San Francisco Classical Voice

RECITAL REVIEW

Angelika Kirchschlager

December 17, 2006

Angelika Kirchschlager

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Experience Pays Off

By Michael Zwiebach

Singers, like firefighters, train for the unexpected. Many things can adversely affect the voice, yet the best singers can overcome them. On Sunday, in a San Francisco Performances recital at Herbst Theatre, the mezzo-soprano Angelika Kirchschlager showed her mettle, battling through a series of symptoms to deliver a nicely balanced lieder program — Haydn, Grieg, Brahms, Schubert, and Liszt — plus two encores. Although some of her interpretations lacked depth, there was no mistaking that she possesses the technical polish and understanding of an experienced lieder singer.

Kirchschlager has all the requisite mezzo qualities in spades — a smooth, mellow midregister and a full, radiant top with some bite. She deploys these qualities with intelligence and skill. In Brahms' Von ewiger Liebe (Of eternal love), for example, she sang with passion and a comfortably open voice, especially in the joyous conclusion.

By contrast, a persistent frog in her throat during the first half and some dry, breathy tone sometimes masked the natural beauty of her timbre, as in the climax of Schubert's Du bist die Ruh (You are repose), where a beautifully managed diminuendo on "erhellt" was marred by a slight break. Undoubtedly, these vocal annoyances discouraged her from taking risks.

Kirchschlager knows her way around lieder. She never oversings and she pays attention to the words, which she projects with clear diction. Her slightly European vowels in the Haydn set — The Mermaid's Song, She Never Told Her Love, and two others dating from the composer's extended stay in England — made the English lyrics more singable and charming. She was particularly good in dramatic songs, like Liszt's setting of Nikolaus Lenau's Die drei Zigeuner (The three Gypsies), to which the singer gave a lot of character, with full use of rubato in the "Gypsy" style music, and a couple of pregnant pauses to drive home the poet's point.

I was puzzled, though, by the seeming lack of involvement in Schubert's An die Musik (To music). Here, the musicmaking sounded pedestrian and without individuality. Surely the glimpse of heaven disclosed in the penultimate line should bring a ripple in the singer's phrasing. She maintained contact with her audience like a seasoned pro, sometimes using an enigmatic "That's all, folks!" smile to end a song. But in Schubert's Lachen und Weinen (Laughter and tears), I felt that the smile substituted for her making more of the transition from minor to major key at the song's close.

A Lisztian temperament

The concert's high points came in the Liszt set. As a song composer, Liszt has many detractors, but I'm not one of them. Granted, he was no natural — he rewrote Der du von dem Himmel bist (You who are from heaven) three times, and many of his other songs were edited or reworked at least once. But the sliding harmonies and modal mixture of Oh! Quand je dors (Oh, when I sleep), together with the way the melody often comes to rest on the third degree, forecast the harmonic idiom of German music in the last half of the century. And Liszt's song can be quite dramatic (overemphatic, his critics would say). Compare his setting of Goethe's Der Wanderer with that of Schubert and make up your own mind. The differences are instructive.

Kirchschlager made the best case for these songs, which seemed a perfect fit for her temperament. Vergiftet meine Lieder (My songs are poisoned), was given an outstanding performance. Oh! Quand je dors was full of strong contrasts, but might have benefited from a little more rubato. Kirchschlager closed with a superb rendition of Der du von dem Himmel bist, and continued the Liszt foray in her first encore, an enlightening performance of Es muss ein Wunderbares sein (It must be a wonderful thing).

For a final encore, Kirchschlager delivered her sultry interpretation of Poulenc's H�tel, redolent of the Paris of Piaf and expatriate jazz. Malcolm Martineau's accompaniment was subtle and controlled, deftly partnering Kirchschlager here and all through the concert. Like the champion accompanist he is, his beauty of tone, variety of touch, and alert, crisp phrasing were always evident. Support of such quality makes it easier for a vocalist to triumph in less-than-perfect conditions. The audience was properly appreciative of Kirchschlager's effort and dedication to her art.