Throughout history men have feared madwomen, burning them as witches, confining them in asylums and subjecting them to psychoanalysis - yet, they have also been fascinated, unable to resist fantasizing about them. For their new release, Carolyn Sampson and Joseph Middleton have created a programme that explores the responses of a variety of composers to women whose stories have left them vulnerable and exposed. As a motto they have chosen an aphorism by Nietzsche: 'There is always some madness in love, but there is also always some reason in madness.' Brahms' Ophelia Songs, composed for a stage production of Hamlet, appear next to those by Richard Strauss and Chausson, while Ophelia's death is described by both Schumann (in Herzeleid) and Saint-Saëns. Goethe's mysterious and traumatized Mignon appears in settings by Hugo Wolf as well as Duparc, while his ill-used Gretchen grieves by her spinning-wheel in Schubert's matchless setting. Sadness and madness tip into witchery and unbridled eroticism with Pierre Louÿs's poems about Bilitis, set by Kœchlin and Debussy. Sampson and Middleton end their recital as it began, with a suicide by drowning: in Poulenc's monologue La Dame de Monte-Carlo, the elderly female protagonist has been unlucky at the gambling tables and decides to throw herself into the sea.
No.4 from 5 Ophelia-Lieder, WoO 22 1 Sie trugen ihn auf der Bahre bloss 0'54 2 Herzeleid, Op. 107 No. 1 1'43 Drei Lieder der Ophelia, Op.67 3 Erstes Lied der Ophelia: Wie erkenn ich mein Treulieb vor andern nun 2'23 4 Zweites Lied der Ophelia: Guten Morgen, ’s ist Sankt Valentinstag 1'05 5 Drittes Lied der Ophelia: Sie trugen ihn auf der Bahre bloss 3'38 6 Hymne à Astarté 1'48 Chansons de Bilitis, L 97 7 I. La Flûte de Pan 2'50 8 II. La Chevelure 3'35 9 III. Le Tombeau des naïades 2'51 10 Épitaphe de Bilitis 3'36 11 Romance de Mignon 4'26 Mignon-Lieder 12 Kennst Du das Land 6'18 13 Heiß mich nicht reden 3'39 14 Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt 2'01 15 So lasst mich scheiden, bis ich werde 3'38 16 Gretchen am Spinnrade, D 118 3'40 17 Mädchenlied, Op. 107 No. 5 1'39 18 Die Spinnerin, Op. 107 No. 4 1'18 19 La mort d’Ophélie 3'10 20 Chanson d’Ophélie 1'35 21 5 Ophelia-Lieder, WoO 22 4'00 Au pays ou se fait la guerre 22 Au pays où se fait la guerre 5'04 23 La Dame de Monte-Carlo 7'15
