Richard STRAUSS (1864-1959)
Der Rosenkavalier (1913)
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf (soprano) – Marschallin, Noble orphan: Christa
Ludwig (mezzo) – Octavian, Noble orphan: Teresa Stich-Randall (soprano)
– Sophie: Eberhard Waechter (baritone) – Faninal, Footman, Waiter: Ljuba
Welitsch (soprano) – Marianne: Paul Kuen (tenor) – Valzacchi: Kerstin
Meyer (contralto) – Annina, Noble orphan: Nicolai Gedda (tenor) –
Italian singer: Franz Bierbach (bass) – Police inspector, Waiter: Karl
Friedrich (tenor) – Landlord: , Attorney): Erich Majkut (tenor) –
Marschallin’s major-domo, Footman, Waiter: Gerhard Unger (tenor) –
Faninal’s major-domo, Animal-seller, Footman, Waiter: Harald Pröglhof
(baritone) – Notary, Footan: Anny Felbermayer (soprano) – Milliner:
Loughton High School for Girls and Bancroft’s School Choirs:
Philharmonia Chorus and Orchestra/Herbert von Karajan
rec. Kingsway Hall, London, 10-22 December 1956
Originally mono: Pristine XR remastering into Ambient Stereo
No libretto
PRISTINE PACO167 [3 CDs: 190.58]
This Pristine set enshrines their second recording of Rosenkavalier in the last two years to feature a performance by Elisabeth Schwarzkopf in her signature role as the Marschallin; last year we heard a live 1959 recording from Covent Garden conducted by the young Georg Solti which I welcomed at the time as providing an alternative to her familiar studio reading under Karajan. Now Pristine have issued a new transcription of that older 1956 performance, but not using the stereo version which was issued by EMI on CD as long ago as 1987 (when it won a Gramophone award for the best remastering of the year). Instead Pristine have got hold of an LP set of the mono recording which, as they carefully explain, was made by a different set of engineers in parallel with the stereo recording and using the same singers, but not the same equipment. EMI too once reissued this mono recording, which Schwarzkopf herself preferred to the stereo delegated to a secondary team, but that version seems to have long disappeared from the catalogues although the stereo version (now on Warner) continues to be available.
It has to be said that the differences between the EMI stereo and the Pristine mono are sometimes difficult to detect (especially with the ambient stereo sound on Pristine) and, when they are noticeable, it is almost a matter of personal taste which the listener may prefer since the performances themselves are of course identical. Where the contrast is greatest comes when different takes are joined together, as for example at the end of the original second LP side just after the end of the levée scene and before the Marschallin’s monologue where the music clearly moves from one recording session to another probably made on a different day. In the stereo version the orchestral sound decidedly shifts perspective from one LP side to the next, and this change – which would have gone entirely unnoticed on LP –becomes immediately obvious when the two takes are conjoined on a single CD. The jolt in sound is of course far less obvious in a mono recording, and for this reason alone some listeners may prefer Pristine to EMI. That particularly applies to those who complain about backward placement of the voices in recordings of the period; in many places here the singers are definitely forward from the orchestra in terms of balance, a consideration which probably explains Schwarzkopf’s preference for mono over stereo. Personally I found the focus on the vocal lines, with the orchestra pushed into the background, a bit too much in the Second Act scene after Ochs is wounded.
On the other hand, it must also be conceded that no Strauss score can ever be fully appreciated in mono sound, however good the original engineering – and the EMI team in 1956 was very good indeed, successfully managing even to elucidate textures in the most complex ensemble passages. But Strauss’s drenched textures in the closing trio and duet absolutely demand a richness of tone which was not really well captured until Decca’s studio set under Solti released in 1969. That set too has the advantage of giving us the score absolutely complete; Strauss railed all his life against the habit of making cuts in his most famous operatic score, to no effect whatsoever, but in a studio recording there is surely no excuse for repeating and perpetuating them. (Solti’s live 1959 performance with Schwarzkopf also makes cuts, but different ones.)
Nonetheless, this remains one of the great Rosenkavaliers on disc even after a gap of over sixty years, and contains one of the best casts ever assembled either on stage or in the studio; the fact that it was made in the studio allows for a wealth of double casting which furnishes us with far better singing that we usually hear in the myriads of footmen, noble orphans, and so on, more so than Decca’s 1969 glitzy cast of Vienna State Opera veterans some of whom were decidedly past their glory days. It was a nice touch for EMI to include in their cast Ljuba Welitsch, one of the great exponents of Salome in the post-war era, just as it was for Decca to import Pavarotti as the ‘Italian singer’ – but the focus of the singing here is surely on the five principals Schwarzkopf, Ludwig, Edelmann, Stich-Randall and Waechter, none of whom really put a foot wrong. Karajan was always a great Straussian, when he could be persuaded to keep his hands off the temptation to cut the composer’s scores (how one laments the butchery of his Frau ohne Schatten!), and here he provides a contrast of sentiment and impetus which ideally suits this comedy.
In the past, Pristine have furnished downloads on their website to supply texts and translations; this does not seem to be the case with this issue, but libretti of Der Rosenkavalier are not hard to obtain. I suspect that most potential purchasers, in any event, will be looking for a second recording to supplement a collection, and they may well find that the cast in this old mono recording will repay investigation as well as a more consistent balance than the EMI stereo transcription.
Paul Corfield Godfrey
Previous review: Ralph Moore
