A remarkable record of a live performance, capturing a collection of Wagner greats and a few surprises.

This disc captures, unadulterated and unadorned, the opening night of a new production of Lohengrin at the Vienna Staatsoper. One glance down the cast-list will tell you that this is something special. It must have been even more special to have been in the theatre, for not only was Karl Böhm in the pit but Wieland Wagner himself was directing the staging, something illustrated generously in the accompanying booklet. The sound, recorded for broadcast by Austrian Radio, is in mono, which is undeniably regrettable, but it’s surprisingly good for its age. The only place where it brings real losses is in the chorus scenes, which are many in this opera. The natural point of comparison for this set is Kempe’s classic set, which shares the same orchestra, the same Lohengrin and the same Ortrud, and was recorded two years previously. The comparisons are fascinating.

The most interesting contrast, and the factor which impels this release, is the conducting of Karl Böhm. Where Kempe is rapt, Böhm is driven. Like his live Ring and Tristan from Bayreuth, he prefers fast tempi, and this drives the drama along at an exciting pace. You can tell that when you compare the timings: Böhm is more than 20 minutes faster than Kempe. In fact he achieves the feat of making this one of the very few Lohengrins on disc (perhaps the only one?) to fit each act complete onto a single CD. Yet Böhm never feels unduly rushed. Instead, the strength of his vision convinces the listener that this is an entirely appropriate view of the piece. Furthermore, he knows how to relax when he needs to, and he does so liberally, particularly for the Grail music. The Act 1 Prelude is markedly slower than what follows it. He broadens out the soundscape after Lohengrin’s arrival in the middle of the act, the excitement of the crowd giving way to a gently meditative first utterance from the knight.

That first utterance is, in fact, something pretty special. Jess Thomas is on top notch form here and he sounds sensational in his farewell to the swan in the first act, as in his declaration of love for Elsa. He is, perhaps, a little anonymous in the second act, but he is moving and remarkably sympathetic in the bridal chamber scene. In fernem Land, similarly slowed down by Böhm, unfolds at an unhurried pace and in one single-minded direction. He was an extraordinary swan knight for Kempe, and it’s exciting to hear him in the live context here. Claire Watson is also on her very finest form as Elsa. There is clarity and purity to her voice that, to my ears at least, comes close to making her the equal of Elisabeth Grümmer - high praise indeed. She is helpless and vulnerable in the first act but brims over with optimism at the start of the second, and her address to the breezes is a delight. Perhaps you don’t get quite the same sense of impending doom in the bridal chamber scene, but she summons up the correct sense of terror as that scene reaches its climax and she is full of pathos in her sense of loss in the final scene.

Kempe’s set gave us the finest Ortrud on disc in Christa Ludwig, and she is every bit as sensational here. If anything, the live event inspires her to give of herself with even more commitment. The dramatic temperature of the whole set rises when she enters at the start of Act 2. There is something darkly insidious in her vocal presence, and the way she seems to pour scorn on her husband is magnificently dramatic. She then inveigles her way into Elsa’s confidence with the skill of the greatest of con artists, and the power of her invocation at Entweihte Götter! is so great that it brings the house down, forcing Böhm to halt proceedings for about twenty seconds. She then chews up the scenery in the great crowd scene at the end of Act 2 and manages a wonderful groan of defeat when the swan is revealed as Gottfried at the very end of the opera. Her husband both on and off the stage, Walter Berry, isn’t quite the match for Fischer-Dieskau either in vocal beauty or in acting - he sounds overly gruff in the first act - but he rises to a climax at the start of Act 2 and is never less than a convincing stage presence. It’s a real treat having Martti Talvela as the King, his rich, fruity bass giving the part an extra level of character that it doesn’t always get. Eberhard Wächter is luxury casting as the Herald.

I doubt that anyone will take this as a top choice, especially not over any stereo sets, because sound quality is important in this opera. However, it’s a remarkable record of a live performance, capturing a collection of Wagner greats and a few surprises, and it will be especially interesting for anyone who knows and loves the Kempe set.

Incidentally, this whole production was double cast. The other cast that alternated with this one included the likes of James King, Gustav Neidlinger and Astrid Varnay. Having not one but two such legendary casts available for one opera in the same city seems like an extravagant dream to us nowadays, but what fun to dream it!

-- Simon Thompson, MusicWeb International

There exists a strange, somewhat ambiguous, bond between Wagner and the instrument symbolic of the romantic generation: the piano. Strange because Wagner’s fingers were not very much at ease on a piano keyboard - to the point that in his lifetime this gave rise to a number of hilarious anecdotes about his technical ineptitude.

That notwithstanding, scholars and performers are left to deal with a rather considerable number of piano works by Richard Wagner, among them, several occasional pieces, often quite short, which is interesting, when we consider the general length, instead, of the composer’s lyrical works.

It shouldn’t surprise us that, up to recently, critics and even performers have paid little attention to the works featured here: comparison with Wagner’s operas and the innovation they introduced is, to all appearances, too crushing for them to take an interest in these short pieces conceived for practical purposes and destined for private use. And yet such an approach appears gratuitously defeatist, obscuring an output that can be quite fascinating and which, what is more important, is essential towards understanding the Maestro’s stylistic evolution.

Thanks to Wagner’s piano works, indeed, we are now able to retrace ”from the inside” almost his entire professional path. - Dynamic

German bass-baritone Theo Adam sings the role of the generous philosopher-poet Hans Sachs in this dazzling performance at the Metropolitan Opera from January 15, 1972 of Wagner’s only comedy, with Spanish soprano Pilar Lorengar as Eva and American tenor James King as the young hero Walther von Stolzing.

Thomas Schippers conducts the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and Chorus with a cast that includes the famous German character singer Benno Kusche (as the pathetic villain Beckmesser) and a host of much-admired American singers including Shirley Love (Magdalene), Loren Driscoll (David), Ezio Flagello (Pogner), Donald Gramm (Kothner) and – in a small role, early in his career – the Met’s current (2011) Hans Sachs, James Morris (Schwarz).

Elisabeth Meyer-Topsøe’s debut CD (KPT 32156) was Editor’s Choice in Gramophone (Jan. 94). “An impressive new soprano” (Gramophone) “Here is a discovery, perhaps the most promising Jugendlich-Dramatische soprano to burst on the scene since Studer…a burgeoning talent with almost limitless possibilities…” (Alan Blyth, Gramophone)

This selection of some of Wagner's finest orchestral excerpts opens with the 'storm-swept ballad' of Der fliegende Holleñnder, the opera which launched his epoch-defining later masterpieces. The entire span of Der Ring des Nibelungen is represented in this program, from the luminous rainbow bridge which leads the gods to Valhalla in Das Rheingold, the urgent drama of Die Walkure, and the atmospheric repose of the Forest Murmurs in Siegfried, to the tragic depths of Siegfried's Funeral March. This recording has been praised for it's 'radiant sensuousness'. (Gramophone) Volumes 2 and 3 in this series are available on 8.572768 and 8.572769.

Also available on Blu-ray

Richard Wagner
DIE FLIEGENDE HOLLANDER
(Blu-ray Disc Version)

Dalland – Robert Lloyd
Senta – Catherine Naglestad
Erik – Marco Jentzsch
Mary – Marina Prudenskaja
Der Steuermann Dalands – Oliver Ringelhahn
Der Hollander – Juha Uusitalo

Netherlands Opera Chorus
Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra
Harmut Haenchen, conductor
Martin Kušej, stage director

Recorded live at the De Nederlandse Opera, February 2010.
Bonus:
- Cast gallery
- Insights and interviews

Picture format: NTSC 16:9 anamorphic
Sound format: LPCM 2.0 / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Menu language: English
Subtitles: English, French, German, Spanish, Dutch
Running time: 166 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

R E V I E W:

Director Martin Kusej has been responsible for one of the worst Don Giovannis I've ever seen (Salzburg, 2006--Decca DVD) and the best Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (BBC--Opus Arte), so I wondered what to expect from this Netherlands Opera Dutchman, recorded in February, 2010. As it turns out, it is indeed "controversial"--it takes startling liberties and doesn't always make sense--but it's a very strong performance.

But before I get into its look and dramatic execution I must give utmost praise to conductor Hartmut Haenchen, who offers a whip-smart account of the score in the original one-act version, taking just two hours and 15 minutes. It never feels rushed but it does feel inexorable, with the orchestra playing with amazing transparency: you can hear Wagner's genius creating and growing. I don't want to call it a chamber-like approach because it is anything but delicate and miniaturized, but each instrumental section gets its due and is crystal clear; the balance between stage and pit is invariably right (bravo to the engineers as well), and somehow Haenchen manages Wagner's awkward mood/tempo changes as if they were organic.

The second act, with Erik popping in all hot and bothered, and then later, Daland, after the big duet, is normally clumsily done; here drama remains heightened. The chorus also is remarkably handled, particularly given what they have to do physically.

I can understand people despising Kusej's approach, but the care he gives to the characterizations somehow makes up for the overall approach which, as suggested above, is quirky. We are on a cruise ship, all glass doors and a deck, in modern dress. (The roomy, wall-to-wall set is by Martin Zehetsgruber and costumes are by Heide Kastler). The tourists, in true tourist outfits (floral shirts, shorts, sunglasses) are terrified of what is on the other side of the glass doors: it is the Dutchman's crew, who appear to be zombies. Well, maybe not zombies, but undesirables--like refugees from one of those unhappy countries who are being ferried to more stable places, each person with a look of desperation on his or her face. Perhaps they are asylum seekers, looking for a homeland, with a doomed captain looking for redemption and love.

The Dutchman suddenly appears--perhaps he's been lying down amid the guests--to sing "Die Frist ist um". When Daland arrives, he's a spiffily dressed tycoon and is interested in business--money changes everyone's status and the Dutchman realizes that. The second scene is set in a women's spa, with everyone except Senta in bathing suits or towels; she is in a black dress, actually has an old-fashioned spinning wheel (what is it doing in a spa?) and stares at a smallish painting of the sea and sky. (Sea and sky are projected throughout the overture as well.)

The last scene, after the weird back-and-forth of the sailors (in black, monkish, hooded clothing) and ladies, is stunning in its severity--just Senta, the Dutchman, and Erik against a background of roiling sea and sky. Senta has become part of her idealized picture. Will she remain true to the Dutchman until death? Apparently, since the shotgun-bearing Erik shoots them both dead at the curtain. Applicable or not--and each may decide for him/herself--this is a very good-looking, action-packed, thought-provoking show.

All of this would be for close to naught if the singing and dramatic commitment were any less fine than they are. Juha Uusitalo has found his ideal role in the Dutchman. His voice is big, with a distinct grain. It is not particularly beautiful but it is highly expressive, and if you think you've seen brooding, wait until you see him. His duet with Senta in Act 2 is so fraught with tension, attraction, disbelief, shock, relief, and sheer craziness that it could leave you trembling. He may be the finest Dutchman I've ever encountered.

Catherine Naglestad's Senta, almost perfectly sung, matches Uusitalo. She's clearly playing with less than a full deck from the start, but she gets stronger as the opera progresses and her vision becomes clearer and more real. I believe she sings Senta's ballad a half-tone higher than usual, which was Wagner's original conception, and the voice gleams. It is an ideally built sound, from the solid middle both up and down, and it's filled with warmth.

Tenor Marco Jentzsch, obviously a plot linchpin in Kusej's worldview of this opera, is active, involved, and sings with ringing if not always appealing tone, particularly above the staff. But he comes across as he should here, as a major player rather than an also-ran in Senta's life. Robert Lloyd proves that he still has the resources for Daland, and his mercenary outlook is in keeping with the text. There have been many better Steersmen than Olivier Ringelhahn, but Marina Prudenskaja's Mary is more appealing than most. Does she run the spa?

Picture, sound, and all production values are stunning, although there is no track-listing in the accompanying booklet (this seems to be a trend that is to be discouraged). There are three other performances of this opera on DVD; none is nearly as good as this one but Kultur's, from the Savonlinna Opera Festival (with Behrens and Grundheber) is extremely well sung. Subtitles are in English, French, German, Spanish, and Dutch. This may be odd, but it is not to be dismissed under any circumstances. It packs quite a wallop.

--Robert Levine, ClassicsToday.com

With a collection of titles, if the programme is well played and recorded one can only come up with the usual line of "go ahead if this is the selection you want". Three out of the four overtures here are early ones and for myself, I must say that the mellow blend of the orchestration of the Prelude to Die Meistersinger was a considerable relief after the brashness of Rienzi. But that the playing is fine cannot be denied. The Philharmonia violins sing the "Prize Song" with a softly expressive silkiness of tone that is most beautiful. The quiet blend of the wind at the start of Tannhduser is equally good to hear, while when the "Pilgrims' Hymn" returns towards the end all bombast is avoided by the soft and deft violin figuration being so delicate that the woodwinds can also play softly, as well as quite swiftly. Maazel does allow the greatest expansiveness later on, as the music demands. Nor is there any lack of brilliance or zest in such a piece as the Dutchman Overture or in the final polacca of Rienzi; though there is a top B just before the final molts put stretto (bar 344) where violins and woodwind do take a split second to become unanimous (not such a niggling criticism as it may seem, since the note is quite long and is an important one at the top of a climax).

-- Gramophone [3/1980]

Wagner's German opera: Tristan und Isolde. Performers include: Ramòn Vinay (Tristan), Astrid Varnay (Isolde), Ludwig Weber (König Marke), Ira Malaniuk (Brangäne), Gustav Neidlinger (Kurwenal), Hasso Eschert (Melot), Gerhard Stolze (Ein Hirt), Theo Adam (Ein Steuermann), Eugene Tobin (Ein Junger Seemann). Choir & Orchestra of the Bayreuth Festival, Eugen Jochum. Recorded live at Bayreuth in 1953.

WAGNER Tannhäuser • Joseph Keilberth, cond; Ramón Vinay ( Tannhäuser ); Gré Brouwenstijn ( Elisabeth ); Herta Wilfert ( Venus ); Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau ( Wolfram von Eschenbach ); Josef Greindl ( Landgraf Hermann ); Volker Horn ( Shepherd ); Josef Traxel ( Walther von der Vogelweide ); Gerhard Stolze ( Heinrich der Schreiber ); Toni Blankenheim ( Biterolf ); Theo Adam ( Reinmar von Zweter ); Bayreuth Festival O & Ch • ANDROMEDA 5162, mono (3 CDs: 183:10) Live: Bayreuth 7/22/1954


I’d really like to know why so many Wagner lovers have a bee in their bonnet over Josef Keilberth. So often in others’ reviews I read that he was routine, dull, unimaginative, etc., etc., yet I’ve always liked his conducting. Even as far back as my earliest years in college, when I was absorbing the Wagner canon from old LP recordings in the library ( Lohengrin with Steber and Windgassen, Fliegende Holländer with Varnay and Uhde, etc.), I always found Keilberth’s conducting well-paced, beautifully phrased and articulated as well as urgent in dramatic scope, and so I find it here. Even as early as the Overture (the Paris version, so it connects to the Venusberg music), Keilberth sounds as if he’s on a mission, and that mission is to make Tannhäuser’s story as thrilling as is humanly possible.


The problem with this release is the sound quality of the orchestra. I don’t know whether this recording stems from an in-house tape or a broadcast, but whichever it is the orchestral sound is harsh. The strings grate, the brasses spit, and the timpani sound like someone hitting a garbage can with mallets. And yet, this is an improvement over the one previous issue I’ve heard on Melodram, which was actually worse than this: The sound was both grating and muddy. At least Andromeda was able to clarify the sound and remove most of the surface noise, and happily the poor sound only affects the loud orchestral passages (like the Overture and the beginning of act II), not the singing. It should be noted that the cover of this release claims all-new 24-bit remastering, although like so many off-brand reissues of classic broadcasts, it has no libretto.


The only somewhat weak link in the cast is Wilfert as Venus. She is just OK. Her voice is not tonally pretty or very expressive except that she yells a good deal, and as I’ve said many times, yelling is not an interpretation. She also has a weak low range, which makes her descents in the scale disappointing. (Yet later on in the scene, the voice becomes less tense and she actually sings the written trills, something many Venuses ignore.) Vinay takes a while to warm up, sounding clumsy in Tannhäuser’s more elegant lines and lacking ease in singing the turns (mordents) in “Dir töne Lob.” Yes, he was an outstanding actor, both visually (which of course we can’t see here) and vocally, and that helps in many scenes of the opera, but I’d have liked a bit more suavity in the opening scene.


Once we leave the Venusberg, however, things brighten up considerably. A quick look at the cast list explains why. We have not only seasoned veterans Greindl and Traxel as Hermann and Walther and the still-young but already-legendary Fischer-Dieskau as Wolfram, but also several singers who would, within a decade, become important artists in their own right, namely Theo Adam, Toni Blankenheim, and Gerhard Stolze. As an extra bonus we get the great Gré Brouwenstijn who, along with Cristina Deutekom, was God’s gift to the soprano world from the Netherlands during the 20th century, as Elisabeth. (I should also mention that boy soprano Horn as the Shepherd is exceptionally good.) In addition, the microphone placement, which makes the orchestra sound so harsh, seems to be perfect for the voices, which all sound right and natural. As the opera progresses, Vinay’s voice brightens and loosens up a little, which is all to the good. (While listening, I kept trying to figure out whose voice he reminded me of; the closest I could come was Bernd Weikl if Weikl sang tenor.)


In act II, the vocal acting reaches new heights. Seldom have I heard Elisabeth sung with such nuance and attention to detail as she is here by Brouwenstijn; listen to the way she paints the words in “Was war es dann,” for instance, and as opposed to Vinay, her vocal elegance in singing the mordents is flawless. Griendl, who could at times sing with a loose vibrato and unfocused tone (as in his studio recordings of Tristan und Isolde and Die Zauberflöte ), is in excellent voice, particularly in the low range, and his singing in “Gar viel und schön ward hier” is both powerful and well-nuanced. I found it ironic that “Blick’ ich umher,” which is supposed to be sung somewhat clumsily by Wolfram (the reason he loses the song contest to Tannhäuser), is so elegantly and beautifully vocalized by Fischer-Dieskau that it almost sounds as if he were giving a Lieder recital. Yet, all in all, the drama builds during this act more suspensefully than I’ve heard it in any other performance of the opera. It’s absolutely hair-raising.


Happily, the Prelude to act III is recorded much better than most of the other orchestral music, possibly because it is mostly played softly. The Pilgrims’ Chorus, taken by Keilberth at a quicker than normal tempo, may sound a tad glib to seasoned Wagnerians yet it still manages to sound fervent, and Brouwenstijn’s ensuing aria (“Allmächt’ge Jungfrau”) is sung with rapturous feeling. Needless to say, “O du mein holder Abendstern” is sung beautifully, but what’s interesting to me about young Fischer-Dieskau is that it was his low range that was better than later on (a situation that made his mid-1970s recording of Die Meistersinger so disappointing). Vinay’s voice, ironically, sounds even deeper than Wolfram’s (later on in his career, he returned to singing baritone and then even sang bass!), but he is locked into the character here, so his “Rome narrative” is movingly and dramatically sung with full attention to words, and his death scene is indescribably moving.


The bottom line, then, is that if you really love Tannhäuser you need to own this performance. Because of the sound quality and lack of a libretto it’s not a first choice—that plum goes to the Dernesch-Kollo-Braun-Solti stereo set on Decca—but all things being equal, the singers are recorded so well that if you simply ignore the harshness of the purely orchestral passages (particularly the loud ones), you’re in for an extraordinary treat. This was a Wieland Wagner production, and somehow or other he and Keilberth got the whole cast to perform at white heat.


FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

Every Wagner fanatic knows the famous 1961 Philips label live recording of Der fliegende Holländer with Franz Crass as Holländer. Herewith, Andromeda presents the radio broadcast of the 1961 Bayreuth production which was recorded with the legendary George London, who gave here one of his best interpretations of the Holländer role. This recording shows once again that Mr. London was and remains unsurpassed as the demonic but for forgiveness-begging Holländer. Starring, in addition, Anja Silja, Fritz Uhl and Josef Greindl, this is the First Release in any format of this performance.

In addition to the less-often heard at Bayreuth production of Lohengrin in 1958, French conductor André Cluytens also led this Die Meisteringer at the same year’s festival. + This newly re-mastered recording features noted Wagnerian Austrian-born baritone Otto Weiner (1911-2000) as Hans Sachs, Elisabeth Grümmer as Eva, and legendary bass-baritone Hans Hotter as Pogner.

WAGNER (trans. Gould) Siegfried Idyll, (orig.) 1 Siegfried Idyll, (trans.) Die Meistersinger: Act I Prelude. Götterdämmerung: Dawn and Siegfried’s Rhine Journey • Glenn Gould (pn, cond); Toronto SO members 1 • SONY 52650 (70:59)


I can think of no worthier nomination to Fanfare’s Classical Hall of Fame than this conductorial debut of the late, exceedingly great Glenn Gould, and also his very last recording. Gould, of course, admitted in the late 1960s to being a closet Wagnerite who often “worshipped at the shrine,” and in 1973 he set down piano transcriptions of three favorite pieces. Meistersinger was a stunner the first time I heard it, and coming off a concert with Jorge Bolet playing the Liszt transcription of Tannhäuser —and he really pounded the thing out—I was left in shocked, disappointed silence after hearing Gould’s shimmering, nuanced, hyper-contrapuntal version of Wagner’s most Baroque work. Since then I have come to admire it to no end, a brilliant conception that brings out things you will not hear in any other recording, orchestral or not. Wagner’s orchestration actually gets in the way of everything there, and Gould admitted that when he prepared to play it, it was a question of “what do I leave out this time,” as there were not enough hands, even his own long fingers, to cover all the parts. “Dawn” is just as persuasive if not as extroverted in its intricacy, and the piano sounds just wonderful.


Siegfried is matched in its slow tempo only by Gould’s orchestra reading. Here he turns this transcription into a marvelous tone poem, drawing each and every strand of meaning out of every bar, always cognizant of the overarching structure and subtle phrasing, both Gould trademarks. You can almost come to accept this piece as meant for the piano, so convincing is his reading. Siegfried for chamber orchestra, in its original guise, is given to us in one of the slowest readings on record (Gould liked to temper the tempo in many works), and one can hear the Toronto players straining to bring every ounce of intensity to Gould’s concentrated leadership. Somehow he makes it work, and as a testimony to his extraordinary talent and career, this beautifully conceived album is mandatory in any collection worthy of the name.


FANFARE: Steven E. Ritter

• A truly legendary performance led by conductor Clemens Krauss, recorded at Bayreuth, 1953. • A stellar cast of Wagnerian singers, including Ramón Vinay (Parsifal), Martha Mödl (Kundry), Hermann Uhde and George London. • Clemens Krauss left precious few recordings before his untimely passing in 1954."