Schubert: Die Nacht Anja Lechner & Pablo Márquez

• Friedrich Burgmüller (1806 - 1874): 3 Nocturnes for Cello and Guitar:
• 1 Burgmüller: Nocturne No. 1 in A Minor - Andantino 03:37
• Franz Schubert (1797 - 1828):
• 2 Schubert: Nacht und Träume, Op. 43 No. 2, D. 827 (Arr. for Cello and Guitar by Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez) 02:46
• Friedrich Burgmüller: 3 Nocturnes for Cello and Guitar
• 3 Burgmüller: Nocturne No. 3 in C Major - Allegro moderato 02:20
• Franz Schubert:
• 4 Schubert: Die Nacht (Arr. for Cello and Guitar by Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez) 02:23
• Winterreise, D. 911:
• 5 Schubert: 24. Der Leiermann (Arr. for Cello and Guitar by Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez) 03:58
• Sonata for Arpeggione and Piano in A Minor, D. 821:
• 6 Schubert: 1. Allegro moderato (Arr. for Cello and Guitar by Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez) 12:45
• 7 Schubert: 2. Adagio (Arr. for Cello and Guitar by Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez) 04:05
• 8 Schubert: 3. Allegretto (Arr. for Cello and Guitar by Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez) 09:39
• 9 Schubert: Fischerweise, Op. 96 No. 4, D. 881 (Arr. for Cello and Guitar by Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez) 02:23
• 10 Schubert: Meeres Stille, Op. 3 No. 2, D. 216 (Arr. for Cello and Guitar by Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez) 02:01
• Friedrich Burgmüller: 3 Nocturnes for Cello and Guitar
• 11 Burgmüller: Nocturne No. 2 in F Major - Adagio cantabile 03:44
• Franz Schubert: Rosamunde, D. 797:
• 12 Schubert: 3b. Romanze. Der Vollmond strahlt auf Bergeshöh’n (Arr. for Cello and Guitar by Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez) 02:31
• Friedrich Burgmüller: 3 Nocturnes for Cello and Guitar
• 13 Burgmüller: Nocturne No. 1 in A Minor - Andantino 03:34
• Total Runtime 55:46

Info for Schubert: Die Nacht

German cellist Anja Lechner and Argentinean guitarist Pablo Márquez met in 2003 and have since explored the most diverse repertoire and modes of expression in their concerts. For their first duo album, a conceptual context is provided by the strong tradition of songs with guitar accompaniment prevalent in 19th century Vienna, as Lechner and Márquez play some of Schubert’s most beloved songs (including Die Nacht, Nacht und Träume and Der Leiermann), elegantly framing the album’s centrepiece: Schubert’s expansive ‘Arpeggione’ sonata. Many of Schubert’s songs were published in alternative versions with guitar during the composer’s lifetime; in some cases, the guitar version appeared even before the one for piano. Interspersed on the recording, as an echo and commentary to Schubert’s spirit and language, are the graceful Trois Nocturnes originally written for cello and guitar by Friedrich Burgmüller (1806-1874). Die Nacht is issued as Lechner and Márquez embark on a European tour with concerts in Germany, Austria, France, Hungary and Romania.

“Art does not reproduce the visible but rather makes things visible.” This statement of Paul Klee’s, from his Creative Confession of 1920, is valid not only as a watchword of modernity; for the Romantics, too, stirred themselves to render visible what is often hidden from us, appearing at most as an emotion.

Schubert’s music offers a particular instance. His works poeticize whatever is real, allowing reality to become dream and , by means of music, the dream of a better world to become reality. All that is earthly is metamorphosed into a function of soul and spirit. Themes such as night, aloneness, silence and longing are the fundamental leanings not just of the composer’s songs but of his soundscapes generally.

For the cellist Anja Lechner, Schubert’s music has been an aesthetic lodestar since childhood, when she became familiar with the songs and piano works in the parental home.

From the early 1990s on, the Rosamunde Quartett, of which she was a founding member, delved deeply into Schubert´s quartets and late quintet alongside a spectrum of repertoire from Haydn to the modern day. Since the quartet disbanded in 2009, she has made a name for presenting programmes that bridge styles and cultures, numerous composers entrusting her with the first performances of their works.

For Die Nacht she has returned to her early passion: the music of Schubert. Completely in the spirit of the composer, whose compositions were to be performed principally in private among friends, she and the Argentinian guitarist Pablo Márquez have recorded a programme that gives the feeling of a musical dialogue taking place in Schubert’s house.

Playing song accompaniments on the quieter guitar instead of the piano, strengthens the impression of intimate music-making. Moreover, singing to the guitar was a widespread practice in the 19th century. Some of Schubert´s songs, who also played the guitar, were, already during his lifetime, published in arrangements for the instrument. The song arrangements in the present recording (with the exception of ‘Der Leiermann’ and the Romance from Rosamunde, which Anja Lechner and Pablo Márquez have themselves newly transcribed) come from manuscripts found in the collection of the Bohemian poet Franz Xaver Schlechta von Wschehrd, who belonged, together with Franz von Schober and the brothers Spaun, to the innermost circle of Schubert’s friends.

At the centre of the recording, alongside five songs and the romance, stands the Sonata in A minor, D. 821, originally written for, and subsequently named after, the arpeggione. Almost forgotten today, this instrument, often referred to as a guitar d’amour or bowed guitar, is customarily replaced by the cello, and is so here, while the transparent piano part has been subtly arranged for guitar. Three nocturnes, originally composed for the cello/guitar combination by a Schubert contemporary, Friedrich Burgmüller, add a gentle echo to the music of Schubert.

The album is Anja’s Lechner first purely classical recording since that of Haydn’s Seven Last Words, Hob. XX:2, with the Rosamunde Quartet in 2001.

Anja Lechner, violoncello
Pablo Márquez, guitar

Anja Lechner
performs as soloist with leading orchestras, as a chamber musician, and as creative participant in diverse projects between the genres. Composers who have written music for her range from Tigran Mansurian, Valentin Silvestrov, Tõnu Kõrvits, Hooshyar Khayam, Zad Moultaka to Dino Saluzzi.

The range of her musical interests is reflected in more than twenty albums for ECM Records.

Her recent releases include Quasi Parlando, music of Tigran Mansurian, with violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja and the Amsterdam Sinfonietta, Mirrors, music of Tõnu Kõrvits, whose compositions she has premiered with the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra and the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir under Tõnu Kaljuste, and Lontano, featuring Lechner’s duo with French pianist Francois Couturier playing music of Giya Kancheli, Anouar Brahem, Ariel Ramirez beside their own music. Lechner and Couturier also collaborate in the Tarkovsky Quartet, with their third ECM album Nuit Blanche.

Lechner was a founding member of the Rosamunde Quartet, with whom she worked for 18 years until the group’s dissolution in 2009, playing on major international stages and at chamber music festivals.

Since 1998, she collaborates with Argentine bandoneon master Dino Saluzzi.

This season 2021/22, Anja Lechner is presenting old and new music for solo cello from J. S. Bach to Valentin Silvestrov, and improvising. She is touring with guitarist Pablo Márquez, playing music by Franz Schubert from their latest ECM album Die Nacht, and the duo Lechner/Couturier is presenting their new program Lontano.

Anja Lechner grew up in Neubeuern am Inn and studied with Heinrich Schiff and János Starker.

Booklet for Schubert: Die Nacht