“The mystery of the ballad comes from the way it is told” - Goethe. This fascinating repertory requires the performer to play each of the characters as he or she would in an opera. Who better than Stéphane Degout to take up the challenge of plunging into the heart of German Romanticism? Fresh from winning a Victoire de la Musique in 2019, the French baritone truly embodies each of the protagonists in these shattering miniature dramas. Beside him here are a longstanding partner and two exceptional guests.

Soprano Robyn Allegra Parton and pianist Simon Lepper perform an album inspired by the burnished gold leaf and sensual contours of Klimt’s Art-Nouveau ‘Vienna Secession’ movement, with music reflecting that aesthetic including songs by Richard Strauss, Alma Mahler, Johanna Muller-Hermann, Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Alban Berg and Joseph Marx – a composer about whom Lepper recently curated a series at Wigmore Hall. These are works that occupy a fascinating realm between the romantic and the modern, so that sensuous, brooding and dark-hued atmospheres are blended with rich textures and radiant harmonies. Described by Opernwelt as ‘captivating, astonishing, overwhelming’, award-winning British soprano Robyn Allegra Parton specialises in this repertoire, and Simon Lepper is one of the finest song accompanists in the world.

There is no shortage of recordings of Schubert song highlights, but this one by tenor Ilker Arcayürek is a standout. Arcayürek is a little less exotic than he sounds; born in Istanbul, he is fully Austrian trained, and is an alumnus of the Vienna Mozart Boys' Choir. His German reveals no trace of an accent, and the strong point of his performance is natural text engagement. Arcayürek's performance, in fact, although he has moved to Britain and become a BBC 3 New Generation Artist, falls into a long Austrian-German tradition that prizes naturalness of phrasing and diction.

Known for her vivid portrayals and full, distinctive voice, Elizabeth Llewellyn has established herself internationally as a dramatic and vocal artist of distinction. She has chosen to offer listeners something new by devoting her debut disc to the music of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, much of it never recorded before. Elizabeth Llewellyn is joined by pianist Simon Lepper, with whom she has collaborated closely in the development of this unique project. To poetry by Christina Rossetti, Coleridge-Taylor’s Six Sorrow Songs and A Lament are almost all world-premiere recordings. The Southern Love Songs evoke styles including Latin music and flamenco, and the African Romances, never recorded until now, are to words by African-American writer Paul Laurence Dunbar.

When Ilker Arcayürek and his pianist Simon Lepper conceived the album “The Path of Life”, it was important to them that it should not be a portrait of a singer and thus another “Best of Schubert” selection, but that a story should be told. The “programme” consists of five chapters, which are seen as stages of life: Love, Longing, Search for Inner Peace, Resignation, Redemption. Playful and in love, the cycle begins. Piningly follows the section of “longing”. Love alone does not fulfil the lyrical figure, which is why “Auf der Bruck” introduces an escape from existence and the “search for inner peace”. The lyrical I wanders, initially seeking happiness in nature and coming to the realisation in “Laughing and Crying” and “The Wanderer” that no matter where one turns, happiness is short-lived and elusive. Heartbreaking reflection is followed by a farewell to friends and life, before the epilogue is intoned with “Des Fischers Liebesglück”. Similarities to the “Leiermann” at the end of “Winterreise” are not coincidental.