The category “Duo for Voice and Piano (Lied)” is held in a total of four rounds. Finding a thematic connection and an inner guiding idea in program design is considered one of the challenges for Lied duos. When speaking with the duos, it quickly becomes clear that the participants have given great thought to their choice of repertoire. They read and research extensively, seeking to understand the thoughts and longings of the composers and poets. The duo of Mikhail Timoshenko and Elitsa Desseva describes the process of finding a program as “creation, but also exhaustion!” The Russian singer and the Bulgarian pianist met while studying music in Weimar. Today, Timoshenko lives in Paris, while Desseva continues to live in Weimar. “And we literally rehearse between Paris and Weimar,” they say—during the long train journeys, scores and texts are diligently studied. Coordinating schedules is also an art in itself: “It even happens that we spend a total of 16 hours on the train for a two-hour rehearsal.”
In partnership with the Musée d’Orsay, Royaumont Abbey welcomes duos of young singers and pianists who have come to study art song and Lied [...]
Baritone Mikhail Timoshenko and pianist Elitsa Desseva received the Eduard Erdmann Advancement Prize 2024. In its citation, the jury commended the duo’s long-standing artistic engagement and dedication to the song repertoire of composer Eduard Erdmann (1896–1958) [...]
