Maitland (Baritone)
The International String Quartet
Andre Mangeot (First Violin); J. Rostall; E. Bray (Viola); J. Shinebourne (Violoncello)
In Wie Melodien a fine song to one of Brahms' noble melodies, the poet tells how music and fragrance flow in his thoughts, but as soon as he tries to pin them down in words, they vanish like a breath. And yet, he thinks, there may lie hidden in the verses something of what he felt, that may dim the hearer's eye with a little thought of pathos.
Standchen (Serenade), a simple, happy song which needs no further explanation.
Sapphische Ode (Sapphic Ode). The first verse tells how the singer plucked roses in the night, how their fragrance seemed to him sweeter than ever by day, and how the dew from their petals fell on his face. In the second verse he finds a parallel in the kisses which he stole by night, and the tears which fell from his beloved's eyes.
Verrath (Betrayal) is a grim song, which goes forward with relentless steps, and tells of one who stood in the moonlight before his beloved's door and saw her bidding farewell to a rival.
Mainacht is a finely lyrical expression of the glamour of a night in early summer.
Blumengruss (Flower Greeting) is a delicate, and expressive little song made of the slightest thought. The posy that the singer has plucked is to greet his beloved a thousand times, even as in gathering it he stooped so often, and pressed each bloom to his heart.
In sturdy march rhythm, and yet in soft tone and with a wonderful sense of mystery, Der Tambour (The Drummer) sets forth the musing of a drummer on the happy time he might have if only his mother knew witchcraft. Then, he sings, his drum might be a steaming cauldron, his sword a great sausage, his shako a beaker full of wine. Then, these really important matters settled, the drummer thinks his mother might lend him moonlight in his tent and send him his sweetheart.
Anakreon's Grab (Anacreon's Grave). In a very slow and calm measure, the singer of Anakreon's Grab muses on the beauty of flower and leaf which has grown up about Anacreon's grave.
There is something relentless in the measured rhythm of Coptisches Lied (Coptic Song), which tells simply that all men must either climb or sink, reign and grow wealthy or serve and be poor, suffer or triumph, must indeed be either the anvil or the hammer of life.
Biterolf Im Lager von Akkon 1190 (Biterolf in the camp of Akkon 1190).
Here a minstrel knight, one of those who appears in the Song Contest in Wagner's opera Tannhauser, sings simply of his thoughts of his homeland. Weary with battle, and far away on an enemy shore, he bids the stars carry his greetings across the sea. Though his heart has no shield against the sorrows of homesickness, he will still bear his part in the Holy War so long as it shall beat.
