Transfiguration
The best way to pay tribute to a legendary Wagner interpreter? Why, to perform the “Liebestod” as beautifully as Nina Stemme did at the first Birgit Nilsson Prize Award Ceremony just last week.
More details about The Birgit Nilsson Prize Award Ceremony 2009 are online.
Sorry. I meant BUY the Price/ Kleiber Tristan. Chalk it up to a neophyte’s jitters.
I have the Stemme Isolde on the Pappano recording. At first, I hated it. For me, Wagnerian singing went horribly awry after Gadski. I want an Isolde who sounds like a great Donna Anna. Legato, legato, legato. I agree that Nilsson was an incredible vocal phenomenon, especially when heard live, but the voice lacks the flexibility to move me in this music. The high notes are of course beyond compare. Flagstad is just about as “modern” as I can stomach as Isolde and Brunnhilde. And of course, the voice is incomparable among those Wagnerian sopranos who have been captured on electrical recordings.
Ultimately, however, I have come around on Stemme – who knows how to sing but doesn’t always, particularly in a role like Isolde that stretches her past the breaking point on occasion. The legato breaks down at key moments and there is too much declamatory grousing phrases that cry out for a singing approach. But she is incredibly riveting in the role. Her intelligence, her phrasing, and her personal intensity are stunning. She is NOT a model Isolde, but (like Maria) she commands attention in whatever she sings, and temperamentally speaking, Stemme is a great match for the role.
For a true and well-sung Isolde on a modern recording, we have Brewer – who is a real singer. For me, Brewer and Farrell should be the modern models for Wagnerian sopranos.
(Margaret Jane Wray provides some lovely singing in the Naxos excerpts. The top is stretched by the high c’s but everything else is lyrical and lovely.)
well, since we started with Stemme, here is Stemme in the Tristan Curse:
Brian:
I have always loved the Kleiber recording, especially Price’s Isolde. It used to be my favorite modern recording – and it is a marvelous example of reimagining a work for recording purposes. There are moments of incredible haunting music-making, especially in the love duet.
I am less enamoured of the recording now for two reasons:
First, as lovely as Price is as Isolde, you can hear the toll that it took on her voice, even in recording. The incipient spread in the upper register is very anxiety-making for me. Also, there are moments where the lack of “nap” in the voice – vocal reserves as it were – distract from the lyricism that she and Kleiber are striving for.
Also, the Price legato was flawed. (Margaret’s NOT Leontyne’s whose legato was along with Sutherland and Callas unique in the post-WWII opera world) I am less willing to sacrifice a true legato for that unearthly purity than I was a decade ago.
As for narration and curse -- a heck of a video, Meier left to her own devices and trumps! So much feeling and possession of the character via the music. I especially love the way her eyes narrow with irony.
I’d love to post Margaret Price’s narration but it ain’t on you tube. I especially love the irony in “Das war ein Schatz mein Herr und Ohm”. Incidentally, I’d carry basically three audios of T & I : Karajan 1952 (the best of the lot?) Bernstein and Kleiber
“As for the Bach H-moll – I can listen to this every day, all day, ten times in a row…” – CerquettiFarrell (#73)
Boy am I ever with you on that! Also the Matthew Passion.
I didn’t much care for Stemme, either. Too opaque. I’ll take Traubel’s (recorded) ruby-throated sparrow or Nilsson’s gleaming sound any day over Stemme. But alas, we can’t turn the clock back and I’m glad Stemme had a triumph at the ROH. Hopefully the BBC will stream this performance a few weeks hence.
As for Verrett’s Norma, it was a big mistake. I heard her do the role in 1976 (Met on tour) and it was at best tepid. A few years later (1979) at the Met Verrett was more poised dramatically but still disappointing vocally. I absolutely adore Shirley Verrett. Her Eboli, Azucena, etc. were something to behold. Verrett and Caballe were so well matched onstage in Norma and in the duets album they made together. But Norma just wasn’t a role that suited Verrett.
73.
I agree about Bartoli. But who else is doing this? And 18th century opera is my obsession so we are stuck until someone else comes along. I’ve heard gr8 things about the Gauvin ‘Porpora’ cd.
PS: A minute of Bach is like a year in jail for me.
#88 Wow sorry about the Bach. Well OK. Just a tip there: you might want to try the new Minkowski H moll mass. Not perfect, but extremely exciting! Watch out especially for the VERY young Julia Lezhneva.
So many ppl tend to do the 18th cen rep formidably well today. How about (for starters)
Sara Mingardo
Karina Gauvin (spectacular indeed)
Joyce DiDonato
Vivica Geneaux
Geraldine McGreevy
Inger Dam-Jensen
Tuva Semmingsen
Maite Beaumont
Patrizia Ciofi
Sandrine Piau
Nuria Rial
Anna Bonitatibus, a favourite of mine, who seems to perform extremely well just about anything.
Here’s a snippet of the lovely Bonitatibus:
Agreed, in Mozart, but it sort of demonstrates the technical accomplishment and lovely quality.
And here’s Vivaldi’s Agitata. And we all know how Bartoli sounds in this!
#88 “A minute of Bach is like a year in jail for me”
Thank you for articulating what I’ve been trying to express for decades!!