18 songs on French texts arranged as a practical edition for voice and guitar
(Ulrike Merk)

Contents: J.P.C. de Florian: Romance de Claudine, Chanson de bergères, Romance de Galatée, Romance de Célestine, Isidore (Vous, qui loin d’une amante), Némorin I, Zoraide, C’en est fait, Annette, Sérénade de Cortez, Unique objet de ma tendresse, C’est une larme, Némorin II, Le rocher des deux amants; Jean Bertaut: Au bord d’une fontaine, librettist unknown: L’Amité, La fuite inutile, Mon coeur soupire

J.P.C. de Florian: Romance de Claudine, Chanson de bergères, Romance de Galatée, Romance de Célestine, Isidore (Vous, qui loin d’une amante), Némorin I, Zoraide, C’en est fait, Annette, Sérénade de Cortez, Unique objet de ma tendresse, C’est une larme, Némorin II, Le rocher des deux amants; Jean Bertaut: Au bord d’une fontaine, librettist unknown: L’Amité, La fuite inutile, Mon coeur soupire
Between the ages of 15 and 17, Fanny Hensel set a total of 18 poems by French poets to music. 14 of these songs were included as scenic songs in stories and novels by Jean Pierre Claris de Florian, who was also extremely popular in Germany at the time. These songs were not published during Fanny Hensel’s lifetime, and so now the arrangement for guitar and voice, which was extremely common for the Romantic period, offers the opportunity to come into contact with these cyclical songs of the young Fanny Mendelssohn in a comprehensive edition.
Ulrike Merk has faithfully transcribed these songs from the manuscript and added fingerings for the guitar. The edition is accompanied by a revision report that outlines necessary corrections to the original text and documents the procedure for setting up the guitar part. Some of the songs are set in Moorish-occupied Spain – the cradle of the classical guitar – in the text, or they are songs accompanied by the protagonist himself with the guitar or whose plot is characterized by innocence and purity. Because of this, they were set in easy movement by Fanny Hensel. In some cases, she even imitated very specific guitar playing techniques, such as the rasgueado in the Sérénade de Cortez, in the piano movement.