Vincent Kusters, baritone, and Julius Drake, piano: Franz Schubert, Winterreise D911 op. 89

Heard: February 25, in the Sint Janskerk Maastricht, as part of ‘The art of song Maastricht’.

Photos: Jean-Pierre Geusens, Focuss22.nl

(Review version 0.99)

Winterreise is a remarkable work. For 75 minutes, you are immersed in 24 songs, 16 of which are in minor keys and in which, in fact, nothing happens. The protagonist engages in a monologue intérieur; the conversations that take place occur exclusively in his head. He walks through an inhospitable winter landscape that seems to symbolize his inner mood. The story moves forward and backward at the same time: while the distance between the protagonist and his lost lover grows ever greater, he continues to think back on her and in Rückblick he even says literally that he wants to return—while on the other hand he knows that his rich rival is now sleeping in her bed. The protagonist lives between love and hate: he alternates between feelings of hurt, love, and anger. As the cycle progresses, depressive resignation is increasingly interspersed with aggression: instead of slowly refocusing on the outside world, the protagonist becomes increasingly trapped in the cocoon of his own unhappiness.

You would expect that this depressing story would appeal to few people, but the opposite is true: the cycle has even reached number one on the Classical Top 400 of the Dutch radio station NPO Klassiek (formerly Radio4). The music is extremely powerful, and so is the story, when you think about it. That does not mean that it does not matter who performs the work.

It starts with the voice type. The work is often sung by a baritone, but was written for a tenor. The nice thing is that each voice type leaves its own mark on it. The lower the voice, the darker the story, broadly speaking. With a low baritone or bass, the emphasis is often on depression and aggression, and with a tenor, more on melancholy, longing, and vulnerability.

To a certain extent, however, each voice type has a choice. Something similar applies to the dynamics: the somewhat larger and more dramatic voices will naturally emphasize the drama a little more, while the lyrical to very lyrical voices naturally give more attention to vulnerability and longing, but there is a lot of room for individual choices. Kusters is a fairly light baritone but has sufficient reserves to emphasize all aspects of the work. What was special about this concert was that he used his voice in a very convincing, beautiful, and consistent way, giving it its own character both vocally and in terms of content.

Gute Nacht

This began with the first sentence of the first (and also longest) song, Gute Nacht. That first sentence: ‘Fremd bin ich eingezogen, fremd zieh ich wieder aus’ (I moved in as a stranger, I move out as a stranger), is in any case an immediate touchstone for a performance of Winterreise. The first part of the sentence contains a fairly neutral statement, but the second part is anything but, and the combination of the two condenses the drama. It is clear that these two parts of the sentence cannot be sung in the same way. But the word ‘Fremd’ appears twice in the middle of the last beat of the bar, in a place where it does not deserve any accent, and the first ‘fremd’ is quite high.

Fortunately, Kusters had no problem avoiding giving the first ‘fremd’ undeserved attention. On the other hand, the last note on the word ‘aus’ is on the first beat, but also on the tonic/root note, towards which a phrase moves. Kusters solved the problem by giving the second ‘fremd’ a slightly less strong accent and allowing the rest of the phrase to end quietly.

Many lower baritones seize every opportunity to show off their bass foundation in the low notes of Winterreise. This is also the case with the word ‘aus’ at the end of this phrase. That would be out of place here, but in any case it is often out of place in Schubert. The hard passages in Winterreise are never low either. In Der Lindenbaum (which is also beautifully sung), you can see that ‘Der Hut flieg mir vom Kopfe’ (high) is marked forte in the accompaniment, while after a decrescendo, the last note is marked ‘piano’. In other words, Kuster’s slightly lighter voice helps him to sing Winterreise as Schubert wrote it. Vocally, he is more or less forced not to strain the low notes, and so they automatically acquire the right expression. Where necessary, however, he was able to build up convincing drama and volume, partly by choosing to modify the vowels quite strongly.

On the other hand, Kusters’ voice is very well suited to placing sensitive accents, especially in the high register. Partly because of this (but also, of course, because of his interpretative choices), Kusters’ Winterreise was vocally controlled, always beautiful in tone, while more than enough accents were placed: a very clear – and unique – story was told. Anger and irony did not play a major role in this, in keeping with Kusters’ (vocal) character. There was plenty of room for other feelings, however, with the protagonist’s depression taking on a poignant and melancholic quality. This immediately gave the concert a charm all of its own.

Drake

This was even more true for Julius Drake. First and foremost, he proved himself to be the ideal accompanist, always perfectly balanced with the singer’s volume and – more importantly – speaking with Kusters’ voice, as it were. On the one hand, you could hear everywhere how he (especially in his right hand) constantly added small accents and emphasized the details in the score, but on the other hand, this was in perfect harmony with the way he followed and supported Kuster.

It was striking how he often gave the highest notes an important role in his right hand, producing a tone color that harmonized beautifully with Kuster’s. (In his recording with Finley, for example, he does this differently.) This not only created a beautiful balance, but also many beautiful details, such as in Die Krähe and Irrlicht. But Drake was also not afraid to place strong accents in the mid-low range, in places where he did not get in Kuster’s way. This could be heard clearly in Der greise Kopf in the repeated ‘wie weit noch bis zur Bahre’ (how far still to the bier). This is an impressive passage in any case, because the piano echoes the singing voice one and two octaves lower respectively, emphasizing the ominous text. But Drake played his dissonance(s), measured against the ‘piano’ in the score, relatively loudly, which gave some members of the audience the impression that something was wrong. In a sense, of course, that was true: here Schubert expresses the protagonist’s death wish with disturbing directness for the first time.

Most striking, however, were his higher notes. In Frühlingstraum, he played the high eighth notes in the right hand in the slow 2/4 sections remarkably softly and subtly. In doing so, he emphasized the very highest notes in the chords, which perfectly matched the mood Kusters was expressing. In any case, that was one of the highlights of this Winterreise. Not so much for the reasons why he is a favorite of the audience, ever since the first performance for Schubert’s friends, but because Kusters succeeded in emphasizing the vulnerability in a tenor-like manner. At times, Drake seemed to feel Kusters’ interpretation almost better than the singer himself.

Julius Drake chose the tenor range for Mut and Der Leiermann. This was probably in accordance with Schubert’s wishes, as both songs are notated a note higher in the manuscript.

The higher pitch of those two songs was a stroke of genius. It made the ending sound as if the protagonist had already detached himself somewhat from life. With the beautiful messa di voce on the last questioning word ‘gehen’, Kusters concluded the cycle with just the right feeling.

The sound created by the higher register also fitted in very well with Kusters’ interpretation of the protagonist: in his opinion, he does not commit suicide. In Kusters’ view, the protagonist remains eternally suspended between heaven and hell, in a kind of eternal purgatory, between suicide and continuing life, without ever finding redemption. (I will be publishing an interview with him shortly.)

Is he right? That is difficult to say, because no one knows for sure how Schubert interpreted the text. The last word of the singing voice is on a fifth, leaving the question (will he go along with death?) unanswered, while the piano does not provide a definitive answer either. Musically, however, Kusters is certainly right, because at the end, the timbres perfectly conclude the atmosphere of his Winterreise. You can interpret this as you see fit, and that way everyone is satisfied. The audience and your reviewer certainly were, and the duo was rewarded with long and enthusiastic applause. Only after the silence that follows the end of every successful Winterreise does it become clear that the performers have succeeded in bringing Schubert’s (and Müller’s) emotional world impressively close to the listener.