Schumann was the first to set a complete cycle of Heinrich Heine’s poems to music. His literary “forks of lightning” had already fascinated Schumann when he was 17 years old. However, he only wrote opus 24 in 1840, in his “year of song”, choosing to set a cycle of poems from the “Buch der Lieder”. He wrote the following to his fiancée: “Ah, Clara, what bliss it is to write for the voice”. This enthusiasm is reflected in each of the nine songs.
At long last, singers with a lower vocal range can also rely on Henle’s Urtext editions of Schumann; the wonderful Song Cycle op. 24 on poems by Heine now appears in a transposed version, edited by Schumann expert Kazuko Ozawa. With the support of celebrated Lieder accompanist Gerold Huber, Henle now offers baritones carefully arranged transpositions for low voice. This Urtext edition includes an extensive preface on the origin of the work and a detailed Critical Report on the edition. The original edition for high voice is available in HN 548.