Richard WAGNER (1813-1883)
Götterdämmerung (1876) [241:41]
Siegfried - Lauritz Melchior (tenor)
Brünnhilde - Helen Traubel (soprano)
Gunther - Herbert Janssen (baritone)
Gutrune - Regina Resnik (soprano)
Hagen - Dezsö Ernster (bass)
Waltraute - Margaret Harshaw (mezzo)
Alberich - Gerhard Pechner (bass-baritone)
First Norn - Jean Madeira (contralto)
Second Norn - Martha Lipton (mezzo)
Third Norn - Margaret Harshaw (mezzo)
Woglinde - Erna Berger (soprano)
Welgunde - Lucine Amara (soprano)
Flosshilde - Herta Glaz (mezzo)
Vassal - Emery Darcy (tenor)
Chorus and Orchestra of the Metropolitan Opera/Fritz Stiedry and various other
conductors
A recreation of Melchior’s final performance as Siegfried on 20 December
1948
Commentary by Milton Cross; interview with Melchior.
IMMORTAL PERFORMANCES IPCD 1010-4 [4 CDs: 53:57 + 51:49 + 56:23 + 79:32]
Sound engineer Richard Caniell specialises in re-creating “Dream Performances”
of Wagner operas. This Götterdämmerung from Immortal Performances in
New Denver, British Columbia, is the fruit of his latest project. Some of
a more purist nature have objected to his practice of reconstructing from
other sources performances which were never broadcast or recorded. The claim
is that these are somehow meretricious. I for one am merely grateful that
through his painstaking synthesis and remastering of fragments of disparate
origins we are afforded the opportunity of glimpsing the splendour of a (virtually)
complete performance from a Golden Age of Wagner singing.
In this recreation of the final Siegfried sung by Melchior in the performance
of Götterdämmerung on 20 December 1948, no fewer than eleven original
members of the cast may be heard, including all the principals except Regina
Resnik, who (and henceforth I quote Richard Caniell) “happily replaces Polyna
Stoska as Gutrune. And one of the three Norns, Jeanne Palmer, is replaced
by Margaret Harshaw, who was also singing Waltraute in this performance. As
for the Rhinemaidens, Dorothy Manski’s Woglinde is replaced by the marvellous
Erna Berger. Maxine Stellman’s Wellgunde is replaced by Lucine Amara. In my
opinion, every substitution tends to improve the performance overall.
“Essentially, the major cast of 20 December 1948 was drawn from the 1951 Met
recording; the Melchior-Traubel Dawn Duet from a Toscanini broadcast
1941; the Funeral Music - Toscanini 1949; the Traubel-Toscanini Immolation
from 1941; Melchior comes from the Met 1936 performance plus two 78 rpm
discs, as well as from the 1937 Covent Garden performance. Some of these passages
occur in our Melchior-Flagstad complete Götterdämmerung (Guild GHCD
2224). Apart from these interpolations, Fritz Stiedry conducts. The many cuts
are his. He omits an entire stanza from Alberich’s brief scene (at “Ich -
und du”) and also cuts much of the orchestral music that opens this act, a
passage we have restored. And if that were not bad enough, Stiedry omits 18
exchanges between Brünnhilde, Gunther and Hagen, cutting from Hagen’s “Und
dort trifft ihn mein Speer” to Hagen’s “Uns allen frommt sein Tod”, omitting
55 lines. There is no source with these singers from which the passage could
be restored, so we are left with this truncation.
“Incidentally, this 1948 Dream Götterdämmerung has lesser sonics only
for very short passages —17 minutes in Act I and 12 minutes in Act III. These
portions were also heard in our Melchior-Flagstad Ring cycle but I have improved
the sonics somewhat for this edition. All else is in good sound for the broadcast
era involved and some of the sonics are superlative.”
I have quoted the booklet notes at length here because they cannot be improved
upon as a summary of the origin and nature of this enterprise and how the
recording was assembled. For the most part, the sound is indeed remarkably
satisfactory and homogeneous. The more obvious insertions from older sources
are as seamlessly integrated as possible despite a few sudden increases in
the amount of hiss, especially when the sections spliced in are obviously
from 78 discs.
As Siegfried, Melchior is hors concours as an artist; he is the very
incarnation and epitome of the heroic Wagner tenor. He sings throughout with
that famous combination of tenderness, virile thrust, clarion top notes, boyish
charm, tireless endurance and beauty of tone which is enough to make any current
aspiring Wagnerian heldentenor despair. He has it all and very little of the
supposed "rhythmic sloppiness" is in evidence. The sustained top
C hurled out by Melchior on greeting Hagen and the hunting party and the swelled,
sustained E on “ein wonniges Weib” just before his fatal stabbing in the back
by Hagen are things of wonder and ample evidence of both the power and beauty
of his heldentenor.
Traubel’s gleaming top notes, warm, expressive middle tones and refulgent
lower register make her ideal as Brünnhilde; she is less matronly, more womanly
than, and just as heroic as, Flagstad. It was surely a good idea not only
to substitute Toscanini’s famous and incandescent 1941 broadcast of key moments
in preference to the more staid Stiedry’s account but also to have tidied
them up by removing bum notes by both Traubel at the climax of the Dawn Duet
and also the horn player during the subsequent Rhine Journey. Enhancing our
pleasure by removing the accidents that can occur during live performances
so that we may enjoy the music undisturbed in repeated listenings must surely
be a welcome little piece of electronic jiggery-pokery that can hardly be
regarded as a moral issue.
The two parallel trios of mythical ladies are exceptionally fine, featuring
some famous names; both the Norns and the Rhinemaidens are rich and expressive
of voice, making their music more absorbing than can sometimes be the case.
The splendidly voiced Margaret Harshaw doubles up as both Norn and Waltraute.
Regina Resnik gives us a more womanly and vibrant Gutrune than the passive
victim more usually heard.
Unfortunately, three of the secondary artists, while adequate, would make
it onto no one’s “Dream Wagner” billing. Compared with more distinguished
contemporary Hagens, Dezsö Ernster is a little disappointing; he is somewhat
laboured and woolly-voiced, lacking the power and blackness of tone required
to freeze the marrow as can great exponents of the role such as Ivar Andresen
and Gottlob Frick. Similarly, baritone Herbert Janssen’s Gunther is a little
bland and makes one wish for Hermann Uhde – although Gunther is admittedly
a weak character, and does not need a heroic voice. There is a droll photograph
in the full and copiously illustrated booklet of Melchior and Janssen looking
like Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum standing either side of Ernster impersonating
Rasputin. Lastly, Gerhard Pechner’s light-voiced, workaday Alberich makes
less impact than it might and is, in any case, shorn of some the little music
he has been given by Wagner, as detailed above.
Little of this matters in comparison with the bigger picture of our being
able to hear a persuasive and convincing reconstruction of what the lucky
audience heard that 20th December 1948. As it was not broadcast,
Richard Caniell’s resurrection of this superlative performance gives Wagnerites
everywhere a listening experience that nobody ever thought it would be possible
to enjoy. This was clearly a labour of love and we should be grateful.
No libretto is provided but the synopsis is very full and usefully cued to
the tracks. Bonuses come in the form of Milton Cross’s commentaries and brief,
genial, edited excerpts from an interview with Melchior made shortly his death
in the early 1970s.
Ralph Moore
Clearly a labour of love and we should be grateful.