SAMUIL FEINBERG (1890-1962): Incantation, Op. 4/1, Snowy Night, Op. 7/2, In Youthful Indolence, Op. 7/3, My Beloved, Op. 16/2, Three Springs, Op. 26/5, The Burned Letter, Op. 26/7, The Imrisoned Knight, Op. 28/2, The Dream, Op. 28/3, Hebrew Melody, Op. 28/4, The River Sprite, Op. 28/5, No, it's not You I Love so Hotly, Op. 28/6, Onto the Highway, Op. 28/7, Maritsa, Op. 47, We're Living in a Story, Op. 14/1, Beyond the distant mountains she grew up, Op. 14/2, Sapho, When...The Voice of Wind, Op. 14/4/, In vain I hasten onto the heights of Sion, Op. 16/3, Hebrew Melody, Op. 27, Evil.

Description: This recital comprises the bulk of Feinberg's song output, all - astonishingly - receiving their world premiere recordings. Feinberg possesses a remarkable gift for melody, and his complete mastery of the piano shows in accompaniments of the utmost sensitivity, exquisitely judged to provide harmonic and dramatic underpinning to the vocal line. The predominant mood of the songs, and the texts - by some of the greatest Russian poets - that he chose to set, is of that particularly Russian brand of philosophical melancholy, which seems to have matched the nature of the man himself and provided his most natural and eloquent means of expression. The songs for bass include several of unforgettable dramatic intensity; among the mezzo songs are to be found masterpieces of lyrical expression, from the emotionally wrenching Burned Letter to the otherworldly resignation of the final Lermontov setting of Op.28, with its Four Last Songs or Das Lied von der Erde sense of final farewell, to Feinberg's invented folksong style of uncanny authenticity in the Maritsa cycle. English translations. Riitta-Maija Ahonen (mezzo), Sami Luttinen (bass), Christophe Sirodeau (piano).