Die Schöne Müllerin: Kaufmann & Deutsch

«It is one of the greatest accounts of Die Schöne Müllerin on disc, though it might faze some. It's big in scale: Kaufmann's soft singing is exquisite, but his voice isn't small and there are moments when he and Deutsch really let rip in their quest for expressive veracity. Interpretatively, it's fairly straightforward: Deutsch's playing has an unsentimental, expressionist edge; Kaufmann, however, is having none of the modish psychoanalytic approach that sees Schubert's Miller as deluded from the outset, presenting us instead with an un-neurotic examination of love and loss, in which the terrible ­emotions of the second half seem all the more excruciating after the optimism of the start. Not for the faint-hearted, but highly recommended.»