With recent albums by Schumann, Dvorak, and songs of Argentina, Bernarda Fink has been making quite a showing. And no wonder—her vast expressive capabilities, sense of phrasing as related to the words and music, and balanced vocal range all serve to propel her into the front rank of lieder interpreters today, an age where lieder has been enjoying somewhat of a comeback. And this is not to even mention her vastly successful operatic career.
Brahms can be a fickle composer, often revealing his secrets to only those willing to take the time to explore the many nuanced varieties of expression he puts into his vocal music. Mere technique, though mandatory, is not enough. And even a singer with obvious interpretative gifts, and perhaps fairly accommodating to other composers, sometimes fails when faced with Brahms. Part of the reason lies in the inability of certain artists to fully understand the Brahmsian notion of resignation—this trait draws its sheltered and lonely lines all through the composer’s output, but never more intensely as in the songs, a place where the many times reluctant composer would share traces of his rarely isolated life with the public at large. Not all of his songs are these melancholy worlds, of course; but even Brahms in his happiest moments sees clouds on the horizon.
Fink does realize this, and portrays the songs accordingly. She does not linger as much as say, the genius of Elly Ameling, whose 1990 Hyperion album of many of these same songs is one of the treasures of my collection. Ameling would whisper these songs in your ear with perfect diction and a mother’s understanding, a sort of old world comfort that seems foreign to today’s more vigorous and less sentimental lieder singers. Fink is an internationalist, one who has seen the world and seeks to set the Brahms corpus in a more universal setting. Both approaches have validity, and I would hate to be without either.
Harmonia mundi has given Bernarda some wonderful acoustics, nicely resonant and tonally opulent. She is proving herself one of the premier storytellers of our time—and there is no good lieder artist who is not a storyteller first—and this album is the latest milestone in what should be a long and fruitful career in the genre. Her dark vocalizing is especially appropriate for this music, so make sure you take your cholesterol medication before listening! And did I mention the first-rate accompanying prowess of Roger Vignoles?
— Steven Ritter
