Robert & Clara: Stephan Loges & Jocelyn Freeman at SongEasel

Stephan Loges at a SongEasel recital on 22 June 2025 (Photo: Kate Kantur)

Robert & Clara: songs by Clara Schumann & Robert Schumann including Liederkreis, Op. 39; Stephan Loges, Jocelyn Freeman; SongEasel at St Matthew’s Church
Reviewed 27 June 2025

An evening of intimate lieder in Elephant & Castle, intertwining songs by Robert & Clara Schumann including his complete Eichendorff Liederkreis

For its latest season, Jocelyn Freeman‘s SongEasel has been filling South East London with song, bringing distinguished artists such as Helen Charlston, Sholto Kynoch, Juliane Banse and James Gilchrist to give recitals in local venues.

On Friday 27 June 2025 it was the turn of St Matthew’s Church, Elephant and Castle, a modern hall-church that is home to a bilingual (Spanish and English-speaking) Church of England congregation. Bass-baritone Stephan Loges (SongEasel’s artist in residence for this season) was joined at the piano by Jocelyn Freeman. The focus of these concerts has been Robert and Clara Schumann, including performing Robert’s major song-cycles from 1840 and all of Clara’s songs. 

For this recital, the first half alternated Clara and Robert’s songs, picking up on the themes present in Robert Schumann’s Eichendorff Liederkreis which formed the second part of the evening.

We began with three Clara Schumann songs. Das Veilchen (setting Goethe) was a late song from 1853. Strophic, Loges really brought out the narrative using his resonant bass-baritone to make the words count, but then in the final verse when the violet is trampled by the young girl, Clara’s music moves away from the norm. Der Abenstern was quiet and intense, almost confiding, whilst the Justinus Kerner setting Der Wanderer in der Sägemühle seemed to begin as simply story telling with a vivid piano, yet it did not go where we expected in musical terms and ended up rather in the air.

We continued with the poet Justinus Kerner with three of Robert’s settings from his Kernerlieder. Wanderlied began all vivid vigour and swaggering before a change of mood to something calmer and more confiding, but Robert repeats the first verse, bringing back the original mood. Erstes Grün was gentler and more intense, but this was still strong stuff, leading to Sehnsucht nach der Waldgegend where the longing was dark and sober with a chorale-like melody over flowing piano, becoming more expansive in the middle.

Back to Clara with two songs from her Sechs Lieder, Op. 13 and the one of her songs from Liebesfrühling, the Rückert sequence she wrote jointly with Robert. Ich hab’ in deinem Auge, setting Rückert, was ingratiating yet not without passion, whilst Sie liebten sich beide, setting Heine, was sober yet intense with a rather poignant piano part. Finally, we returned to Rückert for Warum willst du and’re fragen, one of her best-known songs, with Loges and Freeman bringing out the lyrical beauty, leading to a fine climax.

We then returned to Robert’s Kernerlieder. Wanderung moved between vigorous swagger and the more poetic, whilst though the piano introduction to Stille Liebe was poetic, the main song became sober and thoughtful.

Clara’s Heine setting, Lorelei was perhaps not the style of song associated with her, being closer to one of Robert’s ballads. Here we had vivid story telling and a slow build to a powerful climax as the boatman and his boat are consumed. We stayed with Clara for the final song, the lyrical beauty of the farewell, Beim Abschied.

For the second half, Loges and Freeman gave us Robert Schumann’s sequence of Eichendorff poems that form a literal and metaphorical journey through the forest, the outer world mirroring the poet’s inner world. ‘In der Fremde I’ started us off with flowing, lyrical melancholy whilst though ‘Intermezzo’ seemed measured it was almost overflowing with passion. ‘Waldesgespräch’ returned us to the Lorelei with Loges moving between the wanderers swagger and the scarier enchantress. ‘Die Stille’ was deceptively simple, revealing amazing attention to detail from Loges and Freeman.

‘Mondnacht’ combined magical piano playing with Loges’ intimate, confiding vocals giving a sense of time suspended. ‘Schöne Fremde’ was rather urgent with a feeling of compelling intensity, then ‘Auf einer Burg’ was strong and intense, serious stuff indeed but ending almost mid-air as we never find out who the lovely weeping bride is. The poet’s lost love, perhaps. ‘In der Fremde II’ was urgent yet ending in sudden darkness. We began to notice the way Schumann had a fondness for ending the songs on a question, the young man’s journey not being as straightforward as it might seem.

‘Wehmut’ was sombre with Loges making it seem highly personal, then ‘Zwielicht’ had a slowing unfolding melody over a piano that seemed to echo Robert’s obsession with JS Bach, yet there seemed a deeper meaning here to with, again, a surprise at the end. ‘Im Walde’ began engagingly bouncy but then there was an amazing change of mood. Yet when we return to the end of our journey, in ‘Frühlingsnacht’, the young man seems to have returned to his senses and this was engagingly  conveyed in a performance that was impulsive and full of joy.

We had an encore, one more of Clara Schumann’s Rückert settings, Die Gute Nacht.