Elly Ameling - Schubert: Complete Songs, Vol. 7 (1990)

One of the burdens Graham Johnson agreed to shoulder when he took up the challenge to record all of Schubert's songs was that of Schubert's interminable ballades. Although Schubert used up more pages of manuscript writing ballades than any other type of song in his youth, his efforts were often in vain as most of his ballades are dreary melodramas that go on far longer than their slender narratives can bear and even Schubert's lyrical genius has trouble sustaining a song for more than ten minutes. One of the burdens that soprano Elly Ameling agreed to shoulder when she took up the challenge to record a disc in Johnson's Schubert edition was the burden to perform one of Schubert's ballade, the Minona (D. 152). Ameling and Johnson do all they can, but the song is still interminable and one can readily understand why no other singer has ever recorded it. But after Minona finally ends, the rest of Ameling's recital is so fine -- so beautifully sung, so artfully interpreted, so deeply felt -- that one easily overlooks Minoa. Indeed, by the time Ameling reaches the Mignon songs at the end of the disc, the listener is so completely enraptured by her voice that he/she can barely remember Minona. And the Mignon songs themselves are so lovingly sung that listeners will barely remember their own names after it's over. Graham Johnson's proves once again that he is one of the most accomplished accompanists for singers and one of the great writers of program notes.