”Frieder Anders possesses an attractive baritone with core and substance, which he knows how to unfold with emphasis and lyrical power. At the same time he has developed a remarkable sensitivity for the Russian idiom. The Toistoi and Apukhtin settings (Tchaikovsky’s), which blaze passionately with unhappy longing for love, especially benefit from this, especially as Stella Goldberg accompanied insistently but never obtrusively.” Michael Dellith
”Really well both artists succeeded in the performance of five songs by Modest Mussorgsky (1839 – 1881), written in his early compositional phase between 1857 and 1867.” FAZ
”There followed the songs from the cycle ‘Ohne Sonne’, an unfolded tragedy of the Russian soul, pushed into nocturnal oblivion by the circumstances besetting it, namelessly at its own mercy. This impression was supported by the singer’s subordinating his part to the grand piano’s sweeping passages, including, finally, a menacingly hammering organ point, thus virtually making the subject disappear in gloomy, oppressive depressiveness despite all rebellion.” Wulf Eggert
”Great is the venture to come to the province with high culture of the finest kind…The cultural center “Goldne Sonne” in Schneeberg nevertheless served a song afternoon with the title “Inner Ecstasies”, sung by the baritone Frieder Anders, accompanied on the piano by Stella Goldberg, both from Frankfurt/Main. The singer of medium vocal power, a pure performer without any performing ambitions and with an undercurrent of vibrato in his voice, performed the songs with a fine sense for everything atmospheric, without ever lapsing into superficial drama. Of Hugo Wolf’s Mörike songs, two should be highlighted: The pianist accompanied the “Gesang Weylas” full-bodiedly with sharp chords, the singer became a rhapsodist who praises the beauty of women in a great melodic line. In the “Foot Journey”… the pianist powerfully shaped the involuntary cheerfulness of the little work. In the second part, a series of French songs rang out, all sung in the original language…. The light-filled, rapturous piano movement came off beautifully, and in the song about the sea, more beautiful than all cathedrals (Debussy), Frieder Anders was able to show how powerfully he would sing in opera. Much applause …” Free Press Chemnitz
”It was like an evening of house music in a salon – this was the conclusion drawn by several listeners at the end. Indeed, they heard music in a closeness and liveliness as rarely. This included the intimate atmosphere of the beautiful art nouveau room as well as the very carefully prepared and informative program and, above all, the art of the performers, who have been working together since 1997 with a focus on art song of the 19th and 20th centuries.” KA for Wetterau and Vogelsberg
”Schubert’s songs in particular are ideally suited to showcase Frieder Anders’ gentle baritone and wonderful timbre.” m-r
”An experienced lieder singer with a clear timbre, an unobtrusive breathing technique, and admirably clear articulation. Lyrics and melody have equal importance with him. … Fascinating was the clear integration of the consonants into the phrasing. Thus he achieved an expressivity of great beauty. The ideal complement was the Russian pianist Stella Goldberg who could achieve similar subtleties through touch and dynamics, tempo-wise in agreement with the singer.” Rita Wilhelm
Viktor Ullmann, Hans Kràsa and Pavel Haas: ”As Jews they were first deported to Theresienstadt, were still composing there and were then taken to Auschwitz for murder in the so-called Künstlertransport. Still in better times, Kràsa wrote his five songs op. 4 in Paris in 1925, based on texts by Rilke, Morgenstern and Catullus. Here, a reductive, slag-free melodicism of the singing voice is juxtaposed with a concentrated piano part that is quite advanced for the period in which it was written. Baritone Frieder Anders underscored this with an often recitative-like tone.” FAZ Sunday Newspaper