Romanian classical pianist Clara Haskil (1895-1960) was particularly well known for her brilliant interpretations of classical and early romantic repertoire, especially that of Mozart, Beethoven, and Schumann. Haskil didn’t gain much acclaim until the late 1940s because of a series of physical ailments mixed with crippling stage fright. The songs on this release are all live recordings from Haskil’s concerts, taken between 1947 and 1956, during the peak of her career.

This truly fantastic live set of the complete Beethoven symphonies plus select overtures as played by the Philharmonia Orchestra in Vienna in 1960 under the direction of the legendary conductor Otto Klemperer has now returned to the Andromeda catalog in completely re-mastered, superb 24bit/96kHz sound, taken directly from the original master tapes. It always a fascinating pastime to compare Klemperer’s live performances with his studio recordings of the identical works from the same period, as these come from around the time of his famous EMI late-‘50s recordings with the same orchestra.

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.

Pianist Giacomo Di Tollo's New CD, Released on Andromeda, Is a Paean to Both Italian Opera of the 19th C. And to the Glorious Romantic Tradition of Piano Transcription and Virtuosity That Grew Up Simultaneously with the Technological Advancements in Piano Construction Across the Century. Mr. Di Tollo's Choice of Repertoire, Obscure Works or Otherwise, Intrigues and Delights in It's Insistence on Broadening and Deepening Our Contemporary Knowledge and Listening Enjoyment of a Nearly Lost Yet Proud and Insightful Art Form.

The Brazilian-born composer Antônio Carlos Gomes (1836-96) found immediate success in Europe with Il Guarany, his first opera to be staged there, ensuring his reputation at the time despite being little-known today. As recently as two decades ago, however, this work was re-staged in Germany, by Werner Herzog no less, and starring Plácido Domingo! The highly authentic, idiomatic and definitive studio recording at hand, dating from Sao Paulo, 1959 here makes a welcome return to the active catalog.

The unforgettable passion and intensity that soprano Leonie Rysanek and baritone George London brought to their most famous pairing in Wagner's Der fliegende Hollander is well-represented here as well on this recording of a 1955 live performance of Tchaikovsky's Eugen Onegin, starring Ms. Rysanek as Tatyana and Mr. London as Onegin. Though already becoming less common at the time, the opera is sung in German translation rather than Russian for the Austrian audience in attendance. This historic recording has been remastered in 24bit/96kHz sound.

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.

Following his commercial recording of Parsifal in 1951, one can find a recorded live performance of Parsifal led by Hans Knappertsbusch, one of the finest mid-20th century Parsifal conductors, in every subsequent year up until 1964. + This 1958 Bayreuth undertaking features a cast including Hans Beirer, Jerome Hines and Régine Crespin who was making her Bayreuth debut in the role of Kundry here. + This 4-CD set has been newly re-mastered for this release.

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.

Wilhelm Furtwängler (1886-1954),one of the greatest of 20th century conductors, leads four equally distinguished mid-century violinists and three eminent European orchestras in live performances of violin concertos by Beethoven (Röhn, Berlin), Mendelssohn (de Vito, Torino), Brahms (Menuhin, Lucerne) and Sibelius (Kulenkampff, Berlin). + Recorded during and after WWII, these performances have been newly re-mastered for this release.

Austrian-born conductor Hans Rosbaud (1895-1962), noted champion of contemporary and Austro-German late romantic-era music, features here with an orchestra he came to be associated with and much-identified late in his career, the Southwest Radio-Symphony, Baden-Baden, in these mid-1950’s performances of four of Anton Bruckner’s monumental symphonies. +Includes the early Second, the lesser-known Fifth, the sublime Seventh, and the last fully completed, and towering, symphony, the Eighth.

This never-before-released-in-any-format, newly re-mastered, 1960 live performance of Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman features the soprano Anja Silja (b. 1940) as Senta in her electrifying Bayreuth Festival debut. +Ms. Silja was a sensational presence on the Bayreuth stage throughout the 1960’s. + Conducted by the eminent Wolfgang Sawallisch, this recording also features tenors Franz Crass and Fritz Uhl, and bass Josef Greindl, noted Wagnerians all, in leading roles.

American tenor and actor Mario Lanza (1921-1959) is the featured star on this two-disc set of newly re-mastered recordings from 1940-50, encompassing a time prior, on the whole, to his becoming a famed Hollywood star. +Features a varied menu of music from the Italian, French and American operatic and stage repertoire, including previously non-published recordings and rarities such as “Hallowen Suite”, “In A Persian Garden” and more.

•This legendary 1958, live in London mono recording of Giuseppe Verdi's (1813-1901) Don Carlo makes a welcome return to the active catalogue in improved sound due to a new master tapetransfer. This performance is considered one of the best of the currently available versions. With a cast including Jon Vickers, Gre Brouwenstijn and Tito Gobbi, among others and featuring the conducting genius of Carlo Maria Giulini, it's easy to understand why.

•Conductor Herbert von Karajan leads the Choir and Orchestra of the Vienna State Opera in this New Year's Eve performance of Johann Strauss's (1825-1899) ever-popular Die Fledermaus. This unique live recording insplendid sound features a spectacular cast of singers including Hilde Güden, Walter Berry, Rita Streich and a special guest appearance by Giuseppe di Stefano.

"•Wilhelm Mengelberg, the legendary and controversial conductor of the Gewandhaus Orchestra for fifty years (1895-1945), famed for his championing of both Richard Strauss and Gustav Mahler, is heard here conducting, among other Schubertian coimpositions,Schubert's final two symphonic masterpieces. • This set has received excellent reviews in the European music press."

Otto Klemperer is, to this day, still considered one of the great Bruckner conductors. His EMI studio recordings made in the 1960's remain benchmark reference recordings. This 3CD collection of live Bruckner recordings from the 1950's and 1960's, a welcome addition to his famed studio recordings, finds Klemperer leading three of the finest European orchestras. Newly remastered.

"A concert performance starring four of the greatest singers of the era (Wunderlich, Ludwig, Lipp and Berry). In this 1962 live performance, conductor Karl Böhm leading the Vienna Symphony and the Vienna Boys Choir. This is the only complete recording of Bach's St. Matthew Passion with tenor Fritz Wunderlich in the role of the Evangelist. Newly remastered."

MAHLER Das Lied von der Erde 1. Symphony No. 4 2. MOZART Symphony No. 38 3 • Bruno Walter, cond; 1 Kathleen Ferrier (alt); 1 Julius Patzak (ten); 2 Hilde Güden (sop); Vienna PO • ANDROMEDA 5041, mono (2 CDs: 139:50) Live: Vienna 1 05/17/1952, 2,3 11/06/1955


As I have previously provided fairly comprehensive discussions of Bruno Walter’s surviving performances of both Das Lied von der Erde (in 37:4) and the Symphony No. 4 (in 34:6), I can afford to be much briefer here. These discs are slightly remastered clones of releases originally issued by Andante ( Das Lied ) and DG (the two symphonies). The Mahler song cycle was part of a four-CD set devoted to Walter’s Mahler; it also featured the Mahler Fourth, but instead of the Mozart Symphony it included the three Mahler Lieder also sung by Güden on the same concert, whereas the DG single-disc release (as here) included the Mozart Symphony but omitted the songs. Except for the sound being remastered at a higher level and thus being more to the foreground—meaning simply that you can turn down the volume knob a notch here—the sound quality of the prior and present releases is identical. Unlike the elaborate Andante and DG issues, Andromeda provides no information other than the performers, track timings, and merely “1952–55” for the performance dates. However, both the Andante and DG releases are long out of print, and the rare used copy of either one that turns up on the Internet commands an exorbitant price, so one is grateful to Andromeda for making these performances available again, and at a very reasonable price to boot.


That is particularly the case because these are highly desirable items in the Walter discography. While this live Das Lied cannot match the concomitant Decca studio recording with the same forces for sheer sonic splendor, and has a flubbed entrance by Patzak at one point in the fifth song, the sound quality is still excellent and the performance has a sizzling electricity to it, with Patzak’s voice having noticeably more heft and amplitude. The Symphony No. 4 is one of Walter’s two greatest of his 12 surviving renditions of the work; it is rivaled only by the 1950 Vienna Philharmonic performance with Irmgard Seefried. While I very slightly prefer the 1950 performance as having a hair’s breadth more emotional intensity, and slightly prefer Seefried’s voice to Güden’s as a matter of subjective taste, this one has the superior recorded sound (again, very good for its time), and interpretively the two are virtually identical.


As for the Mozart, the “Prague” Symphony was long a Walter specialty, arguably the crown gem among his interpretations of the nine Mozart symphonies (Nos. 25, 28, 29, 35, 36, and 38–41) that the conductor kept in his active repertoire. Seven performances by him survive, four live and three studio:

12/18/1936	Vienna Philharmonic	(EMI/HMV, studio)
05/25/1954	Maggio Musicale Fiorentino	(Florence, live)
11/28/1954	New York Philharmonic	(New York, live)
12/06/1954	New York Philharmonic	(Columbia, studio)
05/05/1955	Orchestre National de la R. T. F.	(Paris, live)
11/06/1955	Vienna Philharmonic	(Vienna, live)
12/02/1959	Columbia Symphony Orchestra	(Columbia, studio)

For unknown reasons, the 1954 studio recording was not released until it appeared on CD in 1995 in Sony’s Bruno Walter Edition . (For anyone not aware of it, the entire 39-CD edition was reissued a year ago in a budget-priced LP-size boxed set; a far more convenient regular cube box edition, minus the new booklet essay in the LP-size version, can be had from Korea for about 50 percent more plus postage.) That was a crying shame, for it is a great performance, rivaled only by the live performances from New York in 1954 and this Vienna one from 1955. (The Vienna studio version and the live performances from Florence and Paris all suffer from inferior recorded sound and somewhat scrappy orchestral playing, while the 1959 stereo recording comes from Walter’s autumnal phase when his Mozart became somewhat ponderous.) If forced to live with only one version, I would go for the live 1954 New York version; its somewhat glassy and harsh (though vivid) recorded sound is more than compensated for by the absolutely electrifying energy of its first and third movements (the latter timing in at a blistering 3:48, including applause!) and exceptionally flowing middle movement. But that version is again long out of print and practically unobtainable; anyone who has either this Vienna outing or the New York studio version, both again in superior sound to that live New York performance, need not feel he is missing out on anything.


This set, then, features stellar performances of Mahler and Mozart masterpieces by the maestro who was during his lifetime arguably the greatest interpreter of both of those composers. As such, it commends itself to every serious collector of historic recordings; highest possible recommendation.


FANFARE: James A. Altena

"A commanding vocal and stage presence, bass-baritone George London, heard here in his only Elias recording, leads a noteworthy quartet of vocal soloists. Conductor Christopf von Dohnányi is best-known for his near twenty-year tenure as music director of the Cleveland Orchestra. Completed in 1846 after extensive revising, Elias proved to be Mendelssohn's last completed work of this scale and scope. Newly remastered."

"• Wilhelm Furtwängler is considered as one of the most important Bruckner conductors of all times. • With this box you can approve this easy. • All important live recordings of the Maestro collected in one Box set. • Includes his legendary war performances plus the unique No. 7 (appraised from all reviewers as one of the best recordings of the score) recording from Rom. • 6 CD Box"

THE ART OF ARTHUR GRUMIAUX • Arthur Grumiaux (vn); Frieder Weissmann 1 , Lorin Maazel 2 , Hans Müller-Kray 3 , Bernhard Paumgartner 4 , Carlo Maria Giulini 6 , Ernest Ansermet 8 , Ernest Bour 10 , cond; Riccardo Castagnone 5 , Hans Altmann 7 (pn); Hermann von Beckerath (vc); 9 RAI SO of Turin; 1 Cologne RSO; 2 South German RSO; 3 Mozarteum O; 4 Frankfurt RSO; 6 O de la Suisse Romande; 8 Bavarian RSO 10 • ANDROMEDA 9116, mono (4 CDs: 266:57) Live: Turin, Cologne, Mühlacker, Salzburg, Frankfurt, Munich 1951–62


MOZART 1 Violin Concerto No. 1 2 Violin Concerto No. 3. 3 Violin Concerto No. 4. 4 Violin Concerto No. 5. MENDELSSOHN 6 Violin Concerto in e. SCHUBERT 5 Violin Sonata in A. FRANCK 7 Violin Sonata in A. BRAHMS 8 Violin Concerto. CHAUSSON 1 Poème for Violin and Orchestra. RAVEL 9 Sonata for Violin and Cello. 1 Tzigane. STRAVINSKY 10 Violin Concerto. YSAŸE Sonata for Violin Solo, Ballade in d


Belgian violinist Arthur Grumiaux (1921–1986) was a fixture of the concert and recording scene when I was growing up. His playing was impeccably clean in style, utilizing a very narrow vibrato that gave his tone a lean yet shimmering sound, very little portamento, and enlivening inflections that provided a nice rhythmic “lift” to his performances. As this set clearly shows, his proclivities were, for the most part, towards Classical and Romantic composers, though he did play the Stravinsky and Berg concertos and Ravel sonata. According to Wikipedia, he made roughly 30 albums during his active career, mostly for the Dutch Philips label but also for EMI. He was, it seems, one of those violinists, like Nathan Milstein, who was admired as much if not more by his peers than by the general public, though of course he was always a top draw in concerts.


Since Grumiaux played most of these works so often (particularly the Mozart concertos, which he recorded complete for Philips with Colin Davis in 1961–62), there are several alternate performances of many of these pieces floating around; e.g., the Mozart No. 1 with Paumgartner and Nos. 3 and 4 with Moralt (the Concerto No. 5 with Paumgartner is on this set), the Mendelssohn Concerto with a very young Haitink, the Brahms with van Beinum, etc. The cover of this set announces that these live performances are all newly remastered in 24-bit/96 kHz sound.


I was particularly fascinated by his interpretation of the Schubert sonata: crisp, direct, and completely lacking in sentimentality, much like Toscanini’s performances of the Schubert symphonies. This is a performance that will thrill musically scrupulous listeners but not at all those who insist that their Schubert be full of Viennese schmaltz. Grumiaux’s version of the Mendelssohn Concerto is quite excellent as well, with surprisingly brisk conducting by Giulini; nothing is rushed, all the notes “sound” with perfect equipoise, yet there is tremendous élan in this reading (and sensitivity, too, relaxing the tempo here and there and playing an absolutely ethereal first-movement cadenza). Because he was Belgian, Grumiaux was sometimes compared to his great predecessor Ysaÿe, but to my ears his sweet, lean tone had much more in common with Sarasate than with Ysaÿe’s somewhat darker sound. As a matter of fact, I felt that Grumiaux’s lean sonority and objectivist approach didn’t work for me in the Franck Sonata or Brahms Concerto, the only performances on the set that I found too uninvolved. I was, however, fascinated by the way he played Ravel, which (as it turns out) was much like his Stravinsky: lean, angular contours, no sentimentality at all, and a way of bringing out the structure without unduly overstressing it. Indeed, the entire last CD was a gem from start to finish.


Your proclivity to acquire this set will probably have as much to do with your desire to own every note Grumiaux ever recorded if you already have most of the studio versions, especially since we are dealing here with monophonic radio sound of varying quality (rather dry in the Turin broadcasts, somewhat roomier and warmer in the German airchecks), particularly since this set is selling for the somewhat hefty price of $52 on Amazon. However, I can attest that Andromeda did a whale of a job cleaning up the sound so that everything sounds clear without the least bit of distortion, particularly in the sound of the string sections of each orchestra, and there is no question that Grumiaux is interesting to hear from start to finish.


FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

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

WAGNER Parsifal • Hans Knappertsbusch, cond; Wolfgang Windgassen ( Parsifal ); Martha Mödl ( Kundry ); George London ( Amfortas ); Herman Uhde ( Klingsor ); Ludwig Weber ( Gurnemanz ); Kurt Böhme ( Titurel ); Rita Streich, Erika Zimmermann, Hanna Ludwig, Hertha Töpper, Ruth Siewert ( Flower Maidens ); Karl Terkal, Werner Faulhaber ( Grail Knights ); Bayreuth Festival Ch & O • ANDROMEDA 5161, mono (4 CDs: 262:37) Live: Bayreuth 8/1/1952


Once again we have an historic Bayreuth recording from the early Wieland Wagner era, in this case Parsifal under the baton of its once-high priest Knappertsbusch. Possibly due to the overall quieter music, the harsh orchestral sound quality heard on the 1954 Tannhäuser (see my review below) is absent, and if anything the beautiful Bayreuth “sound” permeates this entire performance. Unlike the Tannhäuser, which had formerly appeared on LPs as far back as 1961 and came out on several CD incarnations, this particular Parsifal has only been available (according to the highly reputable web site Opera Discography) on three previous issues, all CD: Melodram, Archipel, and Cantus Classics.


With all due respect to those who enjoy Knappertsbusch’s early-1960s performances (the commercial recording on Philips or the “pirate” version with Jon Vickers), this one simply has more tension and a greater orchestral “sheen” despite the mono sound. And, for me, this cast is simply outstanding in every way. In addition, because of the better orchestral sound, I prefer it to Kna’s 1951 commercially released Decca-London performance from back in the LP days with almost the same principals (except that Arnold van Mill sang Titurel). The one big question mark I had in mind prior to hearing it was Ludwig Weber, a bass who never quite impressed me as both a great voice and a great singing-actor, yet his Gurnemanz in this performance is absolutely first-rate in every respect. The other role I worried about, not vocally but histrionically, was that of the title character, knowing full well that for all his virtues in virtually the entire Wagner canon otherwise, Wolfgang Windgassen was never noted as the most lively or interesting of vocal or stage actors, but he, too, is better than I expected. I suspect that Knappertsbusch’s superb guidance was the answer. Of course, insofar as this conductor and this opera go, they were a perfect artistic match regardless of era (yes, even the 1962 studio recording is good), but to be honest I find his conducting less mannered here, more direct and just as eloquent.


As for the other principals, they are, to my ears, the best in their roles (though I came to appreciate Parsifal rather late, I’ve indeed become a convert and have caught up by listening to several performances through the decades). Mödl’s value always was as much, if not more, as an actress than purely as a singer, and I have admired her ever since Furtwängler’s RAI Ring came out on Seraphim LPs many moons ago. Of modern Kundrys I especially love Waltraud Meier, and purely from a vocal angle her Kundry is better, but Mödl almost gives you the character in 3D. No passive, subservient Kundry she! Mödl’s Kundry, in fact, almost sounds confrontational in the first act, as if she is tired of being treated as a pariah by Gurnemanz and isn’t going to take it any more, and in the second she is pleading with Parsifal rather than just trying to be seductive. And, of course, Amfortas was one of George London’s great roles, so overall we have about as solid a cast (vocally as well as histrionically) as you could hope for. As much as I admire Hans Hotter as a vocal actor, he was simply past his vocal prime after 1957 or so, therefore as much as I like his acting, his singing in the 1962 recording is no match for Weber’s.


And then there is the Bayreuth “sound.” As much as I can like other performances and recordings of Wagner’s music dramas, by and large I am drawn to those that emanated from the Green Hill because of its unusual two-second “decay,” which always seems to add something to the music. Between that aspect of the recording and the magnificent performances, one may wish for the visual element but it isn’t necessary. Somehow or other, Kna manages to conjure up the visuals in your mind as you listen, and even in ancient mono you seem to get a sense of “space” in the sonics that just doesn’t exist in others’ performances, no matter how good—and I, for one, was really blown away by the Metropolitan Opera’s 2012–13 production of this opera when it was broadcast, especially by Jonas Kaufmann’s stellar interpretation of the title role. That one may yet supplant this in my mind (and collection) if and when it comes out on DVD, but in the meantime I could easily live with this recording to the end of my days.


FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

• 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."