Christa Ludwig: The Complete Recitals on Warner Classics (11CD)

"How sun sounds like sun and rain sounds like rain": Christa Ludwig's collected recitals on the occasion of her 90th birthday "Just as Lotte Lenya sings the songs of Brecht and Weill, you must sing the classical song repertoire": Christa Ludwig once received this advice from legendary producer Walter Legge, with whom she would work on a huge discography beginning in the 1950s that included opera as well as a wealth of piano and orchestral songs - such as the legendary recording of Mahler's Lied von der Erde. Now, on the occasion of the artist's 90th birthday on March 16, 2018, all Warner Recitals with legendary Schubert, Schumann, Brahms and Mahler recordings will be released - in state-of-the-art remastering based on the original tapes and with several first releases such as CD premieres. Even Ludwig connoisseurs will be delighted to hear recordings of famous songs by Schubert, Wolf, Reger and Berg that have never been heard before. Also never before released on record: Wagner's "Im Treibhaus" from the Wesendonck Lieder under Sir Adrian Boult and the world-famous "Silent Night, Holy Night." A recital with her first husband, bass-baritone Walter Berry, is being released in its entirety on CD for the first time, showing Christa Ludwig as a humorous, tongue-in-cheek songstress. Another CD premiere is the Brahms recital with her "true love" Leonard Bernstein at the piano - live from Vienna in 1972. In the booklet, the artist, who took her stage farewell in 1994 after a world career, illuminates stages of her artistic life in a topical interview. In it, producer Walter Legge reveals himself as a special mentor: "He taught me how sun sounds like sun and rain sounds like rain."