Search - Marianne Pousseur, Jonathan Harvey, Alice Ader :: Henri Pousseur: Dichterliebesreigentraum

Pousseur's Haunting Schumann Dream

James S. Eisenberg | 09/28/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"A number of composers in recent years have artfully deconstructed masterworks of earlier times. I think of Zender's SCHUBERT'S WINTERREISE-A Composed Interpretation and R.Murray Schafer's SON OF HELDENLEBEN, not to mention Schoenberg's arrangements of Bach, Handel and Brahms and Webern's klangfarben orchestration of the Ricercar from Bach's A MUSICAL OFFERING.

Much more extreme is Pousseur's spider's web constructed around Schumann's DICHTERLIEBE. The tunes and the texts (sometimes spoken) of the beloved song cycle are present in the Pousseur work, but they float in fragments in and out of giant waves of polytonal choral and orchestral sound.

Is it a masterpiece in itself ? No, but it haunts and entertains.

This is a fascinating listen, and is superbly recorded."