Schubert: Die Winterreise review – Jonas Kaufmann dials it down

Jonas Kaufmann has sung enough Lieder in Britain now for us not to be surprised at how a tenor with such a thrillingly operatic voice, who seems to take every challenge he encounters in the opera house so comfortably in his stride, can scale down his sound to the intimate dimensions of a recital hall so convincingly. There are plentiful examples of that artistry in his Winterreise, especially of his perfectly judged pianissimo singing and apparently infinite range of shading, while pianist Helmut Deutsch provides tactful support. But it's still all just a bit too theatrical, as if Kaufmann can't help turning every song into a psychodrama, and feels obliged to extract the maximum intensity from every bar. Each number is compelling, but neither the sense of a cycle, nor the physical and psychological narrative that Schubert depicts so vividly, is ever really felt. There's something matter-of-factly beautiful about it all, and crucially, profoundly unmoving, too. Der Leiermann, the final song, brings no sense of closure, just a last self-contained demonstration of Kaufmann's finesse.