If you have visited the Alte Nationalgalerie in Berlin, you may have stopped before the painting illustrating this article, Im Etappenquartier vor Paris [In the Troops' Quarters outside Paris], an oil on canvas painted by Anton von Werner in 1894. Eight soldiers of different ranks gather in a relatively small space, from the orderly who lights the fire to those who sit casually in the armchairs, probably those of higher rank.

My dearest, happy new year! The new brand calendar has many musical ephemerides, and probably the most significant for us, liedlovers, is related to Hugo Wolf: 22 February marks 120 years since his death. I hope that the anniversary will help to spread his magnificent work, which is not yet sufficiently well known; I also hope that here on Liederabend, his presence would be even [...]

Herod waited for the Kings to come back and tell him where the child he feared was, but they had also been warned in a dream and returned home on another path. Then the furious King of Judea ordered to kill all the children of Bethlehem and the surrounding area younger than two years. Today, December 28 (if you read this on the day it's published) commemorates the [...]

It's Christmas week and, as usual on Liederabend, we start a series of three posts (short posts because we all are busy enough these days) with three songs about Christmas.

After giving several concerts in 1848 and 1849, Johannes Brahms left his career as a solo pianist to focus on composition; in the following years he devoted himself to it intensively and in 1853 began publishing some of his works. The first two were two sonatas, and the third, a collection of six Lieder, the first of which was very successful. A success that has survived until now [...]