WILHELM KILLMAYER (b.1927): 5 Romanzen, 8 Bagatelles, ROBERT SCHUMANN (1810-1856): 3 Romanzen, Op. 94, 5 Stücke im Volkston, Op. 102.

Description: Killmayer's idiom is very tonal, though in a progressive, rather than reactionary, conservative sense. In practice, what this means is that although tonal centers are always in evidence, harsh dissonances and some more modern techniques (occasional vocalizations, drumming on the bodies of the instruments) are not precluded. Thus for instance in the fourth Romance, what starts out sounding like a Schumannesque pastiche is interrupted by passages involving 'Bartók pizzicati' and wild (but always controlled) glissandi. This ingenious amalgam of 19th-century tonality and contemporary techniques is also very much in evidence in the Bagatelles, which also cast a knowing, late-20th-century eye over Romantic-era nostalgia, leading to a slightly off-kilter, highly expressive vocabulary with an attractive, instantly accessible surface and darker, more ambiguous psychological depths - much like Schumann is his own time, making the coupling on this CD especially appropriate. Nicolas Altstaedt (cello), José Gallardo (piano).