Known in his lifetime as ‘the north German Schubert’, Carl Loewe (1796–1869) is remembered today chiefly as a composer of songs and ballads. Yet there is a considerable body of piano music that is strikingly innovative in content, expression and harmony, containing the germs of ideas later taken up by composers such as Wagner and Liszt. Loewe was unquestionably a brilliantly original talent, a major figure in ushering in the Romantic era – with the remarkable Four Fantasies of 1854 heard here ‘documenting’ in music the contemporary emigration of German families to the United States. This third volume of Linda Nicholson’s survey of his piano music on historical instruments concludes its first-ever complete recording on any kind of piano.

‘The piano works of Carl Loewe… buoyed beyond the ordinary by superbly nimble construction and an exuberant sense of expressivity. … There is a Haydnesque charm here, not to mention the glee of the bubbly solo piano music that Rossini amused himself with after he stopped writing operas. … Nicholson, … completely grasps the sunny charm of this music.’ — Fanfare Magazine, September 2015 (Vol.1, TOCC0278)