Susanna Mälkki’s new recordings of Sinfonietta, Op. 23, and “Maeterlinck-Songs” Op. 13 by Alexander Zemlinsky with renowned soprano Petra Lang and the ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien are now available for purchase. Released by Capriccio, the album also includes an incredible never before heard recording from 1992 of the Prelude and Monologue from “Der König Kandaules” conducted by Gerd Albrecht and sung by baritone Siegfried Lorenz. For more information and to purchase and stream the album, click here.
Album description:
“Just heard your wonderful Sinfonietta: hope it is the beginning of your American success,” wrote Arnold Schönberg to Zemlinsky. But Zemlinsky suffered a stroke and died some days later on, lonely in New York. In his Sinfonietta op. 24 (1934), he used again a short theme from the last song of his Maeterlinck-Songs, Op. 13 (1913): “Wohin gehst Du?” (Where are you going?) It’s a theme of ‘self-doubts ‘and ‘Farewell’ when Zemlinsky noticed very carefully the more and more stronger restrictions against the Judaism in Vienna. The Maeterlinck-Songs are “the center of his productivity” (Adorno), and abduct the listeners in a mystic world about life, evanescence, and death.