Krenek has stayed in the news since his death in December 1991 as a result of a number of impressive new recordings. His richly eloquent unaccompanied choral cycle Lamentatio Jeremiae prophetae, Op. 93 (10/92) showed the composer's spiritual core; a great deal of piano music is now available, thanks to the committed advocacy of Geoffrey Douglas Madge (6/92 and 4/93); and Krenek's smash-hit 1920s jazz opera, Jonny spielt auf, has reached CD in a production based on the Leipzig Opera revival under Lothar Zagrosek (4/93). Two string quartets are available (1/89) and more have been released in the USA.
For some years Krenek was represented, if at all, by the occasional uninviting serial chamber piece from his American years: now it is possible to view his travels through twentieth-century music much more fully and to establish his roots in the Viennese tradition from Schubert to Mahler and the Second Viennese School.
All this background is particularly relevant to the Reisebuch (or ''Travelbook from the Austrian Alps''). Two years after the great success of Jonny, Krenek explored the Austrian Alps and recorded his impressions in a set of poems in free verse, a sort of travel diary, which he set to music soon after. (The booklet contains his own American-English versions.) The whole conception, and the musical style, owe much to Schubert's journeys, especially Die Winterreise. Krenek modulates from one style to another, ingeniously moving in and out of the Schubert-Mahler axis. The result is fluent, gemutlich rather than passionate, even though the text contains warnings associated with violence and the rise of Nazism. The baritone voice of Markus Kohler is a consistently smooth and attractively unidiosyncratic vehicle for the Reisebuch, well partnered by Reinhard Schmiedel at the piano in a slightly dry recording. But this release fills a gap both for Krenek and the literature of Lieder in this century opening another window on the output of this muitifarious composer.'