Richard Wagner

This is the second part of this legendary cycle and was recorded in 1949. It was recorded with soloists from the Vienna Opera, an impressive documentation of a glorious opera world that has gone forever. In this performance, the part of Siegmund is played by Günther Treptow. Furtwängler discovered Teptow in a Vienna concert performance of this work and the soloist went on to perform the same role in Milan.

Until now, this legendary production has only been available in dubious sound quality, if at all. In 1948 Rudolf Moralt began the first complete “Ring” cycle for the RAVAG broadcasting station. The Vienna “Ring” of 1948/49 is also the first extant ‘live’ or studio recording.

Gottlieb Frick became a member of the Bayreuth Opera Chorus in 1930 and launched his solo career in 1934. He later became one of the most important German basses and certainly contradicted an old saying among conductors, that a fine choral singer will never become a fine soloist.

These recordings were made on 9 and 11 May 1952 and document the latter part of Kirsten Flagstad’s career. They were made a few weeks before her 57th birthday, thus at a time when most sopranos will have been forced to move into ‘character fach’, the Norwegian soprano however, was still in almost full command of her incomparably rich voice, even after a demanding career spanning over three decades. These recordings of two concerts given at the Berlin Titania-Palast, with the Orchestra of the Municipal Opera, are particularly noteworthy: on the one hand, the Wagner songs sound fresher and more present than in the recording made four years later under Knappertsbusch; on the other, the Berlin live-recording of the Strauss songs is technically far superior to the recording made in London. In May 1950 Kirsten Flagstad had given the first performance of the Four Last Songs by Richard Strauss, at the request of the composer. A tribute to her unique status was also the multitude of her concert engagements: During the course of her career, she sang more than 80 roles in around 2100 performances and also gave approximately 250 concerts with orchestra and 600 recitals.

Clemens Krauss appeared for only one year at the Bayreuth Festival, yet he had conducted several Richard Strauss premières and held the reins, at the peak of his career, of both the Bavarian and Vienna State Operas as well as the Salzburg Festival. Krauss’ first Ring should have been the beginning of a magnificent era, that it was not, was due to his tragic death in Mexico in the spring of 1954 during a concert tour.

Krauss’ work with the Festival’s Sängerensemble gave a much-needed shake-up, with new blood in certain important roles. Hence Wolfgang Windgassen, having debuted at the Festival as Parsifal and as Froh, sang both Siegfried instalments in 1953, rising to peak form in the third act of Götterdämmerung, making the role his own. Gerhard Stolze, powerful of tone and clear of articulation, was to follow similar heroic paths. As Mime, Paul Kuën was sought-after from Munich to the Met as well as in Bayreuth, where with playful facility he found the path through Hans Knappertsbusch’s epic breadth, Joseph Keilberth’s chamber-opera transparency and Krauss’ thrusting impulsiveness alike. The same goes for Gustav Neidlinger as Alberich: a monolithic vocal presence and expressive power virtually beyond equal. As his stage progeny Hagen, Josef Greindl was setting his own personal crown on a Festival season where his contribution as König Heinrich in the opening night’s Lohengrin was as instrumental as his Fafner and Hunding on the Ring’s earlier evenings. And, after a year’s warm-up, Hans Hotter too had become a genuine institution on the green hill. Ira Malaniuk, with her mellifluous mezzo-soprano had become firmly established at Bayreuth after deputising as Fricka a year earlier. Few would have guessed in 1953 that she would be followed as Fricka by Regina Resnik, at the time still very much a soprano, albeit with a naturally sensual and dark vocal colour. Erstwhile baritone Ramón Vinay was garnering acclaim as both Parsifal and Siegmund, having triumphed as Tristan the previous year. Astrid Varnay was one of his two partners that summer, en passant as Ortrud and Brünnhilde, making her mark at last as the most flexible dramatic soprano of her generation. Here was a real ensemble at work, as attested by the total commitment of such artistes as Ludwig Weber, Hermann Uhde - luxury casting as Donner and Gunther - Erich Witte's nimble Loge, Natalie Hinsch-Gröndahl's Gutrune or Rita Streich's vivacious Woodbird. The sound balance pleased Krauss from the off as it emanated from the concealed orchestra pit - as it at last does now, unoccluded, transferred to CD from the original tapes, - although his taut tempi and nuances, here filigree-painted, there crushingly-accented, at times come at the cost of fine co-ordination with the stage. This, however, enhances the vitality of the live recording and it remains eminently regrettable, in the context of ‘Werkstatt Bayreuth’, that Krauss only had the summer of 1953 to shape his sound-vision of Wagner's music dramas in the ‘sacred place’.

This historical performance was recorded in 1964 at the Teatro Colón de Buenos Aires. The choir sing in Italian and the soloists perform in German. The five performances of the work in the space of two weeks in Buenos Aires caused great excitement and this was to be the last opera production in the city for a long time.

Albert Da Costa had a very impressive voice but made very few recordings, so never achieved the level of recognition of his contemporaries. These recordings are from his early career and will be coveted by collectors.