Drei Lieder

Aribert Reimann frequently selects texts for his works which appear to revolve around a particular motif: intermediate states, the ‘not yet’ and the ‘no longer’. He discovered the three poems for his tripartite lied cycle among the works of Edgar Allan Poe: Silence, Dreamland and To-, all written between 1829 und 1844. Reimann set these three texts respectively as a recitative, a large-scale song and a brief epilogue. He employs the orchestra in a variety of ways, repeatedly reducing the forces to chamber music dimensions right down to a duet. The broad technical and expressive spectrum of the Drei Lieder requires a lyrical and dramatic coloratura soprano.