Vocal Evening II – Jiří Rajniš / Róbert Pechanec

Jiří Rajniš is one of the leading Czech baritones of the younger generation. He has completed his vocal studies in the USA, has established himself on the famous European opera stages and has successfully appeared as a guest at La Scala in Milan. Together with our star pianist Róbert Pechanec, he will perform a selection from the Austrian song repertoire, which will be complemented by a vocal cycle by a Slovak composer on a German text. Brno-born Erich Wolfgang Korngold, author of famous film scores for Hollywood, composed his song cycle So Gott and Papa will to texts by poet Josef von Eichendorff at the age of 14. Much better known are the two song cycles by Gustav Mahler. Five songs based on poems by Friedrich Rückert were composed in 1901/1902 (Mahler also used Rückert's texts in his symphonies). The Boy's Wonder Horn is a monumental collection of German folk poems and songs edited by Clemens Brentano and Achim von Arnim. Gustav Mahler set 24 texts from the collection to music. The cycle Die Niemandslieder (Songs of Nobody) from the pen of Slovak author Jevgeny Irshai was written in 1998 based on the poetry of the eminent German poet Paul Celan.