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The Romantics Vol 4 - Schubert: Die Schöne Müllerin
God Bless the USA / United States Army Band & Chorus
The mission of the U.S. Army Band is to inspire America's soldiers and citizens with music. The men and women of this esteemed musical organization accomplish this mission thousands of times each year during performances in the nation's capital, throughout the country and around the world. Established by General of the Armies John J. Pershing in 1922, the U.S. Army Band is the official musical organization for many diplomatic and state functions at the White House, the Pentagon, the U.S. Capitol, at Arlington National Cemetery, and at the Tomb of the Unknown. Leading every Presidential Inaugural Parade since 1925, the U.S. Army Band, known a "Pershing's Own," has also represented the Nation at miliary ceremonies and special events around the world including the Edinburgh Military Tattoo in Scotland, The Kennedy Center Honors National Telecast and the opening of the 1984 and 1996 Olympic Games. It is with great pride that Altissimo! dedicates this recording, God Bless America, to all Americans around the world who serve the cause of freedom.
Voices From The Past: Bela Bartok's 44 Duos & Original Field Recordings
Aaron Helgeson: Poems of Sheer Nothingness
Jeffreys: Idylls and Élégies
Mahler: Das Lied von der Erde - Leider eines fahrenden Gesel
Sospiro - Alessandro Grandi: Complete Arias, 1626 / Roach
This is the première recording of Alessandro Grandi’s complete arias for solo voice from his third volume of 1626, performed here by tenor Bud Roach as they would have been commonly heard at the time of their publication: with the singer accompanying himself on the baroque guitar. A contemporary of Claudio Monteverdi, Grandi found his greatest success with cantatas and arias for solo voice. These secular songs were among the most popular in Venice throughout the third decade of the 17th century, and are considered to represent the apogee of the genre. Like many of the song collections published by Vincenti, this volume includes “alfabeto” notation for the strummed Spanish guitar. - Musica Omnia
Gamelan Son of Lion: Sonogram
Martha Modl: The Portrait Of A Legend
MARTHA MÖDL: THE PORTAIT OF A LEGEND • Martha Mödl (sop, ms); various vocalists; various conductors; various orchestras • PROFIL 12006 (2 CDs: 158:17) Live: 1950–82
WAGNER Rienzi: Gerechter Gott! Tristan und Isolde: Doch nun von Tristan; Begehrt, Herrin was ihr wünscht; War Morold dir so wert; Nicht Hörnerschall tönt so hold; Dein Werk? O tör’ge Magd! So stürben wir, um ungetrennt; Mild und leise. Wesendonck Lieder. Die Walküre: Der Männer sippe; Du bist der Lenz. Götterdämmerung: Starke Scheite … Grane, mein Ross, sei mir gegrüsst. R. STRAUSS Elektra: Was willst du? Seht doch dort! FORTNER Bluthochzeit: Nachbarinnen! Mit einem Messer. REIMANN Melusine: Heut, hier und jetzt wird es entschieden. TCHAIKOVSKY Pique Dame: Schweigt doch endlich! BEETHOVEN Bitten. Die liebe des Nächsten. Vom Tode. Die ehre Gottes aus der Natur. Gottes Macht und Vorsehung. Bußlied
I can’t claim to be an expert on the recordings of Martha Mödl, but to the best of my knowledge Profil has issued all of these for the very first time. At least, the company claims so on the CD insert, and I for one have never seen commercial recordings by her of Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder or any of the Beethoven songs.
Mödl’s strengths as a singer were, ironically, her defects as well. Although she had a superb voice that was well trained, once she was onstage singing she let herself go in a way that was as exciting as it was harrowing. With no thought of technique, she threw herself into the music, often sacrificing tonal security or beauty for a complete identification with the character or words she was singing. The liner notes compare her to Callas, and that is a fair assessment, but I find it ironic to remember that she was not always considered a legend when she was still alive. I still recall, when Furtwängler’s RAI Ring cycle was issued on Seraphim LPs, how many critics who shall remain nameless actually apologized for Mödl’s contribution, although, to be fair, they usually added that when you saw her in person you overlooked the explosive, blown-out high notes because of the intensity of her interpretations. I also heard from an acquaintance of mine that once, in a performance of Elektra with Astrid Varnay in the title role and Mödl as Klytemnestra (which she sings in the excerpt on this set), Varnay got so caught up listening to Mödl that she almost forgot to re-enter.
From a strictly vocal standpoint, her voice is under better control on CD 2 than it is on CD 1. So many of the high notes on the first disc are attacked with such vehemence that you are almost afraid that she is going to blow the voice out, then and there, especially the two high Cs (feared by Flagstad, but apparently not by Mödl) in Isolde’s act I curse. Ludwig Suthaus was a fine singer, but not necessarily for Tristan, which lay very uncomfortably in his range, but he gives it the old college try and, sparked by Mödl, is far more intense here than in his 1952 commercial recording with Flagstad and Furtwängler. The Tristan excerpts go back and forth between two different venues and three different performances (the love duet excerpt with Wolfgang Windgassen was performed at London’s Royal Festival Hall, but not, apparently, with the Royal Philharmonic), and the singers sound rather off-mike in the 1958 Munich performance, but regardless of time or place Mödl is locked into the character with an almost psychic intensity. It’s interesting to hear such an intense vocal actress performing the Wesendonck Lieder , but this is where her high notes are more out of control than anywhere else in the set.
Turning to CD 2, we hear at the outset a much more in-control Mödl, her voice intense but warm and well placed for Sieglinde’s two act I excerpts and a phenomenal Immolation Scene from Götterdämmerung conducted by Georges Sebastian. Mödl often said that this was her favorite role of all, and she certainly makes you think the world is coming to an end! Following this, we jump a decade to a 1967 performance as Klytemnestra (unfortunately, not with Varnay) in which she is appropriately intense, but by now the voice has a wobble. The two excerpts from modern operas, Wolfgang Fortner’s Bluthochzeit and Aribert Reimann’s Melusine, are not really my kind of music (this is from the Ugly 12-Tone Era), but they do show that Mödl was not only a great stage actress but an excellent musician, capable of learning any style of music and infusing it with dramatic energy. The liner notes indicate that Reimann composed this scene especially for Mödl.
More interesting is her fascinating performance as the old Countess in Tchaikovsky’s Queen of Spades. Though sung in German (I hadn’t realized that Germany was still performing foreign operas in the vernacular as late as 1982), she delineates the character of the old woman with perfect feeling and a meaning for the text.
Oddly, this survey of Mödl’s career ends with the earliest performances on the set, a series of Beethoven Lieder from 1950. Her voice is at its freshest here (perhaps Profil wanted to leave us with that sound in our ears), her interpretations are all excellent and not all over the top, and it’s interesting that her accompanist is Michael Raucheisen, who had recorded a large group of Lieder performances with the legendary tenor Leo Slezak back around 1928. They make an excellent pair, and these readings are exceptionally fine in every respect.
Despite the flaws, this set is absolutely indispensable for Mödl fans (and I’m certainly one), for Wagner lovers, and for anyone who wants to hear one of the most intense artists of the 20th century. We’ve had so many cookie-cutter Wagner sopranos in recent years that it’s nice to remember a time when, for some of them at least, performing this music was more than a job. It was almost a matter of life and death.
FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley
Operetten Gala
Meyerbeer: Songs, Vol. 1
English Song Series 3 - Vaughan Williams: On Wenlock Edge, Five Mystical Songs
Includes song(s) by Ralph Vaughan Williams.
Savonlinna Opera Festival Christmas
2. Rauhaa, vain rauhaa/Peace, Perfect Peace 2:13
3. En etsi valtaa, loistoa/We Ask for Nothing Rich or Rare 3:56
4. Jo joutuu ilta/O'er Hill and Dale 2:06
5. Dies est laetitae/Herraa kaikki kiittäkää 2:05
6. Hiljaa, hiljaa helkkyellen/Softly, Softly Ringing 2:31
7. Sylvian joululaulu/Sylvia's Carol 3:50
8. Hiljainen joululaulu/The Peace of Christmas 3:51
9. Maa on niin kaunis/Schönter Herr Jesu 2:43
10. Jouluyö, juhlayö/Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht 4:13
11. On hanget korkeat nietokset/The Shining Snows are Driven High 3:07
12. Arkihuolesi kaikki heitä/Cast Off All Care 2:05
13. Enkelien joululaulu/The Angel's Carol 2:12
14. Mökit nukkuu lumiset/The Snowbound Cabins Sleep 3:27
15. Kun joulu valkeneepi/Now Christmas Is Come 1:37
16. Puer natus in Bethlehem/Synnytti piltin Beetlehem 1:02
17. Panis Angelicus/Leivästä enkelten 3:39
18. O, Jesulein süß/Oi, Jeesus, lapsi armainen 2:09
19. Santa Lucia/Pyhä Lucia 3:43
20. O Tannenbaum/Oi kuusipuu 2:32
21. White Christmas/Valkea joulu 3:45
Ritva-Liisa Korhonen, soprano
Eeva-Liisa Saarinen, mezzo soprano
Raimo Sirkiä, tenor
Jorma Silvasti, tenor
Peter Lindroos, tenor
Jorma Hynninen, baritone
Esa Ruuttunen, baritone
Matti Salminen, bass
Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra
Savonlinna Opera Festival Chorus
Kyösti Haatanen, conductor
English Song Series 2 - Somervell: Shropshire Lad, James Lee's Wife
Endechar: Lament for Spain
Paris Recital 1985
Il mito dell'opera: Cesare Valletti (Recorded 1950-1963)
Il mito dell'opera: Nicola Martinucci (Live)
20th-Century Women Composers: Amy Beach, Lili Boulanger, Rebecca Clarke
This exciting CD includes works by three influential composers. Amy Beach belonged to the group known as the "Boston Six", who preceded the generation of Copland, Gershwin, etc. Lili Boulanger is one of the most important composers, and Rebecca Clarke is, in this country, certainly well known. She was [also] one of the first women who completed regular formal music studies as a career. - Naxos Direct, (translated from German)
Vinaccesi: Cantatas & Sonatas
Beethoven And His Teachers: Music For Piano Four Hands / Bryant, Rachmanov
Performing on early 19th-century pianos from the Frederick Historic Piano Collection, competition prizewinners Dmitry Rachmanov, a Juilliard graduate, and Cullan Bryant, a graduate of Manhattan School of Music, explore the interrelationships between the keyboard music of Beethoven and his principal teachers in this fascinating double-album of rarities for piano four-hands, culminating in a revelatory account of the Great Fugue in Beethoven’s own keyboard arrangement. The distinctive sonorities of these highly esteemed period instruments transport the listener back to the time when Beethoven, his teachers or his own pupils, may have performed this music themselves for the first time.
Malipiero: Il canto della lontananza
ELLINGTON, Duke: From His Treasure Chest (1965-1972)
