Richard WAGNER (1813 - 1883)
Die Walküre - Acts I and III
CD 1
Act I [63:05]
Set Svanholm (tenor) - Siegmund; Kirsten Flagstad (soprano) - Sieglinde; Arnold
van Mill (bass) - Hunding; Wiener Philharmoniker/Hans Knappertsbusch
CD 2
Act III [71:08]
Kirsten Flagstad (soprano) - Brünnhilde; Otto Edelmann (bass) - Wotan;
Marianne Schech (soprano) - Sieglinde; Oda Balsborg (soprano) - Gerhilde; Ilona
Steingruber (soprano) - Ortlinde; Grace Hoffman (mezzo) - Waltraute; Margaret
Bence (contralto) - Schwertleite; Claire Watson (soprano) - Helmwige; Frieda
Roesler (soprano) - Grimgerde; Annie Delorie (mezzo) - Siegrune; Hetty Plümacher
(contralto) - Roßweiße; Wiener Philharmoniker/Sir Georg Solti
rec. Grosser Saal, Musikverein, Vienna, Austria, 13-17 May 1957 (Act III);
Sofiensaal, Vienna, Austria, October 1957 (Act I)
DECCA ELOQUENCE 480 1892 [63:05 + 71:08]
When Kirsten Flagstad signed a contract with Decca she was already past sixty
but her voice was still intact. She had the experience and stamina to carry
through a comprehensive recording schedule during the next few years. For EMI
she had set down Tristan und Isolde under Furtwängler and Dido
and Aeneas under Geraint Jones. Now came - also with Jones - Gluck’s Alceste.
Somewhat later she took the role as Fricka in Solti’s Das Rheingold,
the first instalment in the first complete Ring des Nibelungen. Under
Solti she recorded the third act of Die Walküre and the first act
under Knappertsbusch. Decca also wanted her to set down act II, but Flagstad
was reluctant and in the end she only recorded the Todesverkündigung with
Solti and her long-time partner Set Svanholm. All these recordings and a great
number of song recitals are now being reissued by Eloquence on fifteen CDs.
In due time I will report on the total oeuvre.
These recordings of the two outer acts of Die Walküre are interesting
also for the conductors’ views, since we here meet two great Wagnerians
with almost diametrically opposite attitudes. Knappertsbusch was the great
epic master, shaping long arcs of continuity and stressing the inherent beauty
of the music; Solti was the dramatic, often stressing the thrill and intensity
of the moment. The openings of the two acts are instructive - and also well
suited to the two conductors’ temperaments. The act I prelude is no doubt
dramatic in its dark menace, but it is also a kind of story-telling. Wagner
paints the scene: outside a terrible storm, within Siegmund, exhausted and
with throbbing heart - not only for running to seek shelter from the storm
but also from as yet unknown pursuers. This is well depicted in Kna’s
reading. He also draws glowing playing from the VPO strings, alternately urging
them on and holding back. The cello solo before Siegmund’s Kühlende
Labung has rarely been so beautifully restrained. But beautiful as most
of the act is, it seems that there is some lack of adrenaline.
Solti’s Ride of the Walküre is among the most adrenaline
intense with roaring brass resounding across the imaginary stage. This is a
battle-call - not just a picture of the rocky landscape. And this feeling is
retained throughout the act, Solti wringing every drop of inherent power from
the score.
How much the conducting affects the singing is hard to say. The common denominator
in both acts is Kirsten Flagstad, and she doesn’t even impersonate the
same character. Sieglinde was her debut role at the Met in 1935, when she became the Wagner
soprano overnight, but she sang it rather infrequently after that and by 1957
sounded too matronly for the role. She was still able to lighten the tone but
by and large it is a Brünnhilde we hear. There is no denying, however,
that her vocal powers were largely undiminished and in the final scene - which
in effect is one long love duet with ever-increasing ecstasy - she delivers
glorious singing, with Du bist der Lenz as the crowning glory. We must
certainly be grateful that her adoption of this role has been preserved for
posterity.
At her side Set Svanholm, with whom she regularly appeared on both sides of
the Atlantic, is a pillar of strength. His was a voice with a lot of gleaming
steel in it but he could also be restrained. He begins Winterstürme softly
and gradually increases the intensity, making this one of the more memorable
versions of the song. Before that he has been at his most heroic in Ein
Schwert verhiess mir der Vater, where the cries of Wälse, Wälse are
formidable.
To match these two veterans, Decca chose the fairly young Dutch bass Arnold
van Mill for the role of Hunding. Van Mill had been singing at Bayreuth since
the reopening of the festival in 1951 and had a long career in various roles.
His was a warm and baritonal voice, treated with almost bel canto elegance
- but he lacked the black malevolence of a Gottlob Frick or a Matti Salminen.
It may not be necessary that an evil character is portrayed gnashing teeth
and spitting venom but in particular on record there has to be something frightening.
Van Mill is more a Hans Sachs.
Though there are several drawbacks with this performance I maintain that we
are privileged to be able to hear two of the greatest Wagner singers from the
previous century in such good shape and in a recording produced by John Culshaw
and Erik Smith that is still fully acceptable.
The third act, recorded a few months earlier, finds Flagstad in her element
as Brünnhilde. Solti’s complete recording of Die Walküre had
to wait another ten years, but this act is no mere run-through, and even though
it isn’t the spectacular sonic experience of the complete Ring, it
is a worthy product. The supporting cast is also well chosen. Among the walküres
we find names like Ilona Steingruber, Hetty Plümacher, a young Claire
Watson and Grace Hoffman, who graced (excuse the pun) several important recordings
during the 1950s and 1960s. Marianne Schech was an experienced Strauss and
Wagner singer and though initially she sounds rather pale, she blossoms and
sings gloriously in O hehrstes Wunder.
Otto Edelmann, one of the great basses of his day, was famous for his Baron
Ochs in Der Rosenkavalier and several Wagner roles. Here he sings Wotan
with stern authority, sometimes rather heavy and foursquare, and many of his
top notes are severely strained. Still he manages to make something memorable
of many of the key moments, but he is no match for Hans Hotter in this role.
By 1967, when Solti’s Walküre was issued, Hotter was past
his best and his voice was frayed and vibrato-laden, but he was still able
to turn a phrase memorably. There is however a separate recording of the second
half of act III, made in 1957, the same year as this set, with Leopold Ludwig
conducting and Birgit Nilsson as Brünnhilde. There Hotter is heard in
all his magnificence. That disc - now on Testament - should be in every collection
as a corrective to whatever other version(s) one has.
And what about Flagstad? It is a monumental reading, sensitive and glorious
and sung with admirably steady tone. No one can really mistake this singer
for a young or middle-aged woman but no one could believe either that it is
a woman of sixty-two with behind her a career of forty-four years, the last
twenty devoted to heavy-weight roles like Isolde, Brünnhilde and Fidelio.
Then it’s a matter of personal taste if one prefers the silver-white
brilliance of Birgit Nilsson or the bronze-tinted magnificence of Flagstad.
At any rate this is a recording that will forever serve as one model
for how Brünnhilde should be interpreted.
Göran Forsling