So, in anticipation of a full review here on parterre, Chris’s Cache offers two more: Michael Gielen conducting Jessye Norman, Gwendolyn Killebrew, and Wolfgang Neumann and Marek Janowski leading Eva-Maria Westbroek, Petra Lang, and Stephen Gould.

My first live Gurrelieder occurred not long after I moved to New York when Zubin Mehta conducted it for his farewell to the New York Philharmonic in May 1991 with Susan Dunn, Florence Quivar, and Gary Lakes. It felt extra-special as the great Hans Hotter was the narrator of the penultimate movement.

Ten years later when the Met Orchestra was still doing big choral works at Carnegie Hall, James Levine conducted one of his favorite works featuring Deborah Voigt, Violeta Urmana, and Ben Heppner with another celebrated singer of the past as the Narrator: Ernst Haefliger, who ironically never performed with the Met as a tenor.

Gurrelieder has not been a stranger to my parterre box uploads. Another two remain available for listening and/or downloading–a later Levine performance from Boston with Karita Mattila, Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, and Johan Botha, as well as a performance with Julia Varady, Hanna Schwarz, and Thomas Moser led by Ralf Weikert with Mr. Varady as the Narrator.

Schönberg: Gurrelieder

Tove: Jessye Norman
Waldtaube: Gwendolyn Killebrew
Waldemar: Wolfgang Neumann
Klaus-Narr: Philip Langridge
Bauer: John Tomlinson
Narrator: Günther Reich

Conductor: Michael Gielen
BBC Singers
BBC Symphony Chorus
Goldsmiths Choral Union
BBC Symphony Orchestra
BBC Proms at Royal Albert Hall
10 August 1981
Broadcast

Tove: Eva-Maria Westbroek
Waldtaube: Petra Lang
Waldemar: Stephen Gould
Klaus-Narr: Arnold Berzuyen
Bauer: Kwangchul Youn
Narrator: Francois Le Roux

Conductor: Marek Janowski
MDR-Rundfunkchor Leipzig & Berlin
Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin & Orchestra Philharmonique de Monte Carlo
Philharmonie, Berlin
31 March 2007
Broadcast

All four Gurrelieder can be downloaded by clicking on the icon of a cloud with an arrow pointing downward on the audio player above and the resulting mp3 file will appear in your download directory.

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Image: Portrait of Arnold Schönberg, Richard Gerstl

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