A nostalgic recollection yes, but it's unlikely you've heard a performance like this at an evening concert in the park. The virtuosic playing of this classic Canadian Brass recording has always been jaw-dropping, and it's a wonderful example of how these five players can deliver a sound that matches a symphonic band. The arrangements are ideal, and the playing is magnificent - a real treat.

Classical Music

Felicity Lott's radiant singing has a glistening purity and brightness of tone. Her diction is immaculate and the sheer rapture of her phrasing is glorious to hear.

A distinguished Strauss disc, and how good to find it sponsored by a Scottish commercial firm. The SNO made many fine recordings under Sir Alexander Gibson and this achievement is obviously being prolonged by his successor Neeme Järvi, who has imparted his own precision to the playing. The orchestra now play with a smouldering intensity that can and does, when required, erupt with volcanic force. Em Heldenleben is just the work for this kind of corporate artistic personality and the best tribute I can pay to this performance is that it can stand comparison with Karajan's latest Berlin/DG recording; and Chandos offer better value for money by including the Four Last Songs.

The sound on the LP version is admirable. Recording balance is excellent and even the most complex and forceful sections of the score, such as the Battle scene, never sound congested. .15rvi is kinder to the Adversaries (music critics) than some of his colleagues: the SNO woodwind lack some of the spitefulness that this passage ideally requires. Edwin Paling's playing of the long violin solo depicting Strauss's wife, Pauline, is vividly characterized and technically beyond cavil. I was deeply moved by Jdrvi's interpretation of the final section, where the solo violin and solo horn contribute to his creation of a-truly noble tranquillity. One feature—unique among Ein Heldenleben recordings to the best of my knowledge—is that each of the work's six sections is banded, a very welcome idea.

Those fortunate enough to attend Glyndebourne know how well Felicity Lott sings operatic Strauss, so it is particularly pleasing that wider and larger audiences enjoy her outstanding performance of the Four Last Songs and can now have it on record. I have no hesitation in preferring it to Jessye Norman's over-praised Philips recording; for one thing, Järvi's tempos avoid Masur's ponderous treatment of this score. For another, the songs are sung in the order of the 1950 first performance, with "Beim schlafengehen" first (as on the Delia Casa/13611m classic 1953 Decca disc—nla). Emotionally this seems to me an improvement on the published sequence. Lott's radiant singing reminds me of Sena Jurinac in this music. It has a comparable glistening purity and brightness of tone. Her diction is immaculate and the sheer rapture of her phrasing–in a line like "Sommer lachelt erstaunt" and especially her profoundly moving delivery of "So tief im Abendrot" in the final song—is glorious to hear. The orchestral playing is luminous and rich in detail.

-- Gramophone [10/1987]

Schäfer is in magnificent form...fascinating.

This is Christine Schäfer’s debut release for Sony Classical. I have admired this German soprano’s voice since her 1997 Berlin recording of Mozart concert arias and Richard Strauss orchestral songs with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra under Claudio Abbado (Deutsche Grammophon 457 5822).
 
Throughout the booklet there are numerous pictures of Schäfer in artistic poses together with what looks like a cheese plant in four of the frames. To my untrained eye on the front cover Schäfer looks as if she has the hairstyle of a wealthy Parisian middle class women in the time of Marie Antoinette. All very arty but no more than I would expect from this superb and highly individual performer. There are eleven tracks and Schäfer sings on eight of them. I had the pleasure of hearing the DSO Berlin in concert last September at the Musikfest Berlin 2011 under Leo Hussain; the featured work was the Saint-Säens Symphony No. 3 C minor ‘ Organ’. As well as accompanying Schäfer this orchestra plays a fascinating if curious mix of three orchestral works. I was hearing the Overture from Amboise Thomas’s opera Raymond or Le secret de la reine for the first time. I loved this appealingly melodic score. The Adagietto from Bizet’s Arlésienne suite No. 1 is simply ravishing and their superb performance of Schoenberg’s Farben: Sommermorgen an einem See ( Colours: Summer Morning by a Lake) which is No. 3 from the Five Orchestral Pieces, Op. 16 has a stunning, cool beauty.
 
Christine Schäfer has selected her scores well in repertoire that ranges from the baroque of Handel to the sumptuous late-Romantic of Richard Strauss. The first score on the disc, the dramatic Sein wir wieder gut from Ariadne auf Naxos really tests the extremes and power of Schäfer’s range. Not surprisingly in this difficult aria the results felt a touch forced and not totally comfortable in the lower notes. Schäfer is eminently suited to Handel’s O sleep, why dost you leave me? This is sung with fine English diction and evident tenderness. I delighted in Schäfer’s creamy timbre in Bellini’s charming Ah! non credea mirarti from La Sonnambula. Her impressive coloratura is presented splendidly in Ambroise Thomas’s Je suis Titania from that sorely neglected opera Mignon. Most impressive of all is her Desdemona in Verdi’s dramatically presented Willow Song. Here she is in radiant form and explodes up to the highest notes to wonderful effect.
 
Recorded in the Teldex Studios, Berlin the sound quality is crystal clear and well balanced. I enjoyed this release from first note to last. It is good to see full texts included together with English translations.
 
Schäfer is in magnificent form in this fascinating Sony Classics release.

-- Michael Cookson, MusicWeb International

Richard Strauss's 'Arabella' is a lyric comedy that portrays hardships and obsessions in a society whose latebourgeois values are crumbling. An addiction to gambling has driven the family of cavalry officer Waldner into financial ruin, and their only hope for salvation lies in marrying off their daughter Arabella into a wealthy family. Strauss's orchestral opulence coupled with it's period Viennese setting has seen 'Arabella' perceived as a light-hearted comedy of errors, but Tobias Kratzer's multi-faceted production also explores the disunity between it's characters, spotlighting tensions that connect 19th-century Vienna to the present day.

Richard Strauss's 'Arabella' is a lyric comedy that portrays hardships and obsessions in a society whose latebourgeois values are crumbling. An addiction to gambling has driven the family of cavalry officer Waldner into financial ruin, and their only hope for salvation lies in marrying off their daughter Arabella into a wealthy family. Strauss's orchestral opulence coupled with it's period Viennese setting has seen 'Arabella' perceived as a light-hearted comedy of errors, but Tobias Kratzer's multi-faceted production also explores the disunity between it's characters, spotlighting tensions that connect 19th-century Vienna to the present day.

SINFONIA DOMESTICA

DON QUIXOTE

METAMORPHOSE

ALPENSINFONIE

Nimble mobility, fineness of accentuation, clarity in polyphonic textures and a lyricism which steers clear of emotionalism characterize Zinman'svision of Richard Strauss's orchestral works. As required, Strauss's arches of melody surge forwards, swell or soar to the heights. An excellentrecording.

DON JUAN

With his recording of the spectacular Beethoven symphony cycle and of Mozart's violin concertos David Zinman and the TonhalleOrchestra Zurich have finally established themselves as the first address for classical repertory. The successful co-operationwith ARTE NOVA is being continued with orchestral works by Richard Strauss.

STRAUSS, R.: Daphne

The melodrama, a genre in which a spoken text is declaimed over a musical accompaniment, was a popular form in the nineteenth century, but it failed to thrive in the twentieth. While performances of Strauss' 1897 setting of Tennyson's narrative poem "Enoch Arden" remain rare, it has aged well, and performances as fine as this are a testimony to its viability and its continuing ability to move the listener. Tennyson tells an achingly poignant story of three children, the two boys both growing to adulthood in love with the young woman, with delicacy and restraint. Strauss matches the story with a reserved but expressive piano accompaniment that supports and never overwhelms the narrative. Emanuel Ax plays with grace and deep feeling, but the focus falls on Patrick Stewart's brilliant and powerful performance. His subtle and nuanced telling is far more effective than an overtly impassioned one would have been, and the naturalness of his reading is hugely compelling and moving. Ax closes the album with two short piano pieces that Strauss wrote when he was still in his teens; they serve as a moving and cathartic epilogue to the melodrama. This extraordinary performance of Enoch Arden should be of strong interest to anyone intrigued by the mystery of the relationship between music and poetry.

-- Stephen Eddins, AllMusic.com