To coincide with the re-release
of Haitink’s complete
Ring at budget price (see
review)
EMI have reissued their 1-disc set of highlights on their
budget label, Classics for Pleasure. Compiling less than
80 minutes of highlights from this mighty work is an all
but
impossible task, and we should salute anyone who tries.
Nevertheless, I was left feeling that I had sampled enough
of this set to give me an adequate taster without wanting
to go much deeper.
The extracts themselves are well
chosen. The longest chunks are the full entrance of the
gods into Valhalla and an extended section of the love
music from Act 1 of
Walküre. We are also given the
ubiquitous
Ride of the Valkyries, the
Rhine Journey and
Funeral
March. Everything else feels more bitty, but what else
can you expect on only one CD? Turning first to the singing,
it is almost uniformly good. James Morris’s Wotan sounds
powerful and exciting, more so than I had heard him elsewhere.
His peroration at the end of
Rheingold captures
the young god’s idealism and excitement at the prospects
of his new home. There is a searing nobility, even majesty
in his command of the role. Furthermore, we can feel his
pulse quicken with excitement after the first appearance
of the Sword motif, and thereafter his singing becomes
more energised at the thought of his hopes for the future.
The lesser gods are all taken very well indeed with some
real star casting. Special mention to the slithery Loge
of Heinz Zednik, long unsurpassed in this role. The acoustic
placing of the Rhinemaidens sounds just right here, distant
but still clear.
Things aren’t quite so successful
in
Walküre. Cheryl Studer makes a secure, if somewhat
matronly, Sieglinde, though she misses the excitement as
her recognition of her brother slowly dawns. Reiner Goldberg’s
Siegmund is altogether less pleasant to listen to. His
voice feels hollow and coarse for the
Winterstürme,
with little of the virility one would hope for in this
role. He barks out the closing moments of the act with
squally insecurity. His son, Siegfried, is much more successful.
From hearing him on the Levine and Barenboim
Rings I
have long thought that Siegfried Jerusalem was the most
successful modern exponent of the role, and this recording
only confirmed this. He sings the forging song with complete
security and more than a little boyish petulance. His virile,
excitable tone conveys all of the hero’s youth and optimism,
though the clanging of the anvil is placed rather uncomfortably
forward and has a tendency to drown him out. He tempers
this for the
Forest Murmurs and his exchange with
the Woodbird is enchanting before he takes off with even
more impetuosity at the end of the Act. It’s quite a treat
to have Kiri as the Woodbird: her tone is beautifully natural,
though she doesn’t seem comfortable with the rapid German
pronunciation.
In many ways, however, the most
interesting vocal aspect is the one we hear least of. Eva
Marton’s Brünnhilde has long been the most criticised aspect
of this set, and it can surely be no accident that we hear
so little of her here. The short extracts from
Götterdämmerung only
confirm her dangerous insecurity in this role. There seems
to be no centre to the voice; instead she struts around
the notes, struggling to the top and sounding uncomfortably
insecure when she gets there. There is a noticeable beat
in all of the big climaxes in both the Prologue and Immolation
scenes, and it makes for very unpleasant listening. Perhaps
she gets better elsewhere, but in view of the competition
I wouldn’t choose to listen to this Brünnhilde again.
Haitink is the anchor that holds
everything together. The first time I heard him conduct
Wagner was in his Covent Garden
Parsifal in December
2007, which he directed with security, precision and architectural
vision. Happily the same is true here. He shapes the big
climaxes very well, such as the buoyant yet empty optimism
at the end of
Rheingold, and the tender beauty that
lies at the heart of the
Magic Fire Music. He is
most impressive in the
Götterdämmerung interludes:
the
Rhine Journey really does feel like a journey
with a sense of momentum and purpose that climaxes in the
emergence of the Rhine theme, sweeping all before it in
a most impressive manner. The same is true of the
Funeral
March which has a nihilistic inevitability to it. Those
brass chords thunder out with inexorable doom, and the
ringing brass theme at the end sounds all the more desolate
for the backward-looking loss it conveys. If he is a bit
less solid in his control of tempi at the end of the
Immolation then
this is easily forgiven. Less easy to forget is the thundering
collapse of the Gibichung Hall which is so loud that it
drowns out the music for nearly ten seconds! Haitink is
supported at every turn by the Bavarian RSO who play with
the utmost dedication and an emphasis on beauty over all
else.
As a disc of highlights this one
is successful enough, and it would tempt me to explore
the complete set were it not for Eva Marton’s Brünnhilde.
If you’re looking for a one-disc set of
Ring highlights,
though, you won’t find better than Karajan’s selection
on DG, provided you can cope with the casting inconsistencies.
His unifying sense of momentum is even more striking than
Haitink’s and the singing is super, not least from Thomas
Stewart as the
Walküre Wotan. Furthermore he has
the peerless Berlin Philharmonic as his orchestra, before
whom all else must yield. No-one can really be satisfied
with
Ring highlights, though. With so many sets
available so cheaply these days, just take the plunge and
go for the whole thing.
Simon Thompson
Singers
James Morris (baritone) – Wotan
Eva Marton (soprano) – Brünnhilde
Siegfried Jerusalem
(tenor) – Siegfried
John Tomlinson (baritone) – Hagen
Reiner Goldberg (tenor) – Siegmund
Cheryl Studer (soprano) – Sieglinde
Peter Haage (tenor) – Mime
Kiri te Kanawa
(soprano) – Woodbird
Andreas Schmidt (baritone) – Donner
Peter Seiffert (tenor) – Froh
Marjana Lipovsek (mezzo) – Fricka
Heinz Zednik (tenor) – Loge
Julie Kaufmann
(soprano) – Woglinde
Silvia Herman – Wellgunde
Susan Quittmeyer – Flosshilde
Anita Soldh (soprano) – Gerhilde
Ruth Falcon (soprano) – Helmwige
Ute Walther
(soprano) – Waltraute
Ursula Kunz (soprano) – Schwerteleite
Silvia Hermann
(soprano) – Ortlinde
Margaretha Hintermeier (soprano) – Siegrune
Carolyn Watkinson (soprano) – Grimgerde
Margarita Lilowa (soprano) – Roβweiβe
see end of review for
singers
