Richard STRAUSS Elektra - CHALLENGE CLASSICS CC72565 SACD [PCG]: Classical Music Reviews

Everything about this set is very nearly perfect. The booklet, a handsome volume with the CDs inserted in pockets at front and rear, gives informative essays on the work in English, German and Dutch although the text of the libretto is only given in German. The performance, taken live from the stage of the Netherlands Opera, is almost totally free from the errors one might regard as inevitable in such a complex score - the only trivial mishap occurs when Evelyn Herlitzius enters slightly late with her cry of “Triff noch einmal!” The recording balances are virtually ideal, and we are able to hear all sorts of orchestral detail which are frequently masked - for example, the startling entry of the organ in the final bars - and which make the score sound even more modern than usual. The singers are all well within their roles, and relish the many unexpected opportunities for delicate and expressive phrasing as well as the dramatic moments. The conductor manages to correlate the many subtle changes of speed with assurance and naturalness. The break between the two CDs is made at a more suitable place than in most other sets. Indeed, in nearly all ways this is a truly great performance and recording which should easily rise to the top of the list.

But, but…there is the matter of stage cuts. Strauss himself authorised two abridgements of his music, both removing a matter of four or five pages from the vocal score. It is not at all clear why he allowed this, given that the work is not long. There are suggestions that the passages in question, salaciously bloodthirsty in one case and hinting at a lesbian attraction between the sisters in the other, were offensive to would-be censors (although Salome had been performed without any such cuts); but the intention was also presumably to spare strain on the singer taking the title role. Whatever the reason the cuts are utterly intolerable in a recording in the present day and age, no matter how often they have been followed in stage productions ever since Strauss’s day. If Strauss really intended these passages to be permanently excised, he would have simply removed them from the score, as he did with his revisions to Guntram. He left them to stand, which means that he only countenanced their omission under pressure of circumstances. The music is not inferior to any other part of the score, and listeners should be allowed the chance to hear it. As it so happens there are still only two recordings of Elektra which give us the score complete - those conducted by Sir Georg Solti (Decca) and Wolfgang Sawallisch (EMI) - and any performance which makes the cuts that we have here can only be regarded as a second-best supplement to one of the truly complete sets.

What makes this situation worse is the fact that Evelyn Herlitzius clearly does not stand in need of any abridgement of her role. At the very beginning she is slightly unsteady, and at no time does she produce the rock-solid steely resolution of Birgit Nilsson for Solti; but she very soon settles down, and after her opening monologue is out of the way she is a tower of strength. She manages some really beautiful soft singing in the recognition scene, and responds to Hoffmansthal’s text with real subtlety. She is well matched with Camilla Nylund as her sister, and the duet between the two sisters at the end of the opera is a case of real give-and-take between the singers.

As their nightmare-ridden mother Michaela Schuster is also more subtle than usual. She sounds almost nervously shy in the extraordinary passage as she describes her dreams, where Strauss’s music pushes chromatic tonality to its limits. She omits her spoken commands for “Lichter!” and “Mehr Lichter!” when she hears of Orestes’ death, but gives us some truly menacing laughter and some heart-rending cries from offstage when she is murdered. As her lover Hubert Dalamboye is a heldentenor rather than a character tenor, although he sounds severely strained by Strauss’s demand for a top B; one reads in his biography that he is already singing Tristan and Tannhäuser. Similarly Gerd Grochowski is currently singing Wotan, and his rock-steady voice as Orest is a model of sensitivity. The scene of recognition between him and his sister is a beautiful lyrical interlude, sung with real affection on both sides. The other small roles are all satisfactorily taken, and the chorus is excellent in their small contribution.

Last year when I reviewed the old 1944 Jochum set of this opera (review) I made an appeal for Chandos to release the BBC recording of the English language performance given by Welsh National Opera in the 1970s; this despite the fact that it too is cut. It had a superb cast, and I would like to renew that suggestion again. Leaving that matter aside, apart from the cuts this Netherlands Opera production is really one of the best performances of Elektra we have ever had on disc, amazingly so when one considers that it is a live recording. As I have said, because of the abridgement of the score this cannot be a top recommendation - as it certainly would be otherwise. Solti with Nilsson must still be considered the best, even though we hear more of the orchestral detail in this new recording; but it is very definitely an excellent second reading for a collection. Anyone who loves this work should make every effort to hear it.

Paul Corfield Godfrey

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