Spring is still a couple of weeks away, but in San Francisco, it was 70
degrees during the day and in the evening, there was Matthias Goerne.

At his third concert of Schubert song cycles this week in Herbst Theater,
the German baritone outdid his formidable self and sang an exceptional,
memorable "Winterreise."

It was a stunning 75-minute performance, with pauses of only a couple
of seconds between the 24 songs, and without a glass of water anywhere
in sight.  Goerne's warm, seductive voice caressed, moved, enchanted.
Ruth Felt's San Francisco Performances scored big once again, featuring
a great artist at his best.

With a simple, straightforward interpretation of this winter's journey
of yearning, sadness, disappointment, resignation, Goerne miraculously
conveyed a feeling of comfort and "good pain," tears of relief.

Thinking, breathing and pouring out the music as one with pianist Eric
Schneider, Goerne ameliorated "Numbness" (Erstarrung") and the "Torrent"
of tears ("Wasserflut") with the sheer beauty of the voice, thrilling
legato, and selfless sincerity.

Unlike his approach on Tuesday to "Die schone Mullerin" - uniform (and
gorgeous) slow tempi and quiet singing - Goerne's "Winterreise" had a
dynamic range almost in excess - in fact, too much in "Rast" ("Rest").

At times, the voice rang out in a "helden-lieder" manner, it danced in
the waltz-like "Tauschung" ("Deception"), whispered to greet darkness
in "Die Nebensonnen" ("The Phantom Suns"), made the exceptionally
well-behaved audience hold its breath (and coughs), and came across numb,
frozen in the concluding "Der Leiermann" ("The Organ-Grinder").

Schneider's performance was equally thrilling.  Just as Goerne, the
pianist is completely dedicated to the music, communicating deeply-felt
phrases superbly.  There are no individual notes in evidence in Schneider's
playing, only long lines, entire songs.

Once again, the outstanding English translation went uncredited in the
program, but http://www.recmusic.org/lieder/merge.cgi?47 makes it clear
that it's the work of Emily Ezust, just as skillful and effective as the
two performers were tonight.

Janos Gereben/SF
www.sfcv.org
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