Search - Richard Strauss, Mitsuko Shirai, Hartmut Holl :: Strauss: Ausgewaehlte Lieder

A great many Strauss lieder, done with radiant enthusiasm

Santa Fe Listener | Santa Fe, NM USA | 01/09/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Mitsuko Shirai pithces herself into every song here with radiant tone and inner fervor. That's how it should be in Strauss, whose default mode was rapture. It can get to be too much of a good thing--there are fully 27 lieder here, including almost all the greatest hits (Morgen, Zueignung, Allerseelen). It's like a diet of lavender and honey.



Not all listeners will take immediately to Shirai's mezzo, which is in very good shape here in 1993-94 when the singer was in her early forties. Her throaty tone tends to be a bit matronly and shiny bright at the same time. She certainly doesn't have a standard German voice, but then Shirai is the leading (and only?) Japanese lieder specialist in the world. One can udnerstand why she has a host of loyal fans--nothing here is less than deeply committed and intense. Her then-husband, Hartmut Holl, accompanies superbly, and the recorded sound is fine."