Reinecke The Wild Swans

[Alan Howe]

...fairy-tale after Hans Christian Andersen for soloists, women's chorus, harp, cello, 2 horns, piano and narrator, forthcoming from cpo:
https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/cpo/detail/-/art/carl-heinrich-reinecke-die-wilden-schwaene/hnum/5434255

[John Boyer]

Did you ever get this?  I picked it up recently, along with the companion recordings of "Sleeping Beauty" (https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/cpo/detail/-/art/Carl-Heinrich-Reinecke-1824-1910-Dornr%F6schen-op-139-M%E4rchen-Dichtung-nach-Heinrich-Carsten/hnum/4465807), "Cinderella", and "The Swineherd" (https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/cpo/detail/-/art/carl-heinrich-reinecke-aschenbroedel/hnum/6096038). 

If you like fairy tales or children's stories, you may find them as charming as I did.  They are very much in the spirit of Schumann's "Pilgrimage of the Rose".  I have a friend who loathed the Schumann precisely because of its child-like character, so curmudgeons and cynics are advised to pass them by.  But if the Rose's story left a tear in your eye, you will find much to enjoy here. 

Because of the heavy reliance on spoken narration one must listen to them with libretto in hand, unless you are fluent in German, but this is no great burden for regular opera-listeners.

I see, too, that as of this writing JPC is offering them at 3 euros each, so they are also a bargain, at least for now.

[Alan Howe]

I probably thought this wasn't my cup of tea...