Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

This is a Lohengrin sure to be welcomed by the true Wagnerian connoisseur. Offered complete for the first time on CD and re-mastered in 24bit/96kHz audio, Walhall’s Eternity Series brings to market a 1949 Moscow, USSR performance of the opera, sung in Russian. Evincing tremendous vocal power and voice control, Ivan Kozlovsky (1900-93), a lyric tenor then at his apex, heads the all-Russian cast; his performance ranks with those of the more familiar Wagnerian Lohengrins of the era, Melchior and Konya, in their respective primes. Samuil Samosud conducts the USSR Radio Symphony Orchestra and Chorus.

A mere two recorded examples testify to Hans Hotter in the role of Hans Sachs in Richard Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. This 1956 live Bayreuth recording is, for Hotter fans certainly, a must-have collectible, the bass-baritone in resplendent voice portraying a very human character as opposed to the god Wotan interpretations for which he is justly considered amongst the finest of the 20th c. singing actors in that role. The surrounding cast - Gre Browuenstijn, Wolfgang Windgassen, Dietrich-Fischer Dieskau, among others - under Andre Cluytens direction, could hardly be bettered.

Heinz Wallberg's intimate familiarity with the work (he conducted it on almost fifty separate occasions) can be heard throughout this 1961 performance of Richard Strauss' operatic masterpiece Der Rosenkavalier. Captured live at the Teatro Col�n, Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1961 with a stellar cast that included Regine Crespin and Fritz Wunderlich, among other Straussian notables, and offered here in 24bit/96kHz re-mastered sound, this is a recording to be set alongside those of Clemens Krauss, Karl B�hm and Herbert von Karajan, all famed and important 20th c. Strauss interpreters.

To give at least a sufficient performance of Palestrina by Hans Pfitzner (1869-1949) you need more than ten great singers as well an experienced conductor and an orchestra of the greatest proficiency. With Rudolf Kempe conducting the Vienna Philharmonic, and starring Max Lorenz in the leading role (his only recording in this role!) together with such mid-20th c. vocal luminaries as Elisabeth Söderström, Jean Madeira, Gottlob Frick, Ferdinand Frantz, Paul Schöffler and Walter Berry, et al., all three conditions for success are present in this 1955 performance. 24bit/96kHz re-mastered.

Swiss composer Othmar Schoeck (1886-1957) was known primarily for his art songs and song cycles. His one-act opera Penthesilea is his most well-known opera. The work was inspired by Heinrich von Kleist’s tragic play of the same name. Schoeck also wrote the libretto for the work. This production was recorded in Stuttgart in 1957, and features Martha Modl in the title role.

The great attraction of this Vienna 1950 performance of Mozart’s Idomeneo is dramatic soprano Gertrude Grob-Prandl, an Austrian singer spoken of in certain circles in nearly the same breath as that of Flagstad and Nilsson for her sheer vocal heft when discussing the great 20th c. Wagnerian sopranos. Tenor Horst Taubmann, Flamand in the 1942 premiere of Strauss’s Capriccio, stars as Idomeneo. The self-taught conductor Meinhard von Zallinger, then working in Vienna, and whom HC Robbins Landon called “highly professional”, leads the Vienna State Opera Choir and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra.

In the Summer of 1961, German Conductor Heinz Walberg Was in Charge of Teatro Colo?N's German Season and Decided to Present, Amongst Other Operatic Works, Mozart's Entfu?Hrung Aus Dem Serail. From a Time Prior to the Onrush of Historically-Informed Performances of Classical-Era Works, This Old-Fashioned (In the Best Sense of That Term) Production Featured a Cast Including Fritz Wunderlich As Belmonte, the Revered Anneliese Rothenberger, Renate Holm, Eugenio Valori, Who Sang at This Theater for Three Decades and Kurt Bohme, Whose Singing Career Lasted in Excess of Fifty Years.

Classical Music