One of the most classic Wagner sets of all time appears as part
of EMI’s
Home of Opera series at upper mid-price price
with notes and libretto on a CD-ROM. Long recognised as a glorious
reading it becomes all the more appealing in its newest incarnation.
The chief glory of the set is Kempe’s conducting. While he has
long been considered one of the greatest Wagnerians, it is interesting
that his legacy has recently been even better appreciated by his
re-released Testament recordings of
The Ring and
Parsifal,
both from Covent Garden. In this light it is all the more pleasurable
to return to his stereo studio work. His concept of the piece
is apparent from his visionary, rapt account of the prelude with
the amazing strings of the Vienna Philharmonic. Kempe’s finest
gift was as a storyteller and throughout this set there is a tangible
sense of a world developing before your ears. Look no further
than the prelude to Act 2 to hear this in motion, a spellbinding
piece of slowly unfolding atmosphere. Its antithesis, the Act
3 prelude, explodes off the stave and makes the ensuing tragedy
all the more poignant. All this would be worth little if it were
not for the astonishing musicianship of the Vienna Philharmonic,
caught here mid-way through the Decca
Ring. They confirm
themselves to be the finest Wagner orchestra of their time, fully
inside the music and doing Kempe’s every bidding at just the right
pace. Their distinctive sound is quite remarkable at that, particularly
in the oboe section which sounds astonishingly sharp (“soured-cream-and-capers”,
as Richard Osborne calls it in his booklet note): just listen
to Elsa’s Act 1 entry to see what I mean. Comparing this sound
with their Decca reading for Solti more than twenty years later,
the VPO sounds like two entirely different orchestras: the 1986
reading may well be more conventionally beautiful, but we should
always be glad that Kempe coaxed such a wonderfully distinctive
sound out of them when he did.
Happily the set is complemented by one of the finest collections
of Wagner singers ever assembled. Jess Thomas as the Swan Knight
himself is ethereal and mystical in Act 1 but heroic for his exchanges
with Telramund in Act 2. His grail narration is perhaps a little
pale and Act 3 sounds one-dimensional at times. He is nowhere
near as attention-grabbing as Peter Seiffert for Barenboim or,
in his very different way, Domingo for Solti, but his commitment
to the role is beyond question. Next to him Elisabeth Grümmer
gives us the ideal Elsa, the purity and clean-ness of her voice
giving us the very type of the damsel in distress. Her very first
sigh,
Mein armer Bruder, is laden with pathos and evokes
our total sympathy for the character in just that one phrase.
She is innocence embodied in
Einsam in truben tagen though
she gives way to girlish excitement at the thought of her hero’s
arrival. These qualities mean that her betrayal of Lohengrin in
Act 3 comes as all the more of a shock, and throughout her reading
her voice is redolent with the class of a former era. Gottlob
Frick was an exceptional choice for King Heinrich, radiating authority
and humanity in a way that few of his successors have managed.
Finer still, however, are the darker characters. Christa Ludwig
delivers a hair-raising Ortrud, the finest on disc. She chews
up the drama in every scene in which she appears, both musically
and in her remarkably vocal acting, giving us the epitome of malice
with a smile on its face. Grümmer’s Elsa never stands a chance
against her! Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau gets stuck into the role
of Telramund unlike anyone I have ever heard: just listen to the
relish with which he describes Gottfried’s disappearance in Act
1 or his cry of horror at his wife’s blasphemy. The first scene
of Act 2 is absolutely riveting, both dramatically and musically,
and Kempe whips up the orchestra into a frenzy to keep the tension
wound tight. By the end of it Telramund is audibly a broken man,
entirely in thrall to his wife. Magnificent.
The sound for this first stereo recording of the opera is good,
if a little hissy, and the commitment of all performers helps
to make this what is probably still the finest all round choice
for the opera on disc. Kempe delivers the traditional cuts in
the final act, but you’d have to be a purist of the worst kind
to let this rule the set out of your estimation. Barenboim’s knight
is more heroic, Solti’s sound is more satisfying and Bychkov’s
Ortrud may come the closest to challenging Ludwig, but overall
Kempe still leads the field more than forty years later. There
is no reason to hesitate.
Simon Thompson
Chor der Wiener Staatsoper 
