Mezzo-soprano Kitty Whately trained at Chetham's School of Music, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and the International Opera School of the Royal College of Music. Having won both the Kathleen Ferrier Award and Royal Overseas League Award in the same year, she attended the prestigious Academy of the Verbier Festival. She writes of this project: 'It has been my great pleasure to record with Joseph once again. We have long shared a mutual passion for early-twentieth-century-romantic Lieder and talked of making a disc including songs by Mahler and Strauss. The opportunity to discover and research lesser-known composers from their era has been thrilling and fascinating. As the world endured the pandemic, we all experienced fear and danger and loss in a way that most of our generation never did before, on such a global scale. Joseph and I felt drawn to reflect on grief, mortality, and bereavement.' The two lesser-known composers featured in the recording are Johanna MÃ¼ller-Hermann (who studied with several of the most prominent teachers in Vienna - Josef Labor, Guido Adler, Alexander Zemlinsky, Josef Bohuslav Foerster, Franz Schmidt) and Margarete Schweikert, who's upbringing and life in Karlsruhe and studies with Joseph Haas in Stuttgart could hardly provide a greater contrast - clearly audible in their music.

Tracklist:

Zusammen sterben
Unser Haus
Kindertotenlieder for Middle Voice and Piano~
Nun will die Sonn' so hell aufgeh'n!. Langsam und schwermÃ¼tig, nicht schleppend - Bewegter - Tempo I

UPC: 095115217726
Label: Chandos
Release Date: 2.10.23
Format: CD

Mahler / Whately / Middleton - Befreit - A Soul Surrendered (CD)