I have the complete performance of all 3 Acts which was released by Danacord in 1987 and the sound is perfectly acceptable. Fritz Stiedry is the conductor (nothing special from him), and there are several cuts, especially in Act 2.
Cool - perhaps the issue is just with the quality of what was put on TH-cam. Anyway there is something neat about listening to a recording that was made as it went over the air.
The sound is significantly better than a copy of this that I have. In addition to dumping Melchior, three years later, Bing also canned Helen Traubel, who was still singing like a champ at this point in her career.
Listening to Melchior here, I just don't understand what Bing was thinking in firing him. Yes, he was a pain in the butt in many ways both personally and musically, but so were lots of other singers on the roster in 1950. Same is true of Traubel. They both sound fantastic here.
Just a note or two about some of the cast. Melchior's contract wouldn't be renewed by the Met's incoming General Manager Rudolf Bing. There are always two sides to a story. Melchior felt he wasn't being offered what an artist of his standing warranted and could make more money appearing in films. He had made five between 1943 and 1948. Bing, who prized professionalism in his charges above all things, felt that Melchior was lazy, skipped too many rehearsals and was past his best before date. As it was, Melchior only appeared in one more Hollywood film and the Met's Wagnerian wing went into decline despite the Herculean efforts of tenors like Set Svanholm and Ramon Vinay, who did their level best to replace the jolly Dane. The broadcast is in fact a glimpse into a seismic shift in the Met's repertoire into the 1950s. Most folks assumed that Bing would continue to keep Wagner at the forefront but that wasn't the case. The great Wagnerians that trod the stage in the 1930s and 40s were either gone or in vocal decline. The Melchior of this broadcast is a far cry from his splendid performance in 1940. In the Bing era, Mozart, Verdi and Puccini took centre stage because Bing had the singers on hand to sing the roles. Big voices in the Wagner Wing were in short supply until Birgit Nilsson came along. After Traubel departed, Margaret Harshaw filled the bill quite nicely, eventually singing an astounding fourteen different Wagnerian roles at the Met. Herbert Janssen, who was the Met's leading Wagner baritone throughout the 40s was another veteran who didn't make last long into the Bing Era. His performances were cut down to three or four a season and he retired in April of 1952 after a performance of Meistersinger on the road in Boston. In particular, he was a superb Wolfram in Tannhauser. Bing dispensed with Helen Traubel in 1953 when she pointedly told him she could make better money singing in night clubs! That may be true but what is also true is that her high notes had receded over the years. Astrid Varnay had an off and on relationship with the Met, singing Ortrud and Elsa, Elisabeth and Venus, Kundry and Sieglinde in her early days and then returning much later in her career, with a pair of compelling but grotesque portrayals of Klytemnestra and Leokadja Begbick in Weill's Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny. Black-toned bass Deszo Ernster filled out the big roles in the Wagner wing until 1963. He was also a wonderful, hearty Rocco in Fidelio. Frank Guarrera in a rare performance in Wagner had the longest career of the cast, singing a whopping 680 performances at the Met between an Escamillo in 1948 and Gianni Schicchi in 1976. Escamillo, Figaro, Lescaut and Belcore were his usually fare so Wagner's Herald must have been an interesting change of pace. There is a huge mural on the side of a warehouse in his native Baltimore that is a terrific tribute to one of opera's bubbliest baritones. Milton Cross was the erudite voice of the Met from 1931 to 1974. During that time, he missed only FOUR Saturday afternoon broadcasts, twice due to illness and two more following the death of his wife. His final broadcast was a December, 1974 Turandot. He died of a sudden heart attack only a few days later. Thanks as always for posting.
@@PianistsAndMore You're welcome. @MarchantTapeArchive asked me to do a little digging to confirm which performance this was. This broadcast really is a Twilight of the Gods as far as great Wagnerian performances at the Met goes. All the greats had left or were being shown the door by Bing. Marjorie Lawrence was laid low by Polio and Kirsten Flagstad, who had been somewhat controversially absent from the Met after 1941, didn't stay long upon her return. Karin Branzell and Kerstin Thorborg were gone or leaving. Friedrich Schorr left early, leaving the great baritone roles to Janssen and the admirable American Julius Huehn, though in all honesty, neither was really a Wotan. I love Janssen's Wolfram and his Telramund is much more noble than you usually hear. I also think his Jochanaan in the 1949 broadcast of Salome with the mercurial Ljuba Welitch is superb, especially his fervent entreaty to Salome to seek out Christ and his disciples at the Sea of Galilee. All the great basses were gone as well. Alexander Kipnis retired and Emmanuel List, who was also the Met's leading Baron Ochs, was dispensed with by Bing. It was a sad end to an era, with the Ring and Tristan really suffering. Hans Hopf, Karl Liebl and Jess Thomas all tried on Melchior's mantle but it fell off their thin shoulders. The Melchior era will always be fondly remembered even if some of the cuts made by conductors like Artur Bodanzky and Erich Leinsdorf were brutal. I love this channel and hope our host finds some more gems from the Met like this. Cheers!
This is generally in better sound than what I have heard. It's always marvellous to have a new source for an old recording. Is the Carmen that you have bits of, possible a Met performance from 1949 or 1950? Anything from either of these would be marvellous. Also, any other opera from the 1940s.
![กี่หมื่นฟ้า | Your Sky Series EP.1 [1/4]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/vLGjxFL6U_I/mqdefault.jpg)
Uno de los tenores wagneriones más maravillosos del siglo 20. Mil gracias
I have the complete performance of all 3 Acts which was released by Danacord in 1987 and the sound is perfectly acceptable. Fritz Stiedry is the conductor (nothing special from him), and there are several cuts, especially in Act 2.
Cool - perhaps the issue is just with the quality of what was put on TH-cam. Anyway there is something neat about listening to a recording that was made as it went over the air.
The sound is significantly better than a copy of this that I have. In addition to dumping Melchior, three years later, Bing also canned Helen Traubel, who was still singing like a champ at this point in her career.
Listening to Melchior here, I just don't understand what Bing was thinking in firing him. Yes, he was a pain in the butt in many ways both personally and musically, but so were lots of other singers on the roster in 1950. Same is true of Traubel. They both sound fantastic here.
Just a note or two about some of the cast. Melchior's contract wouldn't be renewed by the Met's incoming General Manager Rudolf Bing. There are always two sides to a story. Melchior felt he wasn't being offered what an artist of his standing warranted and could make more money appearing in films. He had made five between 1943 and 1948. Bing, who prized professionalism in his charges above all things, felt that Melchior was lazy, skipped too many rehearsals and was past his best before date. As it was, Melchior only appeared in one more Hollywood film and the Met's Wagnerian wing went into decline despite the Herculean efforts of tenors like Set Svanholm and Ramon Vinay, who did their level best to replace the jolly Dane. The broadcast is in fact a glimpse into a seismic shift in the Met's repertoire into the 1950s. Most folks assumed that Bing would continue to keep Wagner at the forefront but that wasn't the case. The great Wagnerians that trod the stage in the 1930s and 40s were either gone or in vocal decline. The Melchior of this broadcast is a far cry from his splendid performance in 1940. In the Bing era, Mozart, Verdi and Puccini took centre stage because Bing had the singers on hand to sing the roles. Big voices in the Wagner Wing were in short supply until Birgit Nilsson came along. After Traubel departed, Margaret Harshaw filled the bill quite nicely, eventually singing an astounding fourteen different Wagnerian roles at the Met.
Herbert Janssen, who was the Met's leading Wagner baritone throughout the 40s was another veteran who didn't make last long into the Bing Era. His performances were cut down to three or four a season and he retired in April of 1952 after a performance of Meistersinger on the road in Boston. In particular, he was a superb Wolfram in Tannhauser. Bing dispensed with Helen Traubel in 1953 when she pointedly told him she could make better money singing in night clubs! That may be true but what is also true is that her high notes had receded over the years. Astrid Varnay had an off and on relationship with the Met, singing Ortrud and Elsa, Elisabeth and Venus, Kundry and Sieglinde in her early days and then returning much later in her career, with a pair of compelling but grotesque portrayals of Klytemnestra and Leokadja Begbick in Weill's Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny. Black-toned bass Deszo Ernster filled out the big roles in the Wagner wing until 1963. He was also a wonderful, hearty Rocco in Fidelio. Frank Guarrera in a rare performance in Wagner had the longest career of the cast, singing a whopping 680 performances at the Met between an Escamillo in 1948 and Gianni Schicchi in 1976. Escamillo, Figaro, Lescaut and Belcore were his usually fare so Wagner's Herald must have been an interesting change of pace. There is a huge mural on the side of a warehouse in his native Baltimore that is a terrific tribute to one of opera's bubbliest baritones.
Milton Cross was the erudite voice of the Met from 1931 to 1974. During that time, he missed only FOUR Saturday afternoon broadcasts, twice due to illness and two more following the death of his wife. His final broadcast was a December, 1974 Turandot. He died of a sudden heart attack only a few days later.
Thanks as always for posting.
Terrific comment. Thanks for bringing up Janssen, one of my favorite baritones. I wish we had his "Erhebe dich" here!
@@PianistsAndMore You're welcome. @MarchantTapeArchive asked me to do a little digging to confirm which performance this was. This broadcast really is a Twilight of the Gods as far as great Wagnerian performances at the Met goes. All the greats had left or were being shown the door by Bing. Marjorie Lawrence was laid low by Polio and Kirsten Flagstad, who had been somewhat controversially absent from the Met after 1941, didn't stay long upon her return. Karin Branzell and Kerstin Thorborg were gone or leaving. Friedrich Schorr left early, leaving the great baritone roles to Janssen and the admirable American Julius Huehn, though in all honesty, neither was really a Wotan. I love Janssen's Wolfram and his Telramund is much more noble than you usually hear. I also think his Jochanaan in the 1949 broadcast of Salome with the mercurial Ljuba Welitch is superb, especially his fervent entreaty to Salome to seek out Christ and his disciples at the Sea of Galilee. All the great basses were gone as well. Alexander Kipnis retired and Emmanuel List, who was also the Met's leading Baron Ochs, was dispensed with by Bing. It was a sad end to an era, with the Ring and Tristan really suffering. Hans Hopf, Karl Liebl and Jess Thomas all tried on Melchior's mantle but it fell off their thin shoulders. The Melchior era will always be fondly remembered even if some of the cuts made by conductors like Artur Bodanzky and Erich Leinsdorf were brutal. I love this channel and hope our host finds some more gems from the Met like this. Cheers!
This is generally in better sound than what I have heard. It's always marvellous to have a new source for an old recording.
Is the Carmen that you have bits of, possible a Met performance from 1949 or 1950? Anything from either of these would be marvellous.
Also, any other opera from the 1940s.
I'm not sure yet - there are EIGHT reels of it I need to go through. I suspect there may be some duplication but we'll find out!
31:00
Lohengrin.
Mr Bing was a little bit stupid, sometimes...
@@meisterwue because he let Melchior go?
@@MarchantTapeArchive that's what I wanted to say, indeed. And not only Mr Melchior.