Warm, clean, and tasteful are three words that might describe Swedish singer
Camilla Tilling's lovely voice on this album of
Strauss lieder. Accompanied by an equally excellent pianist,
Paul Rivinius,
Tilling delivers a solid performance on this CD. One senses immediately, from Rote Rosen, how clean and pure her voice is, with a crispness and brightness that is never too crisp or bright.
Tilling's voice has a solid core and a liquid legato that never fails, as is evidenced in Malven or Leises Lied.
Rivinius' piano is fabulous, with careful notes that are playful and tinkling, like in Jung Hexenlied or torrential like in the introduction to Schlechtes Wetter.
Tilling's taste is elegant and her voice never breaks: she always maintains excellent technique through her appropriate phrasing. It is especially exciting to hear her on impassioned pieces like Jung Hexenlied (where she recalls
Diana Damrau) and playful ones like Muttertändelei, and one can only hope for more of this degree of expressivity emotion. Also,
Tilling's range seems, on this album anyhow, somewhat limited, so perhaps her other ventures will lead her into exploring more contrasts in color. There are a few instances where she could go into a darker chest voice in order to accomplish this. But brightness is her strength, and this is particularly evident in Hat gesagt -- bleibt's nicht dabei, where there is also power to her voice. Mein Auge shows off the tremendous focus to her sound, and All' mein Gedanken shows off the best part of her voice, as the tessitura is perfect for her. (Her middle range is so strong that one could conclude that
Tilling is a mezzo-soprano.) The album concludes with the touching Morgen!, in which
Rivinius is joined by violinist
Ulf Wallin. It is aural pleasure to hear the intertwining lines of the piano and violin in the long introduction, and finally
Tilling's soprano enters, beautiful and lyrical. Everything about this CD is high quality, though the sound is on the weak side.