Be Still My Heart
Songs by Robert Gund and Wilhelm Grosz
Christian Immler (bass-baritone), Helmut Deutsch (piano)
Awards:
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Presto Recording of the Week, 26th December 2025
Over half are premiere recordings; all are most persuasively performed. Both composers are masters of their craft, writing fluidly and with the utmost confidence.
Be Still My Heart
Songs by Robert Gund and Wilhelm Grosz
Christian Immler (bass-baritone), Helmut Deutsch (piano)
Purchase product
Awards:
-
Presto Recording of the Week, 26th December 2025
Over half are premiere recordings; all are most persuasively performed. Both composers are masters of their craft, writing fluidly and with the utmost confidence.
About
Be Still My Heart presents works by two little-known Viennese composers.
Robert Gund (1865-1927), born in Switzerland, a pianist, teacher and composer who was highly regarded in Vienna but whose works have since been forgotten, and his younger contemporary Wilhelm Grosz (1894-1939), who was writing highly successful songs for the cinema in Berlin at the time of Gund's death. Grosz then emigrated to the United States in 1939, when his music became influenced by both post-Romanticism and jazz.
This programme, conceived and performed here by Christian Immler and Helmut Deutsch, both masters of the German Lied, includes many songs that are recorded for the first time. Grosz's New York songs have inspired many cover versions by such 20th-century musical greats as Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole and the Beatles.
Contents and tracklist
Spotlight on this release
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Christian Immler on Be Still My Heart
16th Mar 2026
In the run-up to the release of Raphaël Pichon's recording of the St John Passion (on which he sings the bass arias and Pilatus), the German singer discusses a recent passion-project of his own - a beguiling recital of songs by Wilhelm Grosz and Robert Gund with pianist Helmut Deutsch on Alpha Classics.
Awards and reviews
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Presto Recording of the Week26th December 2025
May 2025
Over half are premiere recordings; all are most persuasively performed. Both composers are masters of their craft, writing fluidly and with the utmost confidence.
26th December 2025
Gund's great gift for storytelling is revealed in gripping, twisty ballades such as the declamatory 'Drei Zigeuner' (with Deutsch embracing the Lisztian piano writing with obvious glee) and 'Schön Rotraut'. Grosz's early Lieder call to mind the harmonic world of Korngold and Joseph Marx, whilst the popular English-language songs which he composed after relocating to England are real ear-worms. Both artists capture the wide range of idioms to perfection.
