Wagner: Götterdämmerung, WWV 86d [Recorded 1949]

Giuseppe Di Stefano in San Francisco (Live)

For the first time, the complete Beyreuth Ring from 1962 is being released on this magnificent 4-volume collection. This legendary performance is conducted by Rudolf Kempe, and features Hans Hopf as Siegfried, Gottlob Frick as Hagen, and Birgit Nilsson as Brunnhilde. Gotterdammerung is the fourth of Wagner’s four music dramas that make up his epic Der Ring des Nibelungen.

Wagner: Das Rheingold, WWV 86a [Recorded 1948]

Strauss: Die Fledermaus (1951)

ERNANI: DEL MONACO-WARREN-SIEP

Wagner: Die Walküre, WWV 86b [Recorded 1960]

With more than a dozen separate performances of Norma starring Maria Callas to choose from, recorded between 1949 and 1965 (including two for EMI; the others all “private”), what’s a person to do? Since it’s absolutely necessary for every fan of great singing and/or this opera to own at least one, no matter how many Sutherlands or Caballés are already in their collection, I recommend this one.

It has long been my favorite, but almost every edition on discs (except for the one on Opera d’Oro) has had pitch problems: in the middle of the first Norma/Adalgisa duet, the pitch sneaks up to make the scene almost a half-tone sharp, and after a normalization, does so again at “Ei tornera”, although not quite so drastically, until the end of the opera. (I’m referring specifically to the Fonit-Cetra release of 1986, but most of the others have been the same.) This may not seem drastic to many, but it slightly alters the tone of all the voices–Mario del Monaco sounds like a gigantic mouse at times–and skews the drama, even if the speeding up does add a sense of false urgency. This new Myto edition claims to have corrected these problems, and indeed it has. The sound remains excellent 1955 broadcast, by the way.

And Callas is in her easiest, most expressive, trouble-free voice. Just listen to the “Casta diva”–impeccably sculpted, words and text perfectly combined, sung with scrupulous attention to dynamics. And the bridge between it and the cabaletta, “Fine al rito”, is half statement, half thinking out loud. “Ah, bello a me ritorna” is sung with such assuredness that you’d be fooled into thinking this music was easy–truly bel canto, making song as expressive as ballet and speech together. Callas is remarkably tender with Adalgisa in their first duet beginning “Ah! Rimembranza”, singing with a smooth-as-silk legato. And later on in the opera her rage is terrifying, lashing out at Pollione with (what seems like) clenched teeth.

Ebe Stignani, who had been singing for more than 30 years when this was recorded, still makes a formidable, believable Adalgisa despite sounding more than mature; her phrasing and sensitivity to the music and text put all criticism on the back burner and she and Callas seem to have nothing but respect for one another in their duets. Mario del Monaco is his normal, reliable, leather-lunged self, offering thrills galore. You get the feeling that he’s even trying to temper his delivery with the occasional caressed phrase, but he can’t resist making huge sounds. You cannot argue with the ordinary, vaguely bland but solid Oroveso of Giuseppe Modesti. Tullio Serafin leads masterfully, but the usual pre-Sutherland cuts are made to this opera. This is very highly recommended.

-- Robert Levine, ClassicsToday.com

With the war raging in Europe, and a mere five days after the D-Day invasion which precipitated the eventual end of the conflagration in the European theater, this performance on a much smaller, less consequential but on its own terms no less historic theater stage in Vienna of Richard Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos was given and recorded. Despite the troubling facts that orbit these wartime performances more generally, for those who know operatic history, the singing cast, including Irmgard Seefried, Paul Schöffler, Max Lorenz and Maria Reining is truly a legendary one, as is the conductor Karl Böhm.

This live April, 1957 performance of Gaetano Donizetti's Anna Bolena has been dubbed by some critics and reviewers as the best Anna Bolena on record, and have also anointed this version the best sounding issue it's had, or at least far better than any previously released editions from other labels. For this release, Myto utilized the original Scala master tapes without filtering - just the original sound as it was then recorded. Conductor Gianandrea Gavazzeni heads a spectacular cast that includes Maria Callas, Giulietta Simionato, Gianni Raimondi and Nicola-Rossi Lemeni.

AIDA: WELITSCH-VINAY-HARSHAW-M