Sieben Lehmannlieder

On July 16,1994, the Music Academy Festival Orchestra, under the direction of Catherine Comet, presented the West Coast premiere of Sieben Lehmannlieder, the orchestrated version of the lieder cycle based on poems written by Lotte Lehmann. Soprano Patricia Prunty sang. Ms. Prunty is a 1989 Academy alumna and a rising operatic star.

The original version of Sieben Lehmannlieder premiered at the Music Academy in 1988 with Judith Beckmann, soprano, and Mr. Pasatieri at the piano.

Longtime Lehmann admirer Mrs. Richard H. Hellmann funded both the Academy's commission of Pasatieri to set the Lehmann poems to music and its subsequent orchestration. The world premiere of the orchestral version took place in 1992 with former Academy Music Director Lawrence Leighton Smith leading the Louisville Orchestra.

Mrs. Hellmann has also commissioned a voice and piano score for the Sieben Lehmannlieder. It is published by and available from Theodore Presser, One Presser Place, Bryn Mawr, PA 19010, Attention Jennie Clymer, Reference Scoring 411-41091. The price was $16.50 and includes a photo of Lehmann as a frontispiece to the score.

The poems come from a small paperbound edition of Lehmann's poetry, Lotte Lehmann Gedichte, privately printed in 1969 by Rudolf Reischl OHG, Salzburg. —JS

From the Santa Barbara News-Press Review

Commentary from Hillary Hausers July 20, 1994 review of the Sieben Lehmannlieder.

Pasatieri has said that when he wrote the music for Lehmann's poems, the diva's silver voice was "in (his) ear," and that he continualIy thought of the music she was so known for—Mahler [LL not known for Mahler. —GH], Schubert, Strauss. Judging by Saturday night's performance, Pasatieri has beautifully and successfully mixed a wondrous brew of all these composers.... With the spirit of Lotte Lehmann hovering about (and rendering expectations high). soprano Patricia Prunty stepped into the thick of all this with deserved confidence, instantly dazzling her listeners with a truly lovely, crystalline reading of "Ich bin allein auf Bergesgipfeln" ("I am alone on the mountain peaks"), then graduating to the ultra-romantic heartfelt pleadings of "Wie lieb' ich diese klare Stunde" ("How I love this clear hour"). Then she took her listeners to points beyond—a somber lament in "So hort' ich wieder deiner Stimme Ton" ("Thus I heard again the sound of your voice"), which ended in a quietly riveting, long, long held note in "Um einen toten Traum" (..."for a dead dream")... her emotional and technical capacities seemed boundless... Her capacity for rage and grief emerged in "In Flammen starb dein Bild" ("Your image died in flames..."), and subsided in the slow lament of "Wie schön ist dieser tiefe Schlummer" ("How lovely is this deep slumber"). In "Narcissus" she went dark and mad, reaching a tremendous crescendo and sudden, stunning fortissimo cut-off at the end that rendered her listeners breathless. The seventh, and last, song, "Die Welt scheint ganz aus Glut gesponnen" ("The world appears entirely spun of light") seemed to serve as a showcase for the soprano's abilities for tragic heroine roles, "Elektra" style. . . .