PROGRAM

Johannes Brahms (1833-1897): Vier ernste Gesänge op. 121
Peter Cornelius (1824-1874): Vater unser op. 2
Gustav Mahler (1860-1911): Kindertotenlieder

Jens Hamann, Baritone
Christian Drengk, Organ

It is a dialogue across time when the searcher for meaning Johannes Brahms, towards the end of his life, chooses biblical words for the composition, which were written down between 300 BC and 50 AD. The fact that Christ is not named here suits the skeptical Brahms. Ultimately, questions were more important to him than traditional and ecclesiastical answers.

The poet-composer Peter Cornelius, who poetically entwines the Lord's Prayer in his own words, is quite different, and then sets the verses to music using the musical motifs of the Gregorian Pater noster. Finally, Gustav Mahler appreciates Friedrich Rückert's highly subjective poetry as "first-hand poetry." As with the other so-called "Rueckert-Lieder", there is a piano and an orchestral version.

The organ was chosen for this recording, which, as a special keyboard instrument, becomes an ideal mediator between the original piano versions of the works and the symphonic sound worlds created in them.