Quintette Imaginaire is a disk of Schubert song arrangements from soprano Sandrine Piau and the Quatuor Psophos.  There’s about 43 minutes of songs including such well known ones as “Kennst du das land”, “Viola” “Ganymed” and “Erlkörnig”.  There are also a couple of movements from Schubert quartets to make up a total of 67 minutes of music.

It’s a change to hear these songs sung by a soprano and the textures of the quartet arrangements are interesting.  I particularly enjoyed the bouncy arrangement of “Ganymed” and a thoughtful reading of “Viola”.  I’m not sure a soprano can really sound dark enough for “Erlkönig” though.  All in all there’s some excellent playing and Piau sounds idiomatic in German.

It was recorded at Cité de la Musique et la Danse in Soissons.  The standard resolution audio I listened to was clear and well balanced.  It’s being released as a physical CD, standard resolution and 96kHz/24 bit uncompressed digital and MP3.  There is a physical and digital booklet.

The release date is September 5th 2025.

Catalogue information: Alpha Classics ALPHA 1157