Lieder's Dynamic Duo

With all of this intense performing and recording activity, they still devote much time to teaching at the Karlsruhe Conservatory and at the Mozarteum University in Salzburg. They also judge music competitions, and Holl directs the Hugo Wolf Akademie in Stuttgart, where luminaries visit to lecture and perform, from singers like Benita Valente and Gerard Souzay to writers like the eminent German novelist Peter Hartling. Their most precious legacy, in addition to their own CDs, is their fine pupils who have already begun producing excellent CDs of lieder. Baritone Stephan Genz has recorded a Wolf program for Claves, and Beethoven and Wolf recitals for Hyperion. Continuity, commitment, and devotion -- how many musical performers represent these ideals in as brilliantly sustained a way as Mitsuko Shirai and Hartmut Holl?