Press

“She led a truly colorful life. Today, she would be a highly sought-after personality in the tabloids and just as popular on social media: George Sand, writer, critic, journalist, intellectual, networker. Lover of Alfred de Musset, Frédéric Chopin, and others. Sonya Yoncheva has now dedicated an entire album to this fascinating character, since George Sand has “always captivated her”, with her “nuanced temperament” and “personality of great breadth.” The album opens with pianist Olga Zado though, performing a Chopin arrangement of Bellini’s “Casta diva”. In a following “Echo,” Yoncheva recites a letter from Alfred de Musset to George Sand, while Zado once again plays “Casta diva” on the piano.

Right from the start, the album demonstrates how closely words and music are intertwined here and how much importance is given to the text overall, also when Yoncheva sings. The first vocal piece is “Nuit de décembre” by Ruggero Leoncavallo. She skillfully controls the volume of her voice, soars into the high notes with a slight edge, yet largely remains faithful to a lyrical expression.

Here, it is being demonstrated how she strives to bring in line Yoncheva the opera singer and the art song singer inside of her, especially as Leoncavallo’s piece gains significant dramatic intensity as it progresses. The journey continues with the Spanish flair of Léo Delibes’ “Les filles de Cadix”, where the “con moto” character of the work is particularly well brought out. Yoncheva delivers the embellishments with ease, which are most effective when she sings softly and when she subtly colors the vowels. After a Chopin nocturne followed by another “Echo,” the recording features works by Jacques Offenbach, several pieces by Pauline Viardot, who was a close friend of George Sand, as well as compositions by Francesco Paolo Tosti and Franz Liszt. Violinist Adam Taubitz and mezzo-soprano Marina Viotti also join in on some tracks.

It is a concept album in the truest sense of the word. (…) Overall, it is a varied recording with a deeply personal statement from its protagonist, Sonya Yoncheva.”
Christoph Vratz, Oper! Das Magazin

“George Sand is like the epitome of Parisian intellectualism: a writer, feminist, socialite, and revolutionary whose ideals resonate with compassion and societal optimism that made her an aspirational figure to the progressively oriented middle-class. Her legacy is manifold, and her alliance with spearhead musicians, including Chopin and Pauline Viardot, has greatly influenced her esteem among like-minded posterity.
Sonya Yoncheva, for instance, pays homage with her new album. “George” – as the title reads – is published on Yoncheva’s very own label and Naive, and in a slightly eclectic twist, sets out to resurrect the Romanticist mindscape of French literature’s grande dame. The goal: to “awaken people to the arts as if you were taking care of a small child” (attributed, in the booklet, to Sand).
This didacticism noticeably departs from the operatic program of previous recitals. (…)
On the flipside, the presence of Liszt is fully motivated. His “Liebestraum” echoes the Romantic tints of Chopin, distilled by the sensitive touch of Ukrainian pianist Olga Zado. Yoncheva gives her the opening track, and Zado floats the lyricism of “Casta diva” most delicately. Her affinity with the repertory stands out, and while she is just as subtle an accompanist, it is surprising perhaps that “George” stays clear of Berlioz and the sophistication of his shamefully overlooked Lieder. They certainly would have fit the album’s scope.
(…)
Pauline Viardot’s compositions fall into a different category. “Madrid” echoes the Spanish flavor of the “Habanera,” while “Faible coeur” has a hybrid theatricality, recognizant of both the speech-like delivery of recitatives and the buildup of melody as in an aria. Yoncheva is very good at either, though the grand vocal gesture of finely sustained mezza voces – or, a darkly hued coloratura – fits her profile closest. (…)
“George” closes with Viardot’s “Les bohémiennes,” one of only two duets in which the soprano is joined by Marina Viotti. The blend of their respective timbre is formidable, as they find endless color variation in their flourishes. They also capitalize on rhythmic syncopations and the subtleties of harmonic shifts, making “Les bohémiennes” the undeniable pièce de résistance among the songs present. In itself, it conveys more nuance than the prose to which Yoncheva dedicates three tracks. (…)”
Bob Dieschburg, Operawire

“The first piece Yoncheva sings is Leoncavallo’s “Nuit de décembre” on a text by Alfred de Musset sung with good attention to dynamics and musically reminiscent of a few bars of Nedda’s ballad from Pagliacci. Delibes’ “Les Filles de Cadiz” is well delivered in its colors, accents, and trills. The ballad “Voyez Dans La Nuit Brune” from Offenbach’s Fantasio on a text by Alfred de Musset has charm and character. “Madrid” by Pauline Viardot is a vividly colored bolero where Yoncheva’s voice is enriched with sensual nuances. “Ninon” by Tosti, again on a text by Alfred de Musset, is delivered with musical sensitivity. “Faible Coeur!”, Pauline Viardot’s rearrangement of Chopin’s Mazurka No. 8 is sorrowful in character and enriched by a cadenza and descending chromaticism. For two duets, Yoncheva is joined by mezzo-soprano Marina Viotti, who dedicated a tribute album to Pauline Viardot in 2022 with Christophe Rousset. The two singers perform “Pars, et nous oublie…Reste, ô mon amie” (an arrangement as a chamber lyric of Chopin’s Mazurka in G minor Op. 24) and then close the recording with “Les Bohémiennes” (Viardot’s arrangement for two voices conceived as a sort of medley of Brahms’s Hungarian Dances). Yoncheva’s beautiful timbre matches Viotti’s velvet, and especially in the second piece – progressively more virtuosic and fast-paced, the two performers remind us that this salon music not only evoked atmospheres of high poetic and literary content but also served as entertainment to the surprise and delight of all present.
Music tracks are alternated with Yoncheva’s reading in French, with piano accompaniment, of letters from Alfred Musset to George Sand or from George Sand to Chopin and Marie Dorval. Olga Zado accompanies the piano with a wonderful musical taste and a smooth touch on the keyboard. Opening the recording with Chopin’s transcription of “Casta Diva” from Bellini’s Norma, Zado wonderfully reminds us how much Chopin admired bel canto and especially Bellini’s ligne du chant. I also prized violinist Adam Taubitz who plays beautifully a short Romanza in A Major by Pauline Viardot. In conclusion, this is an interesting and highly personal project that disorients, somewhat like some of the singer’s choices of repertoire and discography in recent years, but still unshackles Yoncheva from more generic recordings that are less original in concept. … the recording succeeds overall in evoking a character and an era characterized by a close relationship between literature and music.”
Pietro Dall’Oglio, Connessi all’Opera

“Among the contents of this publication are many interesting things; particularly touching is the letter written to her by Alfred De Musset, a poet with whom she lived for about two years an overwhelming passion, physical, sentimental, stormy but also intellectual since they were united by a common talent for writing, here recited beautifully and with great emotional impact by Yoncheva.
(…)
Refined performances by Sonya Yoncheva, who displays her usual beautiful timbre by phrasing and reciting the French texts beautifully, varying colors and dynamics according to the word’s meaning.
(…)
All in all, a CD that possesses the uncommon gift of creating an atmosphere, allows itself to be listened to with pleasure and certainly stimulates the exploration of the extraordinary figure of George Sand.”
Danilo Boaretto, OperaClick

“The material on a Naïve CD focused primarily on soprano Sonya Yoncheva is also well-presented, and here the vocal elements are in the forefront from start to finish. But the disc is a curious one, highly personal in concept, design and execution, and less of a presentation of music than it is a tribute to famed 19th-century author George Sand (1804-1876) through music and words and the personal lens and viewpoint of Yoncheva and her collaborators. (…) The performances on this (+++) CD are all fine, and Yoncheva’s collaborators are clearly committed to the whole endeavor, which comes across as more of an emotionally driven, musically illustrated academic exercise than a traditional recital or concert. The musical examples are not exactly irrelevant, but their importance is strictly that of a superstructure for the foundational tribute to Sand that is this disc’s reason for being. The concept is interesting, the execution skillful, yet it is only listeners who already feel a strong connection with and admiration for Sand who are likely to find the recording congenial. They are the members of an “in crowd” at whose center Yoncheva places herself; anyone outside this group of cognoscenti is unlikely to find the material here of more than passing interest.”
InfoDad

“George is a new CD from soprano Sonya Yoncheva and friends made up of music George Sand would have listened to and some readings for her works. There’s a particular emphasis on Pauline Viardot; close friend of Sand and sister of Maria Malibran.

The music includes Chopin piano pieces played by Olga Zado, who also accompanies the songs. His Casta diva, based on the Bellini aria, is particularly interesting. There are songs by Leoncavallo, Delibes, Offenbach, Tosti and Liszt as well as piano music and songs by Viardot. On two of the songs Yoncheva is accompanied by mezzo Marina Viotti and Zado is joined by violinist Adam Taubitz for a Viardot Romance.

The singing is all very high class. Yoncheva is very at home in this music and she blends well with Viotti. The instrumental playing is very good too. On top of that Yoncheva is a very expressive reader. It’s a varied, interesting and enjoyable disk.

The album was recorded in March 2024 at the Salle de Musique in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland, and is very clear and detailed, at least on the 192kHz/24bit digital version I listened to.”
Operaramblings