Lunchtime Opening Recital:

Carolyn Sampson and Joseph Middleton

Saturday 5 April 2025

This event has passed.

We regret to inform you that Patricia Nolz has sustained a serious injury this week performing at the Vienna Staatsoper, and she cannot travel. We wish her all the best for a speedy recovery. We are indebted to Carolyn Sampson who has kindly agreed to step in at short notice and give the opening recital of the 2025 Festival.

Familiar to audiences around the globe, Carolyn was Gramophone Magazine’s Artist of the Year last year and was also honoured with an OBE for her extraordinary dedication to music. Carolyn and her longtime collaborator Joseph Middleton will perform their “Album für Die Frau – scenes from the Schumanns’ Lieder”, which is based on Frauenliebe und Leben.

Price

£15, £13 (unwaged/disabled)

Start time
1pm

Duration
1 hour

Programme

Album für die Frau – Eight scenes from the Lieder of Robert and Clara Schumann

Carolyn Sampson soprano
Joseph Middleton piano

 

Prologue

Langsam und mit Ausdruck zu spielen
from Album für die Jugend Op. 68
Liebst du um Schönheit Op. 12 No. 2

Since first seeing him

Seit ich ihn gesehen
from Frauenliebe und – leben Op. 42
Volksliedchen Op. 51 No. 2 
Liebeszauber Op. 13 No. 3

He, the most wonderful of all

Er, der Herrlichste von allen
from Frauenliebe und -leben Op. 42
An einem lichten Morgen
from 6 Lieder aus Jucunde Op. 23
Warum willst du and’re fragen Op. 12 No. 3

I cannot grasp it or believe it

Ich kann’s nicht fassen, nicht glauben
from Frauenliebe und -leben Op. 42
Die stille Lotosblume Op. 13 No. 6

You, ring on my finger

Du Ring an meinem Finger
from Frauenliebe und -leben Op. 42
Lied der Braut I • Lied der Braut II
From Myrthen Op. 25
Glückes genug
from Kinderszenen Op. 15

Help me, my sisters

Helft mir, ihr Schwestern
from Frauenliebe und – leben Op. 42
Die Lotosblume
from Myrthen Op. 25
Lust der Sturmnacht
from Kerner Lieder Op. 35 (1840)

 

Sweet friend, you look at me in wonder

Süsser Freund, du blickest
from Frauenliebe und -leben Op. 42
Hochländisches Wiegenlied
from Myrthen Op. 25

Der Sandmann
from Lieder-Album für die Jugend Op. 79
Kind im Einschlummern
from Kinderszenen Op. 15

 

On my heart, on my breast

An meinem Herzen, an meiner Brust
from Frauenliebe und -leben Op. 42
Ritter vom Steckenpferd
from Kinderszenen Op. 15
Dein Angesicht Op. 127 No. 2

Now you have caused me my first pain

Nun hast du mir den ersten Schmerz getan
from Frauenliebe und -leben Op. 42
Requiem
from 6 Gedichte von N Lenau und Requiem Op. 90

Postlude

Winterzeit I
from Album für die Jugend Op. 68

 

For the first four years of their marriage, Robert and Clara Schumann kept a joint diary, a project which Robert described as ‘a record of our wishes and our hopes, and the means whereby we may convey to one another any requests we may have to make, for which words may not suffice…’

In the imaginative recital Album für die Frau, Carolyn Sampson and Joseph Middleton combine songs and piano solos by both composers into something similar – the depiction of a relationship seen through the eyes of both parties. Using the eight songs from Robert’s song cycle Frauenliebe und –leben to poems by Adalbert von Chamisso as the framework, they add songs as well as some piano solos in order to create a fuller and more complex picture. The result seems to suggest that the experiences of our ‘Frau’ are richer than Chamisso and Robert Schumann imagined: while love, marriage and motherhood dominated much of Clara Schumann’s life, Robert’s death in 1856 signalled the start of a four-decade widowhood during which she resumed her stellar career as a pianist.

Leeds Lieder Festival 2025

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Lunchtime Opening Recital: Carolyn Sampson and Joseph Middleton
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