Asian musical culture remains largely unfamiliar in the Western world: occasionally, a taste of exoticism is presented under the category Peking opera, but that is mostly as far as it goes. Two young artists aim to change this situation: Anna Herbst and Toni Ming Geiger combine delicate musical jewels from Central Europe and the Far East. They have selected the lied genre as their field of cultural encounter in which the German Romantic period plays such a prominent role with its famous protagonists including Schubert, Schumann (both Robert AND Clara) and Mahler. Herbst and Geiger evoke a breathtaking range of expressive images in their compilation ranging from the praise of spring flowers, a moonlit night and an evening among flowering apricot trees, not to mention the perennial themes of yearning love, heartache and the pain of separation which permeate both such otherwise distant cultures.