Four Last Songs              Richard Strauss

Wesendonck Lieder       Richard Wagner

Selected Duets               Franck and Chausson

 

We have through sorrow and joy gone hand in hand;
From our wanderings, let's now rest in this quiet land.

 

Strauss's Four Last Songs are one of his greatest vocal works. Composed a year before his death, they were premiered by Kirsten Flagstad. Strauss's glorious use of colour and texture are on full display in this set which contemplates life and death. 

 

Wagner composed the Wesendonck Lieder while composing Die Walküre. Mathilde Wesendonck, the wife of one of Wagner's patrons, provided the poetry for this cycle. The intensity of Wagner and Mathilde's relationship contributed to the intensity of the first act of Die Walküre and certainly an influence on Mathilde's poems as well.