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专辑简介

Following their albums \”A Soprano\’s Schubertiade\” and \”Elysium,\” Carolyn Sampson and Joseph Middleton present a new recital dedicated to Schubert\’s songs on the theme of the changing seasons. There have been other successful musical homages to the four seasons, but Franz Schubert, a lover of nature, evokes them here in his songs. Winter, steeped in nostalgia, is represented here by three songs in which Schubert\’s hero sings of lost love. But the gloomy thoughts soon give way to spring, which symbolizes optimism and hope as nature springs back to life: \’Welcome, with your merry swarm of newly awakened creatures around me.\’ With life in full swing in summer, the hero now seems unsure whether his search for love will have a happy ending. In autumn, evoked here through six songs, the hero can only acknowledge his failure, reflected in nature preparing for months of sleep: \’Ah, as the stars in the sky vanish, so vanishes the hope of life.\’ Clarinetist Michael Collins accompanies the duo in one song, \”The Shepherd on the Rock,\” Schubert\’s penultimate composition. This yodeling-inspired, extended song ends with the hope of a better life, as spring is just around the corner, and the prophetic words, \’Now I prepare to go on my wanderings,\’ herald the composer\’s approaching death.