Schubert: Schwanengesang

Schubert’s Schwanengesang, completed just weeks before his early death, speaks of desolation and the often unbearable weight of the world. The song cycle’s dark-hued themes inspired tenor Ian Bostridge and pianist Lars Vogt to expose their innermost feelings about life’s short span in a performance recorded at Wigmore Hall in November 2021. Many in their audience knew of Vogt’s cancer diagnosis but none knew that he would die just 10 months later. The passing in middle age of a musician of such stature—and a man of the utmost decency—lends an extra poignancy to this recording, as if fate determined that it should be Vogt’s swansong. The duo worked together for more than a decade, during which they grew close as artists and friends. “I will miss Lars a lot,” Bostridge tells Apple Music. “I’ve learnt so much from him in a way that’s difficult to put into words. It’s something you only feel when you’re rehearsing and performing with somebody. I was lucky to spend a week at his festival in Heimbach last year. It was such a beautiful thing. Here were these people who’d grown up making music together, and I didn’t feel like an outsider. I just felt like I was joining in. His approach to sharing and communicating was almost unique.” Schubert’s close integration of voice and piano calls for interpreters of his songs to engage in deep listening in rehearsal and performance. Bostridge recalls how Vogt might suggest an idea about a particular piece that would seem strange or even impossible. “Sometimes it would work and sometimes I’d feel, ‘Oh, I can’t really manage that.’ He wanted to play ‘Die Stadt’ from Schwanengesang in a very particular way. We weren’t sure about it at first. So, we experimented, listened to each other and found something that worked for both of us in the end.” Age and experience are arguably even more important than the listening ear when it comes to lifting Schwanengesang off the page. Ian Bostridge, in his mid-fifties at the time of recording the w