Singer Benjamin Appl’s solo concert

 

 

German Baritone Benjamin Appl has been called the best Lieder singer among the young generation of artists (Gramophone Magazine). He had the good fortune to study with the greatest 20th century master of this genre, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau; Appl was his last student. Appl is “a compelling storyteller, alive to the smallest flickers of humor or pathos in a text” (The Spectator). “The voice has a burnished, oaky beauty as well as considerable sweetness, while the interpretations are suffused with a gentle intelligence, an instinct for unforced but direct communication and what feels like a real love for the repertoire.” (Gramophone).

 

Appl, along with pianist Simon Lepper, will present Heimat (Homeland), a programme whose motifs come from the vocal chamber music of composers from various eras writing about their homeland, leaving to join the wide world, and the ensuing longing for their roots. About the circle of life which none of us can escape.

 

Concert programme:
Franz SCHUBERT Seligkeit (Hölty) D 433
Max REGER Des Kindes Gebet (Rafael) op 76 no 22
Franz SCHUBERT Freude der Kinderjahre (Leitner) D 455
Johannes BRAHMS Wiegenlied (Volkslied) op 49 no 4
Franz SCHUBERT Der Einsame (Lappe) D800
Johannes BRAHMS Mondnacht (Eichendorff) op 3 no 5
Franz SCHREKER Waldeinsamkeit (Arnold)
Johannes BRAHMSMein Mädel hat einen Rosenmund (Volkslied)
Richard STRAUSS Allerseelen (Gilm) op 10 no 8
Franz SCHUBERT Nachtstück (Mayrhofer) D672
Franz SCHUBERT Drang in die Ferne (Leitner) D 770
Franz SCHUBERT Der Wanderer an den Mond (Seidl) D870
Adolf STRAUSS Ich weiß bestimmt, ich wird’ dich wiedersehen (Hift)
Franz SCHUBERT Das Heimweh (Hell) D 456
Franz SCHUBERT Der Wanderer (Schmidt) D489
Francis POULENC Hyde Park (Apollinaire) FP 127 no 2
Banjamin BRITTEN Greensleeves (folk song)
Ralph VAUGHAN WILLIAMS Silent Noon (Rosetti)
Henry Rowley BISHOP Home, sweet home (Payne)
Peter WARLOCK My own country (Belloc)
Peter WARLOCK The Bachelor (Anonymous)
John IRELAND If there were dreams to sell (Beddoes)
Edvard GRIEG Sechs deutsche Lieder op 48

Described as ‘the current front-runner in the new generation of Lieder singers’ (Gramophone Magazine, UK), Benjamin Appl, Gramophone Award Young Artist of the Year 2016, was a BBC New Generation Artist from 2014-16 and was also a Wigmore Hall Emerging Artist and ECHO Rising Star for the 2015-16 season. He became an exclusive SONY Classical recording artist in 2016 and his first solo album of German and English song for Sony Classical, ‘Heimat’, won the prestigious Prix Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (Best Lieder Singer) at the 2017/18 Académie du Disque Lyrique Orphées d’Or.

 

The 2018-19 season will see Benjamin Appl make his professional recital debut in the USA, with a tour including performances at Park Avenue Armory, New York and the Phillips Collection, Washington DC. Mr. Appl will appear in concert with the NHK Symphony Orchestra under Paavo Järvi, the Philharmonia Orchestra, Concerto Köln, the Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie, and the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, alongside recital appearances at Wigmore Hall, the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, Oxford Lieder Festival, and Schubertiade Hohenems. He will sing the role of Aeneas in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Sir Roger Norrington, and will give a performance of Mahler and Bernstein at the Osaka Castle Hall in Japan, broadcast by MBS TV. His new Sony Classical recording, ‘Bach’ with Concerto Köln, is due for release in September 2018.

 

With concerts taking place in the historic cities of Riga and Jurmala, the Riga Jurmala Music Festival features four weekends throughout the summer. A leading international orchestra and conductor anchor each weekend, offering a range of symphonic concerts and recitals that feature leading stars and young up-and-coming talent.