Charles GOUNOD (1818 – 1893)
Faust
1. Salut! Demeure chaste et pure² [5:01]
Georges BIZET (1837 – 1875)
Les Pecheurs de perles
2. Au fond du temple saint ¹² [4:40]
Carmen
3. La fleur que tu m’avais jetée² [4:08]
Giacomo MEYERBEER (1791 – 1864)
L’Africaine
4. O Paradiso!² [3:34]
Giuseppe VERDI (1813 – 1901)
Don Carlo
5. Io l’ho perduta!¹² [10:30]
Rigoletto
6. Cortigiani, vil razza dannata¹ [4:26]
Il trovatore
7. Il balen del suo sorriso¹ [3:14]
La forza del destino
8. Solenne in quest’ora¹² [4:15]
Un ballo in maschera
9. Eri tu¹ [4:15]
Otello
10. Credo in un Dio crudel¹ [4:45]
11. Si, pel ciel¹² [4:29]
Pietro MASCAGNI (1863 – 1945)
Cavalleria rusticana
12. Il cavallo scalpita¹ [2:44]
13. Mama, quell vino è generoso² [3:58]
Ruggiero LEONCAVALLO (1858 – 1919)
Pagliacci
14. Si può? Si Può?¹ [4:57]
15. Vesti la giubba² [4:00]
Giacomo PUCCINI (1858 – 1924)
La bohème
16. Che gelida manina² [5:11]
17. O mimi, tu più non torni¹² [4:14]
Jussi Björling (tenor)², Robert Merrill (baritone)¹, RCA Victor Orchestra/Renato Cellini (1, 2, 4, 5, 8, 11, 15, 16, 17); Arthur Fiedler (6, 7, 9, 10, 12, 14); Swedish Radio Orchestra/Nils Grevillius (3; 13)
rec. New York, November 1949 (6, 7, 9, 10 12, 14); November 1950 (5); January 1951 (2, 8, 11, 16, 17); March 1951 (1, 4, 15); Stockholm, September 1950 (3, 13)
NIMBUS NI 7945 [78:31]

This disc is a gem.


There are few recordings of the same vintage – or indeed from any period of recorded history – that have been so frequently issued and reissued than the five legendary duets that Björling and Merrill set down in 1950-51. One can wonder if there is one single lover of great singing that doesn’t have a copy. I hope that there is still a market and that new generations will be able to discover gems from earlier times. These duets are among the most luminous of all. Björling and Merrill took part in the premiere of the new production of Don Carlo at the Metropolitan Opera on 6 November 1950, a performance that was televised. Less than a week later the same cast appeared in a radio broadcast, from which there exist excerpts issued on record. On 30 November RCA Victor and HMV in a joint effort recorded the long duet in a New York studio with Renato Cellini conducting. It was issued in Europe on HMV DB 21622 (78 rpm) and in the US on a 45 rpm disc (ERB-7027) and after that probably everyone – with the possible exception of Harald Henrysson, the curator of the Jussi Björling Museum – has lost count of the number of issues. Just a month later they were back in the studio and recorded four more duets, including the one from The Pearl Fishers, which has been one the most requested recordings ever since.

What is the secret of their popularity? The music of course, but with so many other recordings to choose from this is hardly the main reason. The quality of the recordings is no more than adequate for the period and the playing of the studio orchestra is professional but no more so than on other recordings. But the singing is special. Not only do the two voices blend so well, they are also clearly contrasted, which is especially obvious in Solenne in quest’ora from La forza del destino. Björling, who never sang Forza on stage, opens with hushed lyrical singing, far removed from some world-famous singers who try to break the sound-barrier, and then comes Merrill, who sang his role, he even recorded it with Thomas Schippers in the 1960s, and attacks the music with considerably more power. They recorded the Bohème duet a few years later in the complete recording with Beecham, who perhaps is more individual but whose slow tempo also makes it slightly turgid. Cellini has a more natural flow. Maybe the most interesting item is the Otello duet. The title role is the pinnacle for an Italianate tenor and Björling wanted to sing it but he wished to wait some years until his voice had darkened. It did, which can be heard on his later recordings, but before he was ready for the role death intervened, a fate that also fell upon Caruso a generation earlier. Neither of them reached the age of fifty. That Björling had the measure for some aspects of the role as early as 1951 is obvious from this duet, which actually is one of the more strenuous scenes in the opera. Merrill had recorded Iago’s Credo a year earlier – included here – and he returned to the aria for a later recital, recorded in Rome in 1956 in connection with the complete Rigoletto, where both singers participated.

Even in 1949 Merrill’s voice was one of the most beautiful and brilliant, surpassing even contemporaries like Warren, Gobbi and Bastianini, though falling short on interpretative depth. One can compare in detail his early readings with those from the mid-fifties and again – in Trovatore and Rigoletto – with complete recordings from the early sixties. The voice has not aged all that much but neither have the readings. He is no cipher dramatically but his readings are of the all-purpose kind that could without great loss be interchangeable between operas. Even so it is a special pleasure to listen to him for the supreme singing and these recordings with Arthur Fiedler are relative rarities in the reissue catalogues and therefore especially welcome.

This also goes for Björling’s recordings of roughly the same period. We find his aria recordings from the late thirties and early forties on sundry labels but these sides – there are also arias from Aida and La Gioconda from the same session as Che gelida manina and the two Tosca arias recorded with Grevillius at a session the week before the Carmen and Cavalleria arias – have been largely forgotten. This is a pity since they show Björling at the absolute peak of his powers, having honed them on numerous performances and recitals while still with the voice in mint condition.

If you haven’t got the duets, by all means buy the disc for them – they have rarely been challenged and never surpassed> however even if you do have them in threefold versions this disc remains a gem for the sake of the arias.

-- Göran Forsling, MusicWeb International

Despite the (mainly traditional) cuts, this 1955 BBC broadcast is treasurable. Not only does it feature Joan Sutherland’s touchingly pure and limpid Euryanthe – a role she only sang this once – but it also extends the small discography of Frans Vroons, in a lyric-heroic role which could have been written for him. Marianne Schech and Otakar Kraus are matchless villains, Kurt Bohme a comfortable King. Yet perhaps the performance’s prime virtue is the candescent conducting of Fritz Stiedry. His visionary readings of the familiar Overture and the desolate Prelude to Act 3 are heightened by unusually good broadcast sound, captured by the late Richard Itter on state-of-the-art equipment. This thrilling Euryanthe fully vindicates Weber’s – and Chezy’s –achievement.

-----

REVIEW:

Despite big cuts (including around 20 minutes’ worth of Act 3), this is a well-prepared performance of considerable merits. Not the least of these is the proof that Joan Sutherland could indeed have made a serious career in the dramatic German Fach: she sounds an outstandingly fluent and natural exponent of the titlerole. Conductor Fritz Stiedry’s preserved Wagner performances are often a little spotty but here he seems in well-ordered control of everything. All the other major roles are on committed top form.

– Gramophone

A vibrant sense of identification and technical control at its most impressive.

If you’ve been following the Nimbus Milanov releases you’ll know that their earlier foray into her recorded legacy was a Milanov sings Verdi disc (see review). There, in all her opulent and passionate splendour, she proved herself a legendary heroine, a Verdian of unimpeachable, sometimes torrential expressive qualities. But it was the more thoughtful and delicately deployed moments in her singing that also linger in the mind – her absolute control of pianissimi, the sheer refinement of much of what she did. And that leads one to this latest Milanov disc of aria antiche, lieder, and national folk songs.

The recital starts with that old standby Caro mio ben. Note that the portamenti – always a feature of her art - are relatively discreet, the voice not over-scaled, the chest voice lightly deployed. It’s an imaginative, intelligent performance and contrasts quite firmly with that of many of her contemporaries in this repertoire. Schumann’s Widmung has the requisite urgency of utterance; her German is as ever excellent. Mondnacht is also well judged and she doesn’t do too much with it. The brace of Brahms songs is similarly accomplished, the lulling Wiegenlied especially. But it’s the Strauss songs that show her affinities best I think. Her vibrant sense of identification can be gauged best from Caecilie where the technical control is at its most impressive, though Zueignung is powerful in its own right.

The Yugoslav songs offer another avenue into appreciating Milanov. Some were composed by her brother, her accompanist for the bulk of these tracks, Bozidar Kunc. All are pleasurable. Bersa’s She Duš Dan has an unforced gravity and a near operatic intensity. And Kunc’s ?ežnja is full of urgent, almost florid romanticism, well suited to Milanov’s voice and sense of declamatory power. She brings affectionate refinement, scaled dynamics to The World is Empty. The Songs of Yugoslavia, songs arranged by Dr. Lujo Goranin, are accompanied by an anonymous pianist and violinist; the set was recorded in 1943 whereas everything else derives from sessions in 1955. Milanov’s portamento style is heard to good effect in these six songs. The Magyar influence is strong, tinged with Old Vienna in Gor ?ez jezero – beautifully controlled diminuendi from Milanov here – though elsewhere things are stylistically generic. In the main, though, romantic allure wins the day especially when performed so alluringly as here. There’s nothing in these songs as touching, or important, as the Czechoslovak songs Jarmila Novotna sang at around this time but that doesn’t lessen the impact of Milanov’s singing of them.

There’s residual hiss on the Yugoslav songs, as one would expect. Transfers are fine, the notes too and up to the expected standard.

-- Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International

This is indispensable for any opera collector or lover of great music. Sparkles and delights.

For anyone compiling a directory of the ‘greatest recordings’ of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra some nominations are easy to classify. Sir Thomas Beecham’s 1937/8 Berlin recording of Mozart’s The Magic Flute is certainly one of them. Originally re-mastered in 1991 it is pleasing to have this Nimbus set available in the catalogue.
 
Mozart’s The Magic Flute described as, “ An exotic fairy tale with mystical elements” ( The Penguin Concise Guide to Opera, ed. Amanda Holden, 2005) with a Masonic subplot is one of my favourite operas. I have seen several productions and last September (2009) was fortunate to attend Günter Krämer’s splendid contemporary staging at the Deutsche Oper, Berlin. Beecham’s celebrated version is a studio recording that he recorded at the Beethovensaal in Berlin principally in November 1937. Beecham had to return to Berlin in February/March 1938 for a couple more recording sessions and almost completed the score. Producer Walter Legge used a virtually all-German cast and it seems that he audaciously replaced a few members of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra strategically with players from the Berlin State Opera Orchestra. The Queen of the Night’s aria O zitt’re nicht, mein lieber Sohn ( Tremble not, my dear son) was the one set-piece that had to be recorded later in March with Bruno Seidler-Winkler conducting the Berlin State Opera Orchestra. Incidentally, Beecham chose to omit the spoken dialogue and also the majority of the recitative passages. The roles of the Three Boys are taken by female singers, the sopranos Irma Beilke and Carla Spletter with Rut Berglund, a contralto.
 
It seems that Beecham’s set was the first complete recording. As far as I know it was originally issued in mid-1938 by the HMV label as part of their Mozart Opera Society series. Over four volumes, two for each act, the set comprised nineteen 78rpm records.
 
Mozart’s composition of The Magic Flute in 1791 partially overlapped with his writing of the Requiem a score he never lived to complete. A couple of months before his death the composer was to conduct the opera’s première in September 1791 at the Theatre auf der Wieden, Vienna. It was an immediate success. It is testament to Mozart’s capacity that at a time towards the end of his life, tormented by failing physical and mental health, and mounting debts that he could write music of such vital energy, japery and fantasy. The success was such that following its première the opera was staged over 230 times in its first ten years at impresario Emanuel Schikaneder’s Theatre auf der Wieden.
 
The opera gets off to a flying start with Beecham’s rousing rendition of the Overture - so light and attractive and bursting with energy. The introduction to act one is impressive. In Zu Hilfe! Zu Hilfe! ( O help me, oh help me!) after being chased by a enormous serpent a near-breathless Tamino meets the Three Ladies who emerge from a temple to kill the reptile. The Three Ladies, servants to the Queen of the Night are compelling performers, splendidly blending their well balanced tones.
 
In Papageno’s air Der Vogelfänger bin ich ja ( My profession is bird catching, you know) the highly convincing Gerhard Hüsch displays his durable baritone with bright and clear diction in a performance that just skips with freshness. I enjoyed the glorious flute playing that accompanies Papageno. In his second act air Ein Mädchen oder Weibchen ( I’d like a young wife to comfort me) Papageno is dreaming of the future, with suggestions of despondency, whilst ringing his magic bells. Here the excellent Hüsch has lowered his voice to demonstrate a smooth and dusky timbre.
 
Burning with passion Helge Roswaenge as the love-struck Tamino gives a splendid performance of her air Dies Bildnis ist bezaubernd schön ( This image is captivating and beautiful). I was also impressed by the air Wie stark ist nicht dein Zauberton ( Now I see your powerful magic spell) where a joyous Tamino offers his gratitude to the Gods. With impressive assurance the tenor Roswaenge delivers his tender love song with vivid and penetrating enunciation, using only minimal vibrato.
 
As the Queen of the Night the girlish tones of Erna Berger would initially seem not sufficiently full for this mature and imposing character. Yet any casting reservations soon evaporate and Berger proves to be an inspired choice. In her aria O zittre nicht, mein lieber Sohn! ( Don’t be afraid, dear son) the soprano comes across as especially secure in her mid-top register. There is little noticeable vibrato to affect her light creamy timbre. Justly celebrated the Queen of the Night’s act two aria Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen ( My heart is afire with hellish vengeance) makes considerable coloratura demands that the impressive Berger, if a touch deliberately, surmounts with a thrilling and vehement attack.
 
Wilhelm Strienz performs Sarastro’s act two air with chorus, O Isis und Osiris ( Oh Isis and Osiris), a prayer to the Gods in the temple to bestow the spirit of wisdom on Tamino and Papageno. The bass has a wonderfully rich and mellow timbre with a compelling and menacing quality. I was impressed by Strienz’s remarkable breath control during his extended vocal line. Sarastro’s air from the second act In diesen heil'gen Hallen ( Within this holy place revenge is unknown) is calm and is movingly delivered by Strienz with a deeply resonant power. In this splendid bass aria where Sarastro forgives Pamina and comforts her it would be hard to imagine more wonderful singing.
 
In the act two air Alles fühlt der Liebe Freuden ( Everyone feels the joys of love) Monostastos the Moor creeps into the garden and lovingly gazes upon Pamina who is asleep in a moonlit arbour. As Monostastos I found Heinrich Tessmer a softly expressive and flexibly voiced tenor who certainly does not disappoint.
 
The Queen of the Night’s daughter Pamina is sung by Tiana Lemnitz. With its lyrical vocal line probably the most beautiful air in all the opera is Ach, ich fühl's, es ist verschwunden ( Ah, I feel that it has vanished) from the second act. In an affecting performance the heartbroken Pamina, yearning for Tamino, is tenderly conveyed by Tiana Lemnitz. Sounding a touch too ripe for the part the soprano’s vibrato is evident but never interferes with the enjoyment. Lemnitz’s voice has considerable weight and I noticed how she is able to rapidly glide up the top of her range where she feels most comfortable.
 
Another highlight of the set is Pamina and Papageno’s first act duet Bei Männern, welche Liebe fühlen ( The gentle love of man and women) where the couple sing of the bliss and selflessness of the unison of two lovers. I was struck by the combination of the appealing soprano tones of Tiana Lemnitz so wonderfully set against the rock-solid baritone of Gerhard Hüsch.
 
From act two the trio between Pamina, Sarastro and Tamino Soll ich dich, Teurer, nicht mehr sehn? ( My love when we part, will I not see you again?) contains much splendid music as well as wonderful drama. This is a splendid example of voices that are exceptionally well contrasted. The Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra is in glowing form under Beecham’s assured direction.
 
For a seventy year old recording the sound quality, involving digital transfers from the original 78rpm discs, is remarkable. What it may lack in depth is made up for by Beecham’s sparking performance. The accompanying booklet contains two essays and a synopsis but does not include any texts. So frustratingly the listener is prevented from obtaining the full enjoyment of the performances by understanding the meaning of the carefully chosen words. This same Beecham performance of Mozart’s The Magic Flute is also available on Dutton 2CDEA 5011 and Naxos 8.110127-8.
 
Certainly this classic 1937/8 Berlin recording by Beecham of The Magic Flute is indispensable for any opera collector or lover of wonderful music. Casting a bewitching spell on the listener this performance just sparkles and delights.
 
-- Michael Cookson, MusicWeb International