Swan Song

The significant composers of the Romantic period almost entirely ignored the flute as a solo or chamber music instrument. It’s for this reason that any historical adaptations of works suitable for the flute by these composers are regarded as an extremely welcome enrichment to the repertoire. In this case, violinist and composer Leopold Jansa – who was amongst Vienna’s leading music personalities in the first half of the 19th century – took the songs of his contemporary Franz Schubert and arranged them for flute and piano “after Fr. Liszt’s adaptation”. As in the adaptation of Schubert’s Winterreise [Winter journey] for flute and piano (Zimmermann ZM 35060), Jansa also remains close to Schubert’s original at the beginning of the ten selected swansongs and tastefully modifies the subsequent verses with embellishments which allude to Franz Liszt’s piano adaptations.