I was from Hong Kong (I immigrated to the States 28 years ago). I listened to Hong Kong Philharmonic growing up. This Ring recording is the best I have ever heard from my home town orchestra. It completely changed my opinion towards them. After the pandemic I hope I will get a chance to listen to them live again
The 1955 Keilberth is my favorite Ring overall. I know the Solti is more technically perfect, and I'm glad I had the opportunity to learn the work from it, but the Keilberth offers an amazing sonic window into what was surely one of Bayreuth's greatest decades.
Owners of the Solti version really need to get John Culshaw's book "Ring Resounding" about the production of that justifiably famous set. Terrific read. But for headphone listening, Karajan's is the easiest of the ears IMO.
It is a pity that when he wrote the book, Culshaw did not know that Ernst Kozub was in precarious health and may well have decided that he needed to try to make as much as he could while he still could, even in the knowledge that he might not be able to fulfil engagements. I don't know if Jon Vickers was approached but he would never have worked with Solti after the Covent Garden debacle.
When I bought my first Solti Ring, it was on LP and a set of books, including Culshaw's "Ring Resounding" was included. Great insights to the challenges of recording the work. I loved the Solti so much, that I bought the identical set when it came out on CD. The only other Ring I have is Levine and the Met on DVD, since it was one of the few "traditional" stagings available on DVD. I did not want to buy a version that would be of the moment and outdated before the Rhine washed over Hagen.
As a Wagnerite, a Knappertsbuschite, and a dedicated third nornist, I endorse this video. [edit] now that I've finished watching the video - what an awesome, thoughtful, and straightforward video :) good job!
Oh no I would never ever expected the Hong Kong Philharmonic to be featured in the list of David Hurwitz’s list of the Ring recordings to go for, together with the titans like Solti, Keilberth and Karajan etc!!! As a HKer I am ashamed to not giving enough attention to my hometown orchestra. Now I must rush out and get this recording, fast!
Such a nice and passionate video of the Opus Magnum by the greatest composer ever! My favorite (as a native German): Clemens Krauss 1953 live recording from Bayreuther Festspiele. Never heard anything better!
There are two Sieglinde screams in Böhm. End of Act 1 scream of ecstasy and end of Act 2 scream of sorrow. She also ends in a vocal volcanic eruption of hope in Act 3. Rysanek was truly an exceptional singer.
No matter which is your favorite, I claim special consideration for the Solti (sort of like a "Lifetime Achievement Award). I believe it was the first one issued commercially, it put Wagner on the map, put Nilsson on the map, put the VPO on the map, put Culshaw on the map, put Decca/London on the map, etc. Even if it's not your favorite, the interest generated by the Solti ring (IMO) helped greatly in selling future issues (whether originally recorded before or after the Solti).
Very informative & most interesting. In the final analysis, the Georg Solti Ring set is, for sure, the best recording of this monumental masterpiece. I have loved it ever since it first became available. Prof. Dr. Dr. H. James Birx, New York USA
Thank you for a very informative video. I’m pleased that you highlighted the Naxos Ring as I bought that years ago as individual releases as they were issued. I always thought highly of them but they were rarely mentioned in reviews, so I’m happy that you thought so highly of them.
Thank Bob Levine, ClassicsToday's opera critic who has the finest ear in the business, and absolutely no prejudice where quality is concerned. He's taught me more than I can begin to express.
I am on the floor laughing. Great review, David. Excellent reviews. And your synopses of the various Wagner camps were spot on (and hilarious). My favorite three are Solti, Karajan, and Bohm--all have flaws, I love 'em all. For me they helped me gain an appreciation not just for Wagner, but how a conductor's vision shapes the performance.
I have in my collection: Boehm, Keilberth, Solti, Karajan, Furtwaengler '50 and '53, Krauss, Knappertsbusch '57 and '58. If I had to choose two, it would be the historic Keilberth and Stereo "in Bayreuth", Boehm!!
I wouldn't call myself a historical recording nut (all-in-all I prefer Janowski's Dresden Ring with its crystal clear leitmotivs), but for those who are not averse to somewhat older sonics, I can really recommend the (uncut and very decently recorded) 1949 Vienna Rudolf Moralt Ring. It features the older generation of prewar singers and offers a glimpse of how Wagner must have sounded to the ears of interbellum composers like Berg, Schoenberg, Strauss, etc. And it's so well sung/enunciated that for those who understand German, you can follow the text without the libretto.
1949 and 1953 Krauss is not too far away tho. Might as well recommend the 1928 Parsifal and Siegfried Wagner early Bayreuth singers to hear what Wagner would have had which is more convincing
On the subtopic of Hans Hotter, in the late 1970s I got to hear the elderly Hans Hotter leading a master class in voice at the San Francisco Conservatory. Once or twice he illustrated how a phrase just sung by a student could go better, treating all around to that familiar woolly, wobbly but oracular Wotan-like voice (he must have been eighty-ish at the time). I stood probably only three or four feet behind him. I stayed a few minutes then slunk out, probably thinking (foolishly) this was an event best left to the singers.
I enjoyed Dave's retelling of Leonie Rysanek's scream. However, one fine evening at the Met Jon Vickers pulled and pulled, yet Notung wouldn't budge. And then finally out it came in pieces, with something flying into the orchestra pit while another fragment just missed Sieglinde's head. The performance was unusual in that Birgit Nilsson was singing the role of Sieglinde, not Brunnhilde. Well, Nilsson let out a shriek, but it was a shriek of terror, not of joy. Many in the audience, including myself, cracked up in hysterics. This greatest singers also had a keen sense of humor and was really fast on her feet.
I hope you've heard this by now. First time I ever heard the ring, I thought it was terrible music. Years later, I heard it again, and my life changed. Overall, I prefer the Boulez.
Great choice on the HKPhil Ring set. I attended some of these live concerts. Thrilling experience despite it’s not fully staged plays. Can’t forget that leb wohl delivered by Goerne, kept listening to this piece today. Dilemma of the Wagner Ring - the recording is getting better yet the singers are getting worse.
I've gotten to slightly prefer Varnay to Nilsson's Brunnhilde interperatively. When my VHS tapes of the Levine/Met/Otto Schenk production died, I got a DVD set of Barenboim's Ring and it's marvelous as well! More modern, more interesting, but not crazy. great chat!
I own the Karajan (as an orchestral musician, I love it over all others), and know the Solti, Boulez and Barenboim very well. I couldn’t agree with you more. Very fair critiques . Your comments are spot on! I must hear the Böhm… exciting and raw? Böhm? Who knew? 😂 Thanks again, David.
It is really very good Jack. Much as I have issues about Bohm as a human being he could be very exciting. Yes his Ring is a bit rough sometimes orchestrally (close miking of brass etc) but it is terrifically exciting, try Gotterdammerung Act 2! But similarly he was very exciting in Strauss and Berg.
I have the complete Solti set on vinyl now...I change the LPs more often than my underwear. Ummm......yeah. But there is something special and amazing about this recording on vinyl.
Nice reviews, Dave.. Loved Wagner since I saw Nilssson at the Met in the early 60s (in Gotterdammerung, she had a live, four-legged Grane--who nuzzled her). It's a shame that toda,y no one dare utter the name of James Levine who was a master Wagner conducter. Levine, along with Barenboim, were my favorites. I hold a special affection for Barenboim, however. He seems to me to be able to extract the marrow from Wagner's sensibilies better than anyone; I feel it all the way down to my bones. His closing of Gotterdamerung (I beleive it's on his "Cycle" recording) is breathtaking. He summoned his"Barenboim horns" to great dramatic effect.
Notwithstanding his deserved moral reckoning, Levine as a Wagner conductor can hardly hold a candle to Solti, Karajan, Bohm, Furtwangler, Barenboim, and Thielemann, among many others. Slow labored interpretations lacking a coherent structure.
Excellent discussion. Thank you! One question: where, oh, where can I get that fabulous shirt?! "Abnormal is fine. Stupid is not"? That's perfect! I love it!
Somewhat amazingly, I actually own all three of your recommendations! I had the good fortune to know and work with Jimmy Brown, who was one of the Decca engineers who recorded the Solti cycle. I also met John Culshaw a few times, so I have a bit of a 'vested interest' in that version!
Much enjoyed your exploration of 'Ring' recordings - my own journey with this most amazing of works of art started in the late 70s when BBC Tv broadcast the whole Boulez Ring in acts on consecutive Sunday evenings...and I was hooked! I then started to explore those recordings then available, as well as reading as much literature on the subject (a lot!). First came a Ring you didn't mention: EMI's Goodall/English National Opera, recorded live in Coliseum, London. I started with that as I saw live this Valkyrie (I later saw the WNO Ring, also in English, with Anne Evans who was in the Barenboim Ring at Bayreuth) and was bowled over by both cast and conducting. But very soon I wanted a set in German, so home came the Solti...and a lifelong love affair with this amazing recording - so much so that I read the producer, John Culshaw's 'Ring Resounding' and decided I must visit the Sofiensäle in Vienna to see where this legendary recording (and many other Decca recordings) were made....I achieved this ambition only 5 years ago - the Sofiensäle now restored after the disastrous fire. For live I have Böhm and the '55 Keilberth.....BTW Culshaw discusses the Keilberth in the above book as he was present when it was recorded - he also greatly disparages Böhm's...perhaps on the grounds that he didn't record it! I have most of the other 'studio' Rings you mention, but none tops the Solti.....Oh, I think the DVDs of the Levine/Met Ring might be a pretty good starting point for the novice, with it's 'traditional' staging.
I was all geared up to be a contrarian but I must say I pretty much agree with all of this. I think the ‘53 Krauss has to be the most theatrical version on disc (Alberich’s curse in Rheingold still chills me). But I do find myself grimacing a lot more at the Solti these days and pushing it further to the bottom of the pile now there are so many other splendid recordings.
Solti has dominated the catalog ever since it's release. It's the stereo yardstick, the recording to test your speakers on your system. I happened to catch the last 10 minutes of the Gotterdammerung on TH-cam with Barenboim and Bayreuth. If you notice after the fire scene when Brunnhilde disappears into the storm and the people come out, there are two kids (boy and girl) at the forefront. Towards the end of the act, the boy takes the girl by the hand and leads her to the side (or back) of the stage, as the curtain falls. I am so glad you mentioned Barenboim, and he is a Furtwangler type conductor for sure. Karajan's Die Walkure is special, especially with the singers you mention in that recording. Does it seem that Bohm, on the other hand, races through this cycle? Maybe it adds vitality, I don't know. Keilberth is indeed a classic recording. But I wonder if this cycle demands stereo, so I might be reluctant to hear a monoraul recording of Wagner. I guess you have to be careful of the volume setting.
Thanks, Dave. Very judicious talk. I have, or have spent time with, all of your suggestions, apart from the Naxos one, which I am now intrigued about. Whatever the singers you have in a particular decade you have to do this work, it shows no signs of going away in opera houses anywhere, so seeing how this shapes interpretation is exactly the positive way to move forwards. I'm fond of all of your other suggestions for different reasons - the Janowski, for example, is really excellent and has a quite different "sound" than most of the others plus some great singing (Peter Schreier as Loge and Mime for example). Somehow it sounds more 19th century in pacing and delivery - I'm not really a Nilsson fan so I like Altmeyer's more youthful, lighter Brunnhilde. The Karajan is indeed a whole that is more than the sum of its parts and I wouldn't be without it (although the Bohm and Solti are certainly more exciting in key scenes). Some of the problems there have struck me as having more to do with the recording balances than the singing - for example, the forging scene in Siegfried Act 1 where Stolze is louder than Jess Thomas, or the trio in Gotterdammerung Act 2 where Ridderbusch seems relegated to the background somehow. Unlike some, I really love Fischer-Dieskau as the young Wotan. I just don't believe that Vickers and Janowitz are twins though! If I had to keep one, it'd probably be the Keilberth because of the capturing of the great voices of that time in Bayreuth in stereo, but the Solti is remarkably still an excellent top recommendation.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Lol and I'm thinking that it was always her destiny, given she was called "Gundula", to be in a heavier Wagner role than Elsa. So Kudos to Karajan for making that possible...
I appreciate Gundula Janowitz and think that her voice is truly beautiful, especially in the mid and lower registers. But I've never been able to shake the disappointment of her relatively thin sound in those wonderful, soaring lines of Sieglinde. Despite that, I prefer Karajan's Walkure to Solti's, on balance, even though Crespin is an ideal Sieglinde. BTW, keep in mind that Siegfried and Sieglinde are fraternal twins, not identical! :-)
@@dennischiapello7243 Point taken! However, taking some interest in these discussions with so many intelligent listeners I did find myself wondering whether the best way to do the Ring initially is really a sound recording. Maybe its best to actually watch it? Then get a recording. Its a supposedly "total work of art" after all, so its not quite right just to think about CDs here.
Kober with the Duisburger Philharmoniker is great too. Janowski with the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin and James Levine with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra as well.
For me, the problem with the Solti cycle is Solti himself. He's great in the dramatic and hard-hitting moments, but his foot is still on the accelerator in the spiritual and more tender or heart-wrenching passages. In comparison, even Karajan sounds more spiritual.
Great video, I couldn't agree more. Perhaps I'll add Van Zweden to my collection... but I'm reluctant to buy modern Wagner since Thielemann decided to try his luck in this repertoire. Keilberth and Barenboim, yes! I think Levine deserves an honourable mention: his Ring is very well recorded, very well played and quite decently sung. But for the rest I agree totally with your recommendations...
Agreed on JK, DB & especially CT. CT almost seems to set out to make everything unenjoyable right from the start. My guess is JvZ would not disappoint.
Hello David Hurwitz. Good listening to you. Thanks for uploading this and for making it just about the music and the musician and the quality of performances.
Solt's Ring is arguably Decca's greatest recording. Still sounds stunning after all these years and as for the Vienna Phil - just fabulous! The Naxos intrigues me though. Didn't know it existed.
@@RModillo Jess Thomas. Agreed - his voice always struck me as too refined for Siegfried, especially the boisterous young Siegfried of Part 3. Thomas was great in noble roles like Parsifal and Lohengrin, but he just didn't "click" as Siegfried.
A very interesting 38 minutes and I agree with much of this. I own the Solti, Keilberth, Janowski (the Pentatone, not the earlier one), the EMI Furtwangler, the Karajan, the Fisch, and pieces of the Haitink and Levine Rings, as well as non-cycle recordings by Knappertbusch, Leinsdorf and Fjelstad. I would not be without the Karajan, although Solti would be my first choice as well. I listened to much of the Bohm when first released (a very, very long time ago) and personally found it to lack depth, something I think is generally true of Bohm's conducting -his DG Beethoven cycle is woeful to my ears. And I have never liked the "post coital" scream in Walkure. I have not heard van Zweden, but I have been fortunate enough to have attended two live Ring cycles, one just a few years ago. BTW, the old EMI Walkure Act 1 with Melchior and Lehmann is a must for any Ring collection.
Listened to it the most, but found a flaw (hopefully a newer release has ironed it out). Part of the draw of the Ring cycle was that it's one of the few works including a contra-bass trombone, which didn't disappoint. I had access to Dover scores of the Ring, so was a little surprised to hear silence from the bass clarinet for the entire cycle. The bass clarinet is noticeable in his Tristan recording, maybe made the same year. Switched temporarily to the Boulez recording and was able to hear the the bass clarinet part that way.
What works for me with most operas, Wagner in particular, is getting to know them first via dvd/blu ray. Once you know what's going on you can provide your own visuals to the sound-only cycle of your choice. For me, if opera was all about singing, composers wouldn't have spent so much time fussing about with their librettists which, of course, Wagner didn't do although some would say he should have. As a theatrical experience both the Boulez/Chereau and Copenhagen video Rings are very enjoyable. On cd Solti and Culshaw do a bang-up job of conveying the theatricality of the cycle and without visuals there's the definite advantage of being able to bring your own imagination to bear on underwater nymphs, giants, schlangenwurms, toads and rainbow bridges, none of which ever quite work and sometimes totally bomb on stage.
Actually, I find it more useful to sit down with the libretto and just follow it. Of course, subtitles help with DVDs, but I find most DVD productions to be so silly (when not downright ugly), the singers so unphotogenic, and their acting so pathetic, that it's much more satisfying to use my imagination once I understand what all the screaming is about. Seeing it live is another matter entirely, but to me a video of a live performance is even more artificial and "distancing" then a recording. What we really need are artfully made movies--full scale, glamorous, spare no expense films.
You have me laughing so hard. Every thing you say is true. I’m a Wagner lover and saw Parsifal in Bayreuth in 2019 after waiting 6 yrs for a ticket. It was wonderful and all these Wagner lovers together in one small town and theatre is enough for a comic play to written about. I heard many heated debates at my hotel over which performance or artist etc were the best. Besides that it was glorious to experience.
If you don't know it, you might like Colette's novella Claudine and Annie, which features a visit to Bayreuth circa 1900. You have your comic play script right there.
@@DavidNursal2012 Thanks for telling me I will definitely check it out. I will say that you don’t dare cough or move in your seat while the music is playing in any manner. It is total dead silence otherwise you get a withering glance from your neighbor. No bags or any personal articles are permitted in the auditorium and the list goes on . IDs are checked and you will be banned for life if your ticket is counterfeit. Can’t wait to return. lol
@@richardallen3810 I imagined it must be like that. Though oddly enough, the 1962 Bayreuth Parsifal is notorious for audience noise, especially during the prelude.
Sheesh! Yeah, I heard the waiting time is 7 years! I know, because I tried to get tix; in the meantime, I did see Das Rheingold in Karlsruhe a few years ago - 5th row center seat!
A very entertaining and very well done Video ( I missed any reference to Hans K. Bayreuth Ring) but I need to say I didn't know anything about Bohm Post-coitus scream 🌀 I enjoyed very much watching your Video. Stay Safe and Greetings from Spain 🚩
Warner Classics has a 55 CD box Furtwangler box coming out in the next couple of months that is supposed to include all his studio recordings and commercially released live recordings. So there may be yet another attempt to remaster his Ring cycle.
@@dennismaurer9672 Oops - Dave said Furtwangler did two. I'm as far from an authority on Wagner or Furtwangler as you can get, just made the original comment to let people know another Furtwangler box is coming.
Thanks for the video!! I am wondering how Rudolf Kempe's cycles sound. I found two sets on the market - Bayreuth 61 and Covent Garden 57. I regard many of Kempe's recordings as reference-level, so I'm very curious.
In 1957 Birgit Nilsson was Sieglinde at Bayreuth and gave a scream which I've always found to be quite thrilling. As far as I remember, the Levine Ring on CD had no scream at all which was a bit disappointing. What I would like to hear is Act 3 of Parsifal with no scream from Kundry.
I feel privileged to have actually known an interpreter of one of those essential roles so crucial to the complete Wagner Experience: I have loved the Solti Ring since those distant days when the individual operas were first being released, each of which was a revelation to those of us beginning to get hooked on Wagner, and had access only to a small handful of earlier complete performances (the Furtwangler studio Walkure and the Norwegian Gotterdammerung with Flagstad are the ones I recall). Years later I was hired by Marilyn Tyler, head of opera studies at U. of New Mexico and former lyric soprano, to join the performing faculty of a new summer opera program she was spearheading (I use the word advisedly) in Rome. Even more years later, I happened to glance one day at the cast list of the Solti Walkure and realized that she had been one of those singers, doing ( guess which role) Grimgerde, of course! A few favorite moments from the Solti ring which I've ever heard bettered: Rheingold: The shrieks of the Nibelungs, Donner's Hammer Flagstad in "Wotan, Gemahl' Neidlinger in Alberich's curse Siegfried: Roland Berger's dragon-summoning horn solo in Act 2 Gotterdammerung: Gottlob Frick's pitch-black Hagen, my favorite interpretation of a role which has been singularly fortunate on recordings. The absolutely demented orchestra tantrum which Solti unleashes after Brunhilde's soliloquy which begins the final scene of Act 2. Lieder specialist Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau totally losing it over the same music, during the quarrel with Hagen near the end of Act 3 ("angst und unheil greife dich immer!) Any time la Nilsson uncorks her top B or C.
My first Ring was Solti's and I think I made good choice with that. I love the Ring, it is one of my greatest artistic experience. I was Furtwängler fanatic years ago and I bought the La Scala Ring too in French Furtwängler Society remaster. I think that version has an acceptable sound and quite balanced regards to the orchestra and singers. (I can't stand with recordings where singers are sings into my face but orchestra sounds far away behind them. I want to hear the orchestral performance too.) So I like Furtwängler's version also because now I am quite familiar with the Ring. But the worst thing in that for me is the ending of Die Walküre and the Götter. That stupid audience can't wait for the end and start clapping while the beautiful ending chords are still played. That is very annoying for me. I listened to excerpts from Keilberth's Ring on youtube but the sound is ruined by that very harsh brass sound. I like when brass sounds are played loud but in that case it sounds like the microphones are placed into the horn of the brass instruments. When brasses are playing, they suppress everything else on that recording.
@@orientaldagger6920 Thank you for the reply! I didn't buy another Ring cycle since than. Orchestral performance is important for me (maybe more important than singing). In the meantime I decided that if I will buy another Ring that will be Karajan's. But not now.
Bravo, Dave. Your commentary made me smile. And I know where you're coming from with the choices. My first set was the Furtwangler RAI. It was on some funny label and was ludicrously cheap. The sound is shit, the orchestra [1st trumpet especially] awful etc etc. But I listened through the murk and in the end I grew to love it. Years later when the Solti was available at a reasonable price I picked it up. My expectations were sky high. I marveled at the sound, drooled at the cast but bit by bit got less and less enthusiastic. It took a long time to work it out. In the end I didn't like Solti. When I compared passages time and again what I found was that while there was more surface theatricality, often the tempi were simply too ponderous and the drama through the text simply got lost. I guess you always fall in love with the one you hear first.
I think you're spot on here - with Solti or Böhm (my personal favourite simply because it's so exciting) it's pretty much a done deal. There's one other that I very much enjoy and which you didn't mention: Sawallisch and the Bavarian State Opera live on EMI (it's still around second-hand). Well worth a spin and conducted in an admirably Böhm-like way. Glad you didn't spend any time on the how-slow-can-you-go school of Ring conducting - step forward the Knappertsbusch cultists. One other that has some good moments is Haitink's EMI Ring (some very nice orch playing too), even if he doesn't have the dramatic drive of Böhm, Solti or Sawallisch, or the imagination of Barenboim. Anyhow, a great video. Thanks for it.
I'm fond of the Sawallisch EMI Ring. It's not in my top tier, but Sawallisch is always reliable, and he had a fine cast at his disposal. Hildegard Behrens as Brünnhilde might not be to everyone's taste, but I always liked her as a vocal actress, and she's her usual committed self here.
I often find myself listening to the Sawallisch recording because of the nice flow and colors of the orchestra, but it has good singers too. Karajan`s is like a recording for audiophiles, like a beautiful marble statue. The best modern recording from Bayreuth is by Barenboim, I have listened to his Walküre countless times (to my mind, Graham Clarke created probably the best modern versions of Loge and Mime, truly exciting performances!) I never really liked Nilsson and Sawallisch for some reason, there seems to be no real drama in the voices. Purely musically they are wonderful no doubt.
I only have the Janowski Eurodisc cycle, RCA release I bought back in the late 1980's. I think it was a good intro to the work, esp. with the singing very clear and easy to follow, and the Staatskapelle is great. Some of the high violins sound a bit hard in that early digital way, but overall the sound has great presence. The notes included were excellent, and surprised to hear no notes are incl. in the latest RCA issue, which seem essential to someone coming new to this massive work.
For once, I agree with almost everything you said in this video. The only one I don’t know the the Van Zweden one with HK Phil. Will give it a go. Thanks David!
This past year, my professor of Aesthetics of Music at the Superior Conservatory of Music of Valencia, said in full class and without blushing, that listening to Wagner is unbearable and boring, but yes, that I open my mind to tribal music indigenous and urban music and that I was not so closed in music, because I replied that for me these last two were not art. For me, this little woman has never heard an opera, from whoever she is, in her life. And a concert or symphony I don't think either. This is the level of many teachers in higher centers in Spain.
Wagner bad, Rap good! On a serious note, this reminds of a friend who described Beethoven as a “Robot” rather than a musician, because his music is written down rather than spread aurally. He listens to nothing but Reggaeton btw! All of which sounds the same! 😂😂😂
Saying that indigenous music and rap is not art is also a perspective that betrays a lack of actual cultural comprehension. When an artist strives for perfection it is satisfying and when an artist doesn't strive for perfection the art form becomes a caricature of itself, be it urban music, tribal music, or classical music (especially Opera). It is interesting that Leo Tolstoy wrote a book called "What is Art?" where he really ponders on the excesses of classical music in his time and praises the purity of expression in folk art. That is very understandable and there are many great composers who studied, borrowed and collected folk melodies because the absence of pretentiousness in those melodies made them more powerful. Any great composer that has spent time in Spain has appreciated the abundance of indigenous melodies and rhythms available there. No?
This is the attitude of the "woke" movement in America as well. Anything from the West must necessarily be bad because it was created by white oppressors.
Hello from Bombay (Mumbai) India! And THANK YOU for a most informative and entertaining channel...which is also highly addictive 🙂 Sorry to start off with an error-correction: The Bohm Bayreuth Ring is actually a live recording, not studio. Heard the "post-coital scream". Here are a few others which are comparable: 1. The electronically doctored scream at the end of "Il Tabarro" conducted by Pappano. 2. Tebaldi's shriek as she jumps off the parapet in "Tosca" (Met live, Mitropoulos). 3. Resnik's offstage screams in Solti's Decca/London recording of "Elektra". 4. Albanese's deep, shuddering "Ahime!" during Act 4 of "Manon Lescaut" (Perlea, RCA). And now, please tell us more about the "barking dog" during Ormandy's recording of "Scheherazade" 🙂
I go a little outside the usual requests. But it's summer, and I love to read during that time. I would love one or more videos about some recommended reading music books (biography, listener guide, etc).
Thanks Dave for the interesting choice, and as a Wagner and opera cookie I agree with almost everything. Indeed I find myself agreeing with you on many of your reviews. I might however prefer some of the individual operas in isolated recordings (like Furtwangler's studio Walkure, or Leinsdorf's Walkure with G London as Wotan, or that incredibly intense and black granite Gotterdammerung recorded live in Oslo with the 62 year old Flagstad) What's your opinion on my theory that Wagner is not a passion, it's a disease?
I agree 100% about getting Solti’s version in the beginning. When I decided to buy my first Ring Cycle, I wanted to buy Solti’s version on CD. However, it was very pricey at the time and since money was tight, I bought Wolfgang Sawallisch’s live version with the Bayerische Staatsoper, which was about a fifth of the price of Solti’s. I think it’s very good with performers such as Hildegard Behrens, Waltraud Meier and Kurt Moll. However, “buyer’s remorse” set in as I continued to read the glowing reviews of Solti’s. So, within a few months, I bought the Solti version and unfortunately have not listened to Sawallisch’s in decades. Perhaps I should give it another try.
I pick out parts of Solti's and Karajan's recordings. For Die Walkure, there is HVK's with Jon Vickers' glorious Sigmund and Janowitz' Sieglinde - gorgeously sung and acted, plus the loveliest Magic Fire music. For Siegfried, I turn to Solti because he captures the darkness of the opera, contrasted with a luminous final scene before and after Siegfried has woken up Brunnhilde. Also, Windgassen is superb at conveying the heroic moron that is Siegfried. For Gotterdamerung, again I go with Solti, again because he captures the dramatic and the lyrical wonderfully. Solti's inimitable intensity is very well suited for The Ring. Honorable mention: Bohm's Ring is very exciting and well worth a listen. Rysanek's famous scream when Sigmund pulls out the sword is fantastic.
I prefer my Wagner on video--you really need to see the staging of the opera in order to get the full effect. I like my Wagner to be as close to a movie as possible. However I just broke my own rule 2 weeks ago and bought the Naxos Hong Kong Philharmonic Wagner Ring becuase i had read so much about its quality and so far it's only on cd (as far as I know). So far I'm liking what I hear in this new Ring. Is it the best Ring ever? no--you can get much better historical productions.For example the Kupfer-Barenboim Bayreuth Ring is still one of the best of all time both in staging and in sound. The Barcelona Ring staging was as close to modern Star Wars as you could get--very entertaining to watch on video. However I will say that the Hong Kong Ring in my opinion is the best sounding Ring of the contemporary era (last 15-20 years or so) Your mileage may vary--i know many that say the modern Lepage Metropolitan Opera from several years ago is the best sung of the contemporary era, but i think the Hong Kong sounds better. The orchestra especially sounds wonderful. I agree with Dave you cant go wrong by buying it. It's worth your money.
I just found your channel. SO grateful that you do this. It is clear that you would have made an excellent conductor if you had chosen that path. However we NEED critics who themselves are artists, which you clearly are. I have already started telling my classical music friends about your channel and they're hooked. We've spent the last few days sharing/discussing your video. Thank you for doing this!
I am going to catch so much hate for this, but I grew up with the Levine Ring, and it remains my favorite to this day. I know that people complain about the glacial tempos, but honestly, the slowness of some of the sections draws out the depth of Wagner's rich harmonies and sonorous orchestrations (I like the Fate motif and the Brünnhilde's awakening motifs, for example, to be as absolutely drawn out as possible) and also does justice to the profundity of some moments ("Ruhe, ruhe" at the end of Götterdämmerung). No, Behrens is obviously not a real Wagnerian Brünnhilde, but I find that there is an extraordinary sensitivity and character to her voice that gives the character more color than the Nillsons and Varnays of the previous generation. Reiner Goldberg is an acquired taste, but one eventually falls in love with the sound. And of course, one associates it with the Otto Schenck/Günther Schneider-Siemssen production at the Met, which remains one of the greatest opera productions in history
I am currently at the Bayreuth Festival and heard an absolute horrible Walküre and a really mediocre Tannhäuser. And you are absolutely right. The people here are just mental….😂But it is to some degree quiet funny.
I've listened to excerpts of Walküre, and wasn't impressed. I saw Klaus Florian Vogt's Lohengrin at Bayreuth in 2015, and his light voice was fine; it vaguely reminded me of Jess Thomas, in fact, and that's no bad thing. However, Vogt just doesn't cut it as Siegmund, which is almost a high baritone role. What a shame!
@@ftumschk Sadly Vogt wasn‘t the problem on that evening. Of course he has not the typical voice for Siegmund but he was better than expectet, because his voice became slightly darker compared to earlier in his career. But still not suiting for the role. The conducting was the main problem… Absolutely uninteresting, dull, slow and unexciting. There is a live stream on youtube from the opening night of the Walküre (the performance which I saw) and it sounds better and livlier compared to what I heard. I saw the last Walküre from the Castdorf-Ring in 2017, conducted by Janowski, which was a stunning and exciting performance. He was so much more exciting than on his digital recording and of course 100 times better than Inkinen now. I had a discussion with a friend of mine, who visits Bayreuth regularly since 1966. He heard great performances with Böhm, Nilsson, Windgassen etc. and I asked him, why the musical quality is very variable these days. He said, that for most conductors at that time, Bayreuth was the summit of a long successfull career. Today they invite rather young, unexperienced people, like Inkinen, who are at the beginning of a career. Of course the situation in the Bayreuth orchestra pit was always difficult and big conductors, like Solti, failed. But when you are young, unexperienced and you have to face the difficult aspects of that pit, it can end like it ended with Inkinen. And of course there were conductors who were pretty young and successfull when they conducted the first time in Bayreuth, like Sawallisch who was in his thirties. But that is rather special and not normal. You never know what you get in Bayreuth.
@@philippborghesi1060 I saw the Castorf Ring in annual increments from 2013 onwards, and had enjoyed Petrenko in the first three operas. I was initially disappointed when he dropped out in 2016 (I think it was because he'd been given the Berlin PO job), but thrilled when it was announced that Marek Janowski would be taking over in his place. Having long been a fan of Janowski's Eurodisc Ring Cycle, I was delighted to get the chance to hear him conduct a Ring opera live. Like you say, you never know what to expect at Bayreuth - and, in this instance, it was a very welcome bonus :)
@@philippborghesi1060 Oksana Lyniv made a stunning debut conducting Holländer, in my opinion. At least that is what I say after having listened to the stream provided by Bavarian Radio (Bayern Klassik). BTW: I fondly recalled, while listening to the performance, my first ever experience of a stupendously gifted woman conductor, the late Judith Somogyi, who also conducted Holländer, at Frankfurt Opera in the mid 1980s. The pit was on fire, and each singer onstage carried by her steady hands, never overwhelming the voices. The production was rather traditional, but, oh, the music...
I have just started listening and viewing the Opera North staged concert performance, courtesy BBC, 2017, via TH-cam - I have some reasonable quality Audioengine speakers, and my ears at age 75 are too old to worry about hifi frequencies above 8k. . I've never heard any of the Ring Cycle previously, so as to the quality of the singing and orchestra compared to the CDs boxes discussed, I am not qualified to comment, but as a gentle introduction to the music with subtitles and no distracting "stage business", just some appropriate and imaginative visual effects, I shall see how things go. I see that the English National Opera are undertaking a new Ring Cycle, which I presume will be sung in English. As I live in NZ, I'm unlikely to be able to see this in person, but I hope that the Cycle will be recorded.
YOU DID IT! You whittled away the dross, gave some mention to the kaleidoscope of those 'other' concerns/factions/cults, and kept it to the work, the singers, orchestras, conductors and the recordings which were the result; AND, to my great appreciation, mentioned the Leonie 'post coital scream' thing. Live, in the house, I was a great Rysanek fan. SF Opera did a Walküre in 1976. Rysanek, Vickers, Roberta Knie, Hans Sotin, Ruth Hesse and Clifford Grant. I did standing room for each performance; I was more enthusiastic then. It was a production where the mortals were the Gods. NOT to belittle the others... but the Rysanek/Vickers element was a pretty sizzling example of 'it does not get better than this'. At one performance, as Siegmund pulls it out and Leonie Sieglinde let's out her famous multi-layered-with-meaning-shriek, staggers backwards in awe, ecstasy and general OMGodness..... Well, there was a tree stump coffee table in exact center stage. It seems that Mrs. Hunding was so in the throes that she must have forgotten herself because over she went. Backing into the coffee table, she did it with such force that what we saw was a near perfect cartwheel of legs and skirt in the air in flamboyant, wild, circular motion. The audience did a collective gasp, heard over the orchestra, and down she went. Thankfully she was not hurt and, stage animal that she was, she instantly came crawling into an on her knees position at said coffee table, ready for more of what ever Siegmund had to offer. She turned that near disaster into an 'in the moment' bit of colossal proportions. Wagner - Walküre - Sieglinde - la Rysanek ! A really fine presentation, David. Thank you.
Just listening to the van Zweden Die Walker. Its a belter! Great singing and characterisation plus a wonderful flowing accompaniment from Van Zweden and the HKPO.
My discovery of the ring was through the Karajan version, and I must say that to this day, after many more Rings, Gundula Janowitz remains the ideal Sieglinde for me. What she does with the O hehrstes Wunder in the third act is just amazing and since then, every time I hear it elsewhere, I can't help but be a little disappointed....
My three rings are historical recordings from the 1950s. Furtwängler and La Scala, which is the weakest of the three. Keilberth 1953, released by The Intense Media at a very low price. It features Hans Hotter, Martha Mödl and Wolfgang Windgassen, among others. One of my best value for money buys ever. And the 1956 Bayreuth conducted by Hans Knappertsbusch, about the finest you can get, with Hotter, Varnay and Windsgassen. I'll have to add more to my collection, provided the price is within reach.
I can't understand Wagner nuts who must hear every Wagner recording. Whenever I re-listen to my 10 least favorite Ring Cycles, just to remind myself why they're so bad, I always vow to myself never to listen to them again for at least the following 3 months.
A very interesting video! I just listened to The Ring Cycle for the first time, and I'm very much interested in listening to it again, and in other versions. Out of personal curiosity, how do people tend to feel about Swarowsky's Ring? I found the entire recording in my local library, and I thought it was very good. Though I'm not familiar with opera or Wagner, so what do I know? Very informative video!
The Membran release of the Rome Furtwangler sounds OK to me - at least no worse than others from that era. But the Milan one is probably beyond hope - only worth dipping into to sample Flagstad's Brunnhilde.
I have (for the last few years, at least) favored Knappertsbusch when it comes to re-listening, but I'm speaking as someone who hasn't actually buckled down and listened to the entirety of Keilberth's.
I have a number of complete Rings, including all 3 of Keilberth's ('52, '53, and '55), both Furtwänglers, Knappertsbusch '56, Kraus, Böhm, the Met from Bodanzky and Leinsdorf, various individual recordings of the operas, and probably more that my aging brain isn't recalling. And though dismissed by Mr Hurwitz, my favorites feature Melchior, Flagstad, and Marjorie Lawrence, not necessarily all in the same production.
No, of course there is no complete Ring with Melchior and Flagstad. I wasn't very clear with that comment, Although, Richard Caniell has created a Dream Ring with Melchior and Flagstad on the Immortal Performances label, if you want to dive into the creative imagination and ears of Mr. Canielle. It's a worthwhile experience if you're not orthodox about your live performances.
It may have been necessary to record these Met 1930s Wagner recordings in cut versions, but today we can only get "what's left", and the cuts are too much for us not to turn elsewhere. I, too, am grateful for the snippets we have. .
I just began listening to Solti. I had just planned to sample the Vorspiel of Das Rheingold for now. I just can't stop listening. I guess I'm going to listen to the whole opera.
@@dennischiapello7243 Indeed. I didn't spot any off-ramp later on either. So, I listened to the whole Rheingold with just one short break in the middle. There are so many powerful and memorable moments; I now feel like my ears are full of ringworms.
I own both the Karajan and the original Solti with the Culshaw hard bound book on LP, that is a story in itself as I found the Solti box set sealed, unopened at a record dealer where I normally would purchase rock, jazz more contemporary music. I came in to pickup an order and as I left I couldn't believe my eyes, the box set sitting on a shelf. It just came in from a larger purchase the store made. Prior to that, I've seen three sets; one loaned to me and two others for sale that were in terrible shape. Sometimes things just fall into your lap. Have you ever heard the Esoteric Audio reissue on SACD(ESSD-90021~34) of the Solti? I understand that it's the best sounding set out there but perusing eBay they go for thousands of dollars.
Dear Mr Hurwitz, Many thanks for your regular educational and entertaining recommendations of recordings, both of the so-called 'standard repertoire' and of more esoteric but very enjoyable works. I have the complete Solti Ring on Decca and John Culshaw's 'Ring Resounding' published account of the recording sessions. With a little more free time now on my hands, I am keen to acquaint myself with The Ring but feel I need a good guide in book form. As I'm not a trained musician, I'd prefer something accessible to the ordinary listener, without too many score excerpts interspersed throughout the text but perhaps a little more expansive than the notes and expanatory CDs in the box. Although it is outside your usual remit in these videos, I wonder whether you could suggest a suitable book to ease me in to both the plots and music (or would you simply rely on the resources provided and 'dive in')? With very best wishes from Oxford, UK.
My main issue with the Patrice Chereau production was that it was the first ever broadcast Ring and should have been more traditional for those who had loves the work for years. Instead of the magical, legend, he gave us modern drek.
Daniel Barenboim's 1992 Bayreuth Laser Ring on DVD is my favourite recording. Sounds incredible, with a fantastic cast, especially Anne Evans as Brunhilde. Sotli's Ring has that 1950s Alfred Hitchcock movie music sound which I find off putting and I don't like the addition of the sound effects. Also Hans Hoffer sounds like he has a cold and they should have stuck with George London from Rheingold.
Thanks for this! I really like 1956 Knappertsbusch. You are right about Stewart. George London as the Rhinegold Wotan with Solti is fabulous. Curious as to your opinion on Levine on DG?
My Ring recordings go back to the 1930’s Potted ring on HMV Black Label, ( Pearl reissue on CD and Original 78 rpm-records)the conducting being shared between Albert Coates, Leo Blech, and Heger? The La Scala Ring is ok if you get a cleaned up version of it. It has more fire than the Rome Ring. As far as “Modern” Cycles are concerned I’ve always had a great love for the 1966 Bohm Cycle ( I’ve owned this on Vinyl and now have it on CD) I prefer the Solti Cycle to the Karajan Cycle. I also rather like the ENO recording in English under Goodall. I’m a great Rita Hunter fan.
Pristine Classical's remasters of the Furtwangler Rings are quite good, makes them far more listenable than the other versions I've heard. Although not enough to make them the recommended choice for beginners, but I do think the 1950 La Scala performance especially is artistically great enough to spend the extra money. It's the second Ring I generally reach for when I'm in the mood for a listen, which is pretty darned often. As for which Ring is the first one I reach for, I actually go for Bohm over Solti. When I was first getting into opera, I did what everyone does and got the Solti first, and didn't really care for the work. I find Solti's habit of turning the dial to 11 at every moment of the opera a little wearying and as a result, I found the work kind of bombastic and square. Solti's Ring reminds me of some of my classmates in grad school who had a habit of highlighting virtually every line on the pages, so you'd look at their books at the end of the term and nothing was really highlighted because everything is highlighted. Wagner didn't really click for me until I got the Bohm Ring, and to this day, I still find it much more enjoyable to sit down for 15 hours of Bohm's, although I do enjoy many 15 minutes sections of Solti's. You're exactly right that the Bohm is just thrilling, exciting, dramatic, overall just a fantastic theatrical experience. And the singing is slightly better at the edges for Solti with some of the casting of some of the small parts (Joan Sutherland as the forest bird!) but the casting of the major parts are equally strong I think, and Nilsson herself thought her performance of Brunnhilde better on the Bohm than the Solti. I'll turn to Solti or Karajan if I felt like listening to a highlight (especially an orchestral highlight) but if I feel like listening to the whole cycle, most of the time, it'd be the Bohm. The Keilberth is very good but I found the more I listened to Astrid Varnay, the less I enjoyed her performances, to the point now where I find her actively distracting and annoying. She has this habit of scooping up to the note, which she deploys as more of a tic rather than an interpretative tool, and I find I never want to listen to her anymore. I just find myself shouting at my stereo for her to just sing the notes as written.
Interesting that you mentioned Jaap von Sweden's Ring as being similar to von Karajan's. Not only did von Sweden use a lieder singer (Goerne) for Wotan, so did Karajan, with Fischer-Dieskau. Something you might have mentioned in recommending the Solti Ring as the hands-down best choice for a first recording, is the whole Culshaw-Ring-Resounding-Stereo aspect, with every special effect following Wagner's specifications to a T: the full set of precisely tuned anvils, authentic alpenhorns, an enormous thunder machine, and on and on. Those might be non-musical factors, but as you point out, Wagner was a man of the theater, and he pulled out all the stops in The Ring.
I will now date myself and say that when I was finally able to purchase my first Ring cycle, there was Solti and there was Karajan (brand new) - and that was it. The general opinion among my music student peers was that Solti had the better singers, but that Karajan had worked magic with the orchestra. Choose your poison! I took Karajan at the time, but later got Solti and others (including Böhm). Sorry to say this, but I cannot share your opinion about Barenboim. I have heard him conduct a number of times with various orchestras and was at the Staatsoper Berlin for his Ring (soon after his Bayreuth Ring). For whatever reason, he leaves me absolutely cold whatever he conducts. So if he‘s conducting, I don‘t go. Chacon à son goût, as a relatively famous person in a relatively famous opera/operetta has been known to sing.
Hi David, I have just discovered your channel and would like to say how much I have enjoyed what I've seen and heard so far. In 2004 I attended the State Opera production of the full cycle in Adelaide, South Australia as conducted by Asher Fisch. The whole endeavor was recorded and released on the Melba Label on SACD Hybrid CDs. The production was engineered by the same people who were later responsible for the marvelous recent Naxos Hong Kong edition. Have you heard it? The Walkure in particular is excellent.
Great videos David, and they have really helped me build my collection. Could you finish off the Vaughan Williams Symphonies you have done 1, 4 and Job but would love to know your views on the rest.
I am one of those opera lovers who values highly, maybe even most highly, the theatricality of an opera. If the conducting is dull or weird in a bad way, I just cannot abide any recording of Wagner's Ring (or almost any other opera), If the sound is so dismal that it breaks the theatrical connexion with the work, I'll listen it once and let it gather dust for the rest of my life. Alas, Furtwängler and some other famous and wonderful conductors end up covered in dust due to that very regrettable factor. Regarding videos, if the costumes and setting are bizarre and betray the vision of the composer and librettists, no matter how good the singing and conducting, how marvellous the recorded sound, that, too, goes even faster into the bust-catching piles.
“Cultists are nuts”. 😂😂😂😂. Couldn’t agree more. Grew up with the Solti Ring which has spoilt me for any others. The dream cast cannot be even closely matched today and Culshaw’s production/engineering is legendary.
As a Wagnerite, a crazy person - I can't comment, but will just say thanks for the video.
Hojotoho, indeed!
Wise way to avoid David's censorious fingertips.
Haha, likewise.
Me too!
I was from Hong Kong (I immigrated to the States 28 years ago). I listened to Hong Kong Philharmonic growing up. This Ring recording is the best I have ever heard from my home town orchestra. It completely changed my opinion towards them. After the pandemic I hope I will get a chance to listen to them live again
The 1955 Keilberth is my favorite Ring overall. I know the Solti is more technically perfect, and I'm glad I had the opportunity to learn the work from it, but the Keilberth offers an amazing sonic window into what was surely one of Bayreuth's greatest decades.
Great set, and Keilberth's 1953 set is even greater for the singing, but alas, it's not in stereo.
Owners of the Solti version really need to get John Culshaw's book "Ring Resounding" about the production of that justifiably famous set. Terrific read. But for headphone listening, Karajan's is the easiest of the ears IMO.
It is a pity that when he wrote the book, Culshaw did not know that Ernst Kozub was in precarious health and may well have decided that he needed to try to make as much as he could while he still could, even in the knowledge that he might not be able to fulfil engagements. I don't know if Jon Vickers was approached but he would never have worked with Solti after the Covent Garden debacle.
When I bought my first Solti Ring, it was on LP and a set of books, including Culshaw's "Ring Resounding" was included. Great insights to the challenges of recording the work. I loved the Solti so much, that I bought the identical set when it came out on CD. The only other Ring I have is Levine and the Met on DVD, since it was one of the few "traditional" stagings available on DVD. I did not want to buy a version that would be of the moment and outdated before the Rhine washed over Hagen.
@@Horichdaslicht1858 In other words, Kozub was "our Siegfried"? Not named in the book.
@@Rozsaphile Yes.
@@Rozsaphile Culshaw named Kozub in his (uncompleted) memoirs.
As a Wagnerite, a Knappertsbuschite, and a dedicated third nornist, I endorse this video.
[edit] now that I've finished watching the video - what an awesome, thoughtful, and straightforward video :) good job!
Oh no I would never ever expected the Hong Kong Philharmonic to be featured in the list of David Hurwitz’s list of the Ring recordings to go for, together with the titans like Solti, Keilberth and Karajan etc!!! As a HKer I am ashamed to not giving enough attention to my hometown orchestra. Now I must rush out and get this recording, fast!
Such a nice and passionate video of the Opus Magnum by the greatest composer ever!
My favorite (as a native German):
Clemens Krauss 1953 live recording from Bayreuther Festspiele.
Never heard anything better!
Um, OK, but spare us that "greatest composer ever" nonsense.
I don’t know if the Krauss is the best overall Ring, but it’s the best Siegfried.
There are two Sieglinde screams in Böhm. End of Act 1 scream of ecstasy and end of Act 2 scream of sorrow. She also ends in a vocal volcanic eruption of hope in Act 3. Rysanek was truly an exceptional singer.
No matter which is your favorite, I claim special consideration for the Solti (sort of like a "Lifetime Achievement Award). I believe it was the first one issued commercially, it put Wagner on the map, put Nilsson on the map, put the VPO on the map, put Culshaw on the map, put Decca/London on the map, etc. Even if it's not your favorite, the interest generated by the Solti ring (IMO) helped greatly in selling future issues (whether originally recorded before or after the Solti).
Very informative & most interesting. In the final analysis, the Georg Solti Ring set is, for sure, the best recording of this monumental masterpiece. I have loved it ever since it first became available. Prof. Dr. Dr. H. James Birx, New York USA
If not "the best" certainly the best known.
Thank you for a very informative video. I’m pleased that you highlighted the Naxos Ring as I bought that years ago as individual releases as they were issued. I always thought highly of them but they were rarely mentioned in reviews, so I’m happy that you thought so highly of them.
Thank Bob Levine, ClassicsToday's opera critic who has the finest ear in the business, and absolutely no prejudice where quality is concerned. He's taught me more than I can begin to express.
I am on the floor laughing. Great review, David. Excellent reviews. And your synopses of the various Wagner camps were spot on (and hilarious). My favorite three are Solti, Karajan, and Bohm--all have flaws, I love 'em all. For me they helped me gain an appreciation not just for Wagner, but how a conductor's vision shapes the performance.
I have in my collection: Boehm, Keilberth, Solti, Karajan, Furtwaengler '50 and '53, Krauss, Knappertsbusch '57 and '58. If I had to choose two, it would be the historic Keilberth and Stereo "in Bayreuth", Boehm!!
I wouldn't call myself a historical recording nut (all-in-all I prefer Janowski's Dresden Ring with its crystal clear leitmotivs), but for those who are not averse to somewhat older sonics, I can really recommend the (uncut and very decently recorded) 1949 Vienna Rudolf Moralt Ring. It features the older generation of prewar singers and offers a glimpse of how Wagner must have sounded to the ears of interbellum composers like Berg, Schoenberg, Strauss, etc. And it's so well sung/enunciated that for those who understand German, you can follow the text without the libretto.
Thanks for the suggestion
1949 and 1953 Krauss is not too far away tho. Might as well recommend the 1928 Parsifal and Siegfried Wagner early Bayreuth singers to hear what Wagner would have had which is more convincing
On the subtopic of Hans Hotter, in the late 1970s I got to hear the elderly Hans Hotter leading a master class in voice at the San Francisco Conservatory. Once or twice he illustrated how a phrase just sung by a student could go better, treating all around to that familiar woolly, wobbly but oracular Wotan-like voice (he must have been eighty-ish at the time). I stood probably only three or four feet behind him. I stayed a few minutes then slunk out, probably thinking (foolishly) this was an event best left to the singers.
I enjoyed Dave's retelling of Leonie Rysanek's scream. However, one fine evening at the Met Jon Vickers pulled and pulled, yet Notung wouldn't budge. And then finally out it came in pieces, with something flying into the orchestra pit while another fragment just missed Sieglinde's head. The performance was unusual in that Birgit Nilsson was singing the role of Sieglinde, not Brunnhilde. Well, Nilsson let out a shriek, but it was a shriek of terror, not of joy. Many in the audience, including myself, cracked up in hysterics. This greatest singers also had a keen sense of humor and was really fast on her feet.
I have never actually heard this piece at all. I loved this review and I will now be checking out this work. :-) Thanks for another great video.
I hope you've heard this by now. First time I ever heard the ring, I thought it was terrible music. Years later, I heard it again, and my life changed. Overall, I prefer the Boulez.
Great choice on the HKPhil Ring set. I attended some of these live concerts. Thrilling experience despite it’s not fully staged plays. Can’t forget that leb wohl delivered by Goerne, kept listening to this piece today. Dilemma of the Wagner Ring - the recording is getting better yet the singers are getting worse.
I've gotten to slightly prefer Varnay to Nilsson's Brunnhilde interperatively. When my VHS tapes of the Levine/Met/Otto Schenk production died, I got a DVD set of Barenboim's Ring and it's marvelous as well! More modern, more interesting, but not crazy. great chat!
My favourite example of Karajan’s idiosyncratic casting is that he auditioned Alfred Deller’s son Mark for the role of Erda.
That is delicious to contemplate!
Erda sung by a COUNTERTENOR? I don't think Wagner would have approved.
The Dresden Ring has become a favorite. Youthfulness of the singers is a good thing.
I own the Karajan (as an orchestral musician, I love it over all others), and know the Solti, Boulez and Barenboim very well. I couldn’t agree with you more. Very fair critiques . Your comments are spot on! I must hear the Böhm… exciting and raw? Böhm? Who knew? 😂 Thanks again, David.
It is really very good Jack. Much as I have issues about Bohm as a human being he could be very exciting. Yes his Ring is a bit rough sometimes orchestrally (close miking of brass etc) but it is terrifically exciting, try Gotterdammerung Act 2! But similarly he was very exciting in Strauss and Berg.
What do you think of Boulez's Ring? David never talked about it.
@@ericc8269 Actually he does, if only for a good bit less than a minute: see 3:30.
I have the complete Solti set on vinyl now...I change the LPs more often than my underwear. Ummm......yeah. But there is something special and amazing about this recording on vinyl.
Same here!🤣
Nice reviews, Dave.. Loved Wagner since I saw Nilssson at the Met in the early 60s (in Gotterdammerung, she had a live, four-legged Grane--who nuzzled her). It's a shame that toda,y no one dare utter the name of James Levine who was a master Wagner conducter. Levine, along with Barenboim, were my favorites. I hold a special affection for Barenboim, however. He seems to me to be able to extract the marrow from Wagner's sensibilies better than anyone; I feel it all the way down to my bones. His closing of Gotterdamerung (I beleive it's on his "Cycle" recording) is breathtaking. He summoned his"Barenboim horns" to great dramatic effect.
Notwithstanding his deserved moral reckoning, Levine as a Wagner conductor can hardly hold a candle to Solti, Karajan, Bohm, Furtwangler, Barenboim, and Thielemann, among many others. Slow labored interpretations lacking a coherent structure.
@@NYCOPERAFAN Never experienced that but I don't have your speakers. 🤣
If we are cancelling Levine, shouldn't we also cancel Furtwängler for literally being the leading conductor in Germany under the nazis?
Excellent discussion. Thank you!
One question: where, oh, where can I get that fabulous shirt?! "Abnormal is fine. Stupid is not"? That's perfect! I love it!
We will have an e-commerce portal up in the next few weeks (a month or two?). Hang in there!
@@DavesClassicalGuide Fantastic! Thank you!
Somewhat amazingly, I actually own all three of your recommendations! I had the good fortune to know and work with Jimmy Brown, who was one of the Decca engineers who recorded the Solti cycle. I also met John Culshaw a few times, so I have a bit of a 'vested interest' in that version!
Much enjoyed your exploration of 'Ring' recordings - my own journey with this most amazing of works of art started in the late 70s when BBC Tv broadcast the whole Boulez Ring in acts on consecutive Sunday evenings...and I was hooked! I then started to explore those recordings then available, as well as reading as much literature on the subject (a lot!). First came a Ring you didn't mention: EMI's Goodall/English National Opera, recorded live in Coliseum, London. I started with that as I saw live this Valkyrie (I later saw the WNO Ring, also in English, with Anne Evans who was in the Barenboim Ring at Bayreuth) and was bowled over by both cast and conducting. But very soon I wanted a set in German, so home came the Solti...and a lifelong love affair with this amazing recording - so much so that I read the producer, John Culshaw's 'Ring Resounding' and decided I must visit the Sofiensäle in Vienna to see where this legendary recording (and many other Decca recordings) were made....I achieved this ambition only 5 years ago - the Sofiensäle now restored after the disastrous fire.
For live I have Böhm and the '55 Keilberth.....BTW Culshaw discusses the Keilberth in the above book as he was present when it was recorded - he also greatly disparages Böhm's...perhaps on the grounds that he didn't record it!
I have most of the other 'studio' Rings you mention, but none tops the Solti.....Oh, I think the DVDs of the Levine/Met Ring might be a pretty good starting point for the novice, with it's 'traditional' staging.
Love the Bohm ring. Not sure if I love it as much your biting snark though. Keep it coming Dave, you're a treasure.
I was all geared up to be a contrarian but I must say I pretty much agree with all of this. I think the ‘53 Krauss has to be the most theatrical version on disc (Alberich’s curse in Rheingold still chills me). But I do find myself grimacing a lot more at the Solti these days and pushing it further to the bottom of the pile now there are so many other splendid recordings.
I hate the Solti. Krauss, Keilberth, Karajan, Janowski... - all better.
Solti has dominated the catalog ever since it's release. It's the stereo yardstick, the recording to test your speakers on your system.
I happened to catch the last 10 minutes of the Gotterdammerung on TH-cam with Barenboim and Bayreuth. If you notice after the fire scene when Brunnhilde disappears into the storm and the people come out, there are two kids (boy and girl) at the forefront. Towards the end of the act, the boy takes the girl by the hand and leads her to the side (or back) of the stage, as the curtain falls. I am so glad you mentioned Barenboim, and he is a Furtwangler type conductor for sure.
Karajan's Die Walkure is special, especially with the singers you mention in that recording. Does it seem that Bohm, on the other hand, races through this cycle? Maybe it adds vitality, I don't know.
Keilberth is indeed a classic recording. But I wonder if this cycle demands stereo, so I might be reluctant to hear a monoraul recording of Wagner. I guess you have to be careful of the volume setting.
Thanks, Dave. Very judicious talk. I have, or have spent time with, all of your suggestions, apart from the Naxos one, which I am now intrigued about. Whatever the singers you have in a particular decade you have to do this work, it shows no signs of going away in opera houses anywhere, so seeing how this shapes interpretation is exactly the positive way to move forwards. I'm fond of all of your other suggestions for different reasons - the Janowski, for example, is really excellent and has a quite different "sound" than most of the others plus some great singing (Peter Schreier as Loge and Mime for example). Somehow it sounds more 19th century in pacing and delivery - I'm not really a Nilsson fan so I like Altmeyer's more youthful, lighter Brunnhilde. The Karajan is indeed a whole that is more than the sum of its parts and I wouldn't be without it (although the Bohm and Solti are certainly more exciting in key scenes). Some of the problems there have struck me as having more to do with the recording balances than the singing - for example, the forging scene in Siegfried Act 1 where Stolze is louder than Jess Thomas, or the trio in Gotterdammerung Act 2 where Ridderbusch seems relegated to the background somehow. Unlike some, I really love Fischer-Dieskau as the young Wotan. I just don't believe that Vickers and Janowitz are twins though!
If I had to keep one, it'd probably be the Keilberth because of the capturing of the great voices of that time in Bayreuth in stereo, but the Solti is remarkably still an excellent top recommendation.
Yes, Janowitz had more hair on her chest.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Lol and I'm thinking that it was always her destiny, given she was called "Gundula", to be in a heavier Wagner role than Elsa. So Kudos to Karajan for making that possible...
I appreciate Gundula Janowitz and think that her voice is truly beautiful, especially in the mid and lower registers. But I've never been able to shake the disappointment of her relatively thin sound in those wonderful, soaring lines of Sieglinde. Despite that, I prefer Karajan's Walkure to Solti's, on balance, even though Crespin is an ideal Sieglinde. BTW, keep in mind that Siegfried and Sieglinde are fraternal twins, not identical! :-)
@@dennischiapello7243 Point taken! However, taking some interest in these discussions with so many intelligent listeners I did find myself wondering whether the best way to do the Ring initially is really a sound recording. Maybe its best to actually watch it? Then get a recording. Its a supposedly "total work of art" after all, so its not quite right just to think about CDs here.
I love your cheeky ‘Get Solti’, which I heard as a paraphrase on ‘Get Shorty’ 😉
Kober with the Duisburger Philharmoniker is great too. Janowski with the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin and James Levine with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra as well.
For me, the problem with the Solti cycle is Solti himself. He's great in the dramatic and hard-hitting moments, but his foot is still on the accelerator in the spiritual and more tender or heart-wrenching passages. In comparison, even Karajan sounds more spiritual.
Great video, I couldn't agree more. Perhaps I'll add Van Zweden to my collection... but I'm reluctant to buy modern Wagner since Thielemann decided to try his luck in this repertoire. Keilberth and Barenboim, yes! I think Levine deserves an honourable mention: his Ring is very well recorded, very well played and quite decently sung. But for the rest I agree totally with your recommendations...
Agreed on JK, DB & especially CT. CT almost seems to set out to make everything unenjoyable right from the start. My guess is JvZ would not disappoint.
Hello David Hurwitz. Good listening to you. Thanks for uploading this and for making it just about the music and the musician and the quality of performances.
This imperfect Wagnerite loves your work and this video! And, I am not crazy, my therapist says so!
Solt's Ring is arguably Decca's greatest recording. Still sounds stunning after all these years and as for the Vienna Phil - just fabulous! The Naxos intrigues me though. Didn't know it existed.
The ANALOG Solti ring is so much better than the digital version. But I prefer Boehm.
A lot of seedy playing from VPO, and irregular rhythms. Karajan is a useful corrective. Too bad about Herbie's choice of Siegfried...
@@RModillo Which one - Jess Thomas or Helge Brillioth?
@@ftumschk Whichever sang in Part 3. Sounds like a lieder recital gone very wrong whenever he's involved.
@@RModillo Jess Thomas. Agreed - his voice always struck me as too refined for Siegfried, especially the boisterous young Siegfried of Part 3. Thomas was great in noble roles like Parsifal and Lohengrin, but he just didn't "click" as Siegfried.
Before the Hurwitz Effect takes over: the Keilberth set is available a LOT cheaper from Berkshire Record Outlet than from Amazon.
A very interesting 38 minutes and I agree with much of this. I own the Solti, Keilberth, Janowski (the Pentatone, not the earlier one), the EMI Furtwangler, the Karajan, the Fisch, and pieces of the Haitink and Levine Rings, as well as non-cycle recordings by Knappertbusch, Leinsdorf and Fjelstad. I would not be without the Karajan, although Solti would be my first choice as well. I listened to much of the Bohm when first released (a very, very long time ago) and personally found it to lack depth, something I think is generally true of Bohm's conducting -his DG Beethoven cycle is woeful to my ears. And I have never liked the "post coital" scream in Walkure. I have not heard van Zweden, but I have been fortunate enough to have attended two live Ring cycles, one just a few years ago. BTW, the old EMI Walkure Act 1 with Melchior and Lehmann is a must for any Ring collection.
Keilberth is a revelation
My first CD Ring was Bohm and I don't regret it for a first ring.
Listened to it the most, but found a flaw (hopefully a newer release has ironed it out). Part of the draw of the Ring cycle was that it's one of the few works including a contra-bass trombone, which didn't disappoint. I had access to Dover scores of the Ring, so was a little surprised to hear silence from the bass clarinet for the entire cycle. The bass clarinet is noticeable in his Tristan recording, maybe made the same year. Switched temporarily to the Boulez recording and was able to hear the the bass clarinet part that way.
What works for me with most operas, Wagner in particular, is getting to know them first via dvd/blu ray. Once you know what's going on you can provide your own visuals to the sound-only cycle of your choice. For me, if opera was all about singing, composers wouldn't have spent so much time fussing about with their librettists which, of course, Wagner didn't do although some would say he should have. As a theatrical experience both the Boulez/Chereau and Copenhagen video Rings are very enjoyable. On cd Solti and Culshaw do a bang-up job of conveying the theatricality of the cycle and without visuals there's the definite advantage of being able to bring your own imagination to bear on underwater nymphs, giants, schlangenwurms, toads and rainbow bridges, none of which ever quite work and sometimes totally bomb on stage.
Actually, I find it more useful to sit down with the libretto and just follow it. Of course, subtitles help with DVDs, but I find most DVD productions to be so silly (when not downright ugly), the singers so unphotogenic, and their acting so pathetic, that it's much more satisfying to use my imagination once I understand what all the screaming is about. Seeing it live is another matter entirely, but to me a video of a live performance is even more artificial and "distancing" then a recording. What we really need are artfully made movies--full scale, glamorous, spare no expense films.
You have me laughing so hard. Every thing you say is true. I’m a Wagner lover and saw Parsifal in Bayreuth in 2019 after waiting 6 yrs for a ticket. It was wonderful and all these Wagner lovers together in one small town and theatre is enough for a comic play to written about. I heard many heated debates at my hotel over which performance or artist etc were the best. Besides that it was glorious to experience.
If you don't know it, you might like Colette's novella Claudine and Annie, which features a visit to Bayreuth circa 1900. You have your comic play script right there.
@@DavidNursal2012 Thanks for telling me I will definitely check it out. I will say that you don’t dare cough or move in your seat while the music is playing in any manner. It is total dead silence otherwise you get a withering glance from your neighbor. No bags or any personal articles are permitted in the auditorium and the list goes on . IDs are checked and you will be banned for life if your ticket is counterfeit. Can’t wait to return. lol
@@richardallen3810 I imagined it must be like that. Though oddly enough, the 1962 Bayreuth Parsifal is notorious for audience noise, especially during the prelude.
Sheesh! Yeah, I heard the waiting time is 7 years! I know, because I tried to get tix; in the meantime, I did see Das Rheingold in Karlsruhe a few years ago - 5th row center seat!
I only own the Solti and I've never felt the need for any other. However, I might buy the latest remastering of it as I note its available on SACD
A very entertaining and very well done Video ( I missed any reference to Hans K. Bayreuth Ring) but I need to say I didn't know anything about Bohm Post-coitus scream 🌀 I enjoyed very much watching your Video. Stay Safe and Greetings from Spain 🚩
Wagging my tail for Wagner. A glorious exposition, thank you.
Warner Classics has a 55 CD box Furtwangler box coming out in the next couple of months that is supposed to include all his studio recordings and commercially released live recordings. So there may be yet another attempt to remaster his Ring cycle.
The furtwangler box will not have rai ring; never was meant for commercial release
@@dennismaurer9672 But it should have the EMI Ring. Edit - I see from John Fowler's comment that not all of it survives.
@@Don-md6wn same recording
@@dennismaurer9672 Oops - Dave said Furtwangler did two. I'm as far from an authority on Wagner or Furtwangler as you can get, just made the original comment to let people know another Furtwangler box is coming.
Thanks for the video!! I am wondering how Rudolf Kempe's cycles sound. I found two sets on the market - Bayreuth 61 and Covent Garden 57. I regard many of Kempe's recordings as reference-level, so I'm very curious.
In 1957 Birgit Nilsson was Sieglinde at Bayreuth and gave a scream which I've always found to be quite thrilling. As far as I remember, the Levine Ring on CD had no scream at all which was a bit disappointing. What I would like to hear is Act 3 of Parsifal with no scream from Kundry.
Later on, Rysanek became known for the ‘Sieglinde scream’.
I own 15 Ring Cycles on CD and my top three would be in line with Dave’s:
• Solti
• Bohm
• Keilberth 1955
I feel privileged to have actually known an interpreter of one of those essential roles so crucial to the complete Wagner Experience: I have loved the Solti Ring since those distant days when the individual operas were first being released, each of which was a revelation to those of us beginning to get hooked on Wagner, and had access only to a small handful of earlier complete performances (the Furtwangler studio Walkure and the Norwegian Gotterdammerung with Flagstad are the ones I recall). Years later I was hired by Marilyn Tyler, head of opera studies at U. of New Mexico and former lyric soprano, to join the performing faculty of a new summer opera program she was spearheading (I use the word advisedly) in Rome. Even more years later, I happened to glance one day at the cast list of the Solti Walkure and realized that she had been one of those singers, doing ( guess which role) Grimgerde, of course!
A few favorite moments from the Solti ring which I've ever heard bettered:
Rheingold: The shrieks of the Nibelungs, Donner's Hammer Flagstad in "Wotan, Gemahl' Neidlinger in Alberich's curse
Siegfried: Roland Berger's dragon-summoning horn solo in Act 2
Gotterdammerung: Gottlob Frick's pitch-black Hagen, my favorite interpretation of a role which has been singularly fortunate on recordings.
The absolutely demented orchestra tantrum which Solti unleashes after Brunhilde's soliloquy which begins the final scene of Act 2.
Lieder specialist Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau totally losing it over the same music, during the quarrel with Hagen near the end of Act 3 ("angst und unheil greife dich immer!)
Any time la Nilsson uncorks her top B or C.
Sounds right to me! Thanks for sharing your experience with Grimgerde!
My first Ring was Solti's and I think I made good choice with that. I love the Ring, it is one of my greatest artistic experience. I was Furtwängler fanatic years ago and I bought the La Scala Ring too in French Furtwängler Society remaster. I think that version has an acceptable sound and quite balanced regards to the orchestra and singers. (I can't stand with recordings where singers are sings into my face but orchestra sounds far away behind them. I want to hear the orchestral performance too.)
So I like Furtwängler's version also because now I am quite familiar with the Ring. But the worst thing in that for me is the ending of Die Walküre and the Götter. That stupid audience can't wait for the end and start clapping while the beautiful ending chords are still played. That is very annoying for me.
I listened to excerpts from Keilberth's Ring on youtube but the sound is ruined by that very harsh brass sound. I like when brass sounds are played loud but in that case it sounds like the microphones are placed into the horn of the brass instruments. When brasses are playing, they suppress everything else on that recording.
@@orientaldagger6920 Thank you for the reply! I didn't buy another Ring cycle since than. Orchestral performance is important for me (maybe more important than singing). In the meantime I decided that if I will buy another Ring that will be Karajan's. But not now.
Bravo, Dave. Your commentary made me smile. And I know where you're coming from with the choices.
My first set was the Furtwangler RAI. It was on some funny label and was ludicrously cheap. The sound is shit, the orchestra [1st trumpet especially] awful etc etc. But I listened through the murk and in the end I grew to love it. Years later when the Solti was available at a reasonable price I picked it up. My expectations were sky high. I marveled at the sound, drooled at the cast but bit by bit got less and less enthusiastic. It took a long time to work it out. In the end I didn't like Solti. When I compared passages time and again what I found was that while there was more surface theatricality, often the tempi were simply too ponderous and the drama through the text simply got lost. I guess you always fall in love with the one you hear first.
I think you're spot on here - with Solti or Böhm (my personal favourite simply because it's so exciting) it's pretty much a done deal. There's one other that I very much enjoy and which you didn't mention: Sawallisch and the Bavarian State Opera live on EMI (it's still around second-hand). Well worth a spin and conducted in an admirably Böhm-like way. Glad you didn't spend any time on the how-slow-can-you-go school of Ring conducting - step forward the Knappertsbusch cultists. One other that has some good moments is Haitink's EMI Ring (some very nice orch playing too), even if he doesn't have the dramatic drive of Böhm, Solti or Sawallisch, or the imagination of Barenboim. Anyhow, a great video. Thanks for it.
I'm fond of the Sawallisch EMI Ring. It's not in my top tier, but Sawallisch is always reliable, and he had a fine cast at his disposal. Hildegard Behrens as Brünnhilde might not be to everyone's taste, but I always liked her as a vocal actress, and she's her usual committed self here.
Boooooo ! 😉 Go (slow) Kna !
I often find myself listening to the Sawallisch recording because of the nice flow and colors of the orchestra, but it has good singers too. Karajan`s is like a recording for audiophiles, like a beautiful marble statue. The best modern recording from Bayreuth is by Barenboim, I have listened to his Walküre countless times (to my mind, Graham Clarke created probably the best modern versions of Loge and Mime, truly exciting performances!) I never really liked Nilsson and Sawallisch for some reason, there seems to be no real drama in the voices. Purely musically they are wonderful no doubt.
I only have the Janowski Eurodisc cycle, RCA release I bought back in the late 1980's. I think it was a good intro to the work, esp. with the singing very clear and easy to follow, and the Staatskapelle is great. Some of the high violins sound a bit hard in that early digital way, but overall the sound has great presence. The notes included were excellent, and surprised to hear no notes are incl. in the latest RCA issue, which seem essential to someone coming new to this massive work.
For once, I agree with almost everything you said in this video. The only one I don’t know the the Van Zweden one with HK Phil. Will give it a go. Thanks David!
You should agree with me more. You'll be the better for it.
This past year, my professor of Aesthetics of Music at the Superior Conservatory of Music of Valencia, said in full class and without blushing, that listening to Wagner is unbearable and boring, but yes, that I open my mind to tribal music indigenous and urban music and that I was not so closed in music, because I replied that for me these last two were not art. For me, this little woman has never heard an opera, from whoever she is, in her life. And a concert or symphony I don't think either. This is the level of many teachers in higher centers in Spain.
oy vey! That's more than frightening.
Wagner bad, Rap good!
On a serious note, this reminds of a friend who described Beethoven as a “Robot” rather than a musician, because his music is written down rather than spread aurally.
He listens to nothing but Reggaeton btw! All of which sounds the same! 😂😂😂
Saying that indigenous music and rap is not art is also a perspective that betrays a lack of actual cultural comprehension. When an artist strives for perfection it is satisfying and when an artist doesn't strive for perfection the art form becomes a caricature of itself, be it urban music, tribal music, or classical music (especially Opera). It is interesting that Leo Tolstoy wrote a book called "What is Art?" where he really ponders on the excesses of classical music in his time and praises the purity of expression in folk art. That is very understandable and there are many great composers who studied, borrowed and collected folk melodies because the absence of pretentiousness in those melodies made them more powerful. Any great composer that has spent time in Spain has appreciated the abundance of indigenous melodies and rhythms available there. No?
This is the attitude of the "woke" movement in America as well. Anything from the West must necessarily be bad because it was created by white oppressors.
I remember when Solti and Böhm came out on CD. Bought them - and bought many others after that. Always thinking with the later ones "not quite...".
Hello from Bombay (Mumbai) India!
And THANK YOU for a most informative and entertaining channel...which is also highly addictive 🙂
Sorry to start off with an error-correction: The Bohm Bayreuth Ring is actually a live recording, not studio.
Heard the "post-coital scream". Here are a few others which are comparable:
1. The electronically doctored scream at the end of "Il Tabarro" conducted by Pappano.
2. Tebaldi's shriek as she jumps off the parapet in "Tosca" (Met live, Mitropoulos).
3. Resnik's offstage screams in Solti's Decca/London recording of "Elektra".
4. Albanese's deep, shuddering "Ahime!" during Act 4 of "Manon Lescaut" (Perlea, RCA).
And now, please tell us more about the "barking dog" during Ormandy's recording of "Scheherazade" 🙂
Did I say it was a studio recording? Sorry about that!
No problem!
I go a little outside the usual requests. But it's summer, and I love to read during that time. I would love one or more videos about some recommended reading music books (biography, listener guide, etc).
I've written 15 of them. Feel free!
Thanks Dave for the interesting choice, and as a Wagner and opera cookie I agree with almost everything. Indeed I find myself agreeing with you on many of your reviews. I might however prefer some of the individual operas in isolated recordings (like Furtwangler's studio Walkure, or Leinsdorf's Walkure with G London as Wotan, or that incredibly intense and black granite Gotterdammerung recorded live in Oslo with the 62 year old Flagstad) What's your opinion on my theory that Wagner is not a passion, it's a disease?
I agree 100% about getting Solti’s version in the beginning. When I decided to buy my first Ring Cycle, I wanted to buy Solti’s version on CD. However, it was very pricey at the time and since money was tight, I bought Wolfgang Sawallisch’s live version with the Bayerische Staatsoper, which was about a fifth of the price of Solti’s. I think it’s very good with performers such as Hildegard Behrens, Waltraud Meier and Kurt Moll. However, “buyer’s remorse” set in as I continued to read the glowing reviews of Solti’s. So, within a few months, I bought the Solti version and unfortunately have not listened to Sawallisch’s in decades. Perhaps I should give it another try.
Sawallisch is pretty good; that version is best heard without the visuals, as it was saddled to a horrible Regietheater production.
I pick out parts of Solti's and Karajan's recordings. For Die Walkure, there is HVK's with Jon Vickers' glorious Sigmund and Janowitz' Sieglinde - gorgeously sung and acted, plus the loveliest Magic Fire music. For Siegfried, I turn to Solti because he captures the darkness of the opera, contrasted with a luminous final scene before and after Siegfried has woken up Brunnhilde. Also, Windgassen is superb at conveying the heroic moron that is Siegfried. For Gotterdamerung, again I go with Solti, again because he captures the dramatic and the lyrical wonderfully. Solti's inimitable intensity is very well suited for The Ring. Honorable mention: Bohm's Ring is very exciting and well worth a listen. Rysanek's famous scream when Sigmund pulls out the sword is fantastic.
I prefer my Wagner on video--you really need to see the staging of the opera in order to get the full effect. I like my Wagner to be as close to a movie as possible. However I just broke my own rule 2 weeks ago and bought the Naxos Hong Kong Philharmonic Wagner Ring becuase i had read so much about its quality and so far it's only on cd (as far as I know).
So far I'm liking what I hear in this new Ring. Is it the best Ring ever? no--you can get much better historical productions.For example the Kupfer-Barenboim Bayreuth Ring is still one of the best of all time both in staging and in sound. The Barcelona Ring staging was as close to modern Star Wars as you could get--very entertaining to watch on video. However I will say that the Hong Kong Ring in my opinion is the best sounding Ring of the contemporary era (last 15-20 years or so) Your mileage may vary--i know many that say the modern Lepage Metropolitan Opera from several years ago is the best sung of the contemporary era, but i think the Hong Kong sounds better. The orchestra especially sounds wonderful. I agree with Dave you cant go wrong by buying it. It's worth your money.
My favs are Levine (earlier), Solti, and Naxos Hong Kong!
I just found your channel. SO grateful that you do this. It is clear that you would have made an excellent conductor if you had chosen that path. However we NEED critics who themselves are artists, which you clearly are. I have already started telling my classical music friends about your channel and they're hooked. We've spent the last few days sharing/discussing your video. Thank you for doing this!
Welcome aboard! Thanks very much!
I am going to catch so much hate for this, but I grew up with the Levine Ring, and it remains my favorite to this day. I know that people complain about the glacial tempos, but honestly, the slowness of some of the sections draws out the depth of Wagner's rich harmonies and sonorous orchestrations (I like the Fate motif and the Brünnhilde's awakening motifs, for example, to be as absolutely drawn out as possible) and also does justice to the profundity of some moments ("Ruhe, ruhe" at the end of Götterdämmerung). No, Behrens is obviously not a real Wagnerian Brünnhilde, but I find that there is an extraordinary sensitivity and character to her voice that gives the character more color than the Nillsons and Varnays of the previous generation. Reiner Goldberg is an acquired taste, but one eventually falls in love with the sound. And of course, one associates it with the Otto Schenck/Günther Schneider-Siemssen production at the Met, which remains one of the greatest opera productions in history
I am currently at the Bayreuth Festival and heard an absolute horrible Walküre and a really mediocre Tannhäuser. And you are absolutely right. The people here are just mental….😂But it is to some degree quiet funny.
I've listened to excerpts of Walküre, and wasn't impressed. I saw Klaus Florian Vogt's Lohengrin at Bayreuth in 2015, and his light voice was fine; it vaguely reminded me of Jess Thomas, in fact, and that's no bad thing. However, Vogt just doesn't cut it as Siegmund, which is almost a high baritone role. What a shame!
@@ftumschk Sadly Vogt wasn‘t the problem on that evening. Of course he has not the typical voice for Siegmund but he was better than expectet, because his voice became slightly darker compared to earlier in his career. But still not suiting for the role. The conducting was the main problem… Absolutely uninteresting, dull, slow and unexciting. There is a live stream on youtube from the opening night of the Walküre (the performance which I saw) and it sounds better and livlier compared to what I heard. I saw the last Walküre from the Castdorf-Ring in 2017, conducted by Janowski, which was a stunning and exciting performance. He was so much more exciting than on his digital recording and of course 100 times better than Inkinen now. I had a discussion with a friend of mine, who visits Bayreuth regularly since 1966. He heard great performances with Böhm, Nilsson, Windgassen etc. and I asked him, why the musical quality is very variable these days. He said, that for most conductors at that time, Bayreuth was the summit of a long successfull career. Today they invite rather young, unexperienced people, like Inkinen, who are at the beginning of a career. Of course the situation in the Bayreuth orchestra pit was always difficult and big conductors, like Solti, failed. But when you are young, unexperienced and you have to face the difficult aspects of that pit, it can end like it ended with Inkinen. And of course there were conductors who were pretty young and successfull when they conducted the first time in Bayreuth, like Sawallisch who was in his thirties. But that is rather special and not normal. You never know what you get in Bayreuth.
@@philippborghesi1060 I saw the Castorf Ring in annual increments from 2013 onwards, and had enjoyed Petrenko in the first three operas. I was initially disappointed when he dropped out in 2016 (I think it was because he'd been given the Berlin PO job), but thrilled when it was announced that Marek Janowski would be taking over in his place. Having long been a fan of Janowski's Eurodisc Ring Cycle, I was delighted to get the chance to hear him conduct a Ring opera live. Like you say, you never know what to expect at Bayreuth - and, in this instance, it was a very welcome bonus :)
@@philippborghesi1060 Oksana Lyniv made a stunning debut conducting Holländer, in my opinion. At least that is what I say after having listened to the stream provided by Bavarian Radio (Bayern Klassik).
BTW: I fondly recalled, while listening to the performance, my first ever experience of a stupendously gifted woman conductor, the late Judith Somogyi, who also conducted Holländer, at Frankfurt Opera in the mid 1980s. The pit was on fire, and each singer onstage carried by her steady hands, never overwhelming the voices. The production was rather traditional, but, oh, the music...
Thanks for the report!
I have just started listening and viewing the Opera North staged concert performance, courtesy BBC, 2017, via TH-cam - I have some reasonable quality Audioengine speakers, and my ears at age 75 are too old to worry about hifi frequencies above 8k. . I've never heard any of the Ring Cycle previously, so as to the quality of the singing and orchestra compared to the CDs boxes discussed, I am not qualified to comment, but as a gentle introduction to the music with subtitles and no distracting "stage business", just some appropriate and imaginative visual effects, I shall see how things go. I see that the English National Opera are undertaking a new Ring Cycle, which I presume will be sung in English. As I live in NZ, I'm unlikely to be able to see this in person, but I hope that the Cycle will be recorded.
YOU DID IT!
You whittled away the dross, gave some mention to the kaleidoscope of those 'other' concerns/factions/cults, and kept it to the work, the singers, orchestras, conductors and the recordings which were the result;
AND, to my great appreciation, mentioned the Leonie 'post coital scream' thing.
Live, in the house, I was a great Rysanek fan.
SF Opera did a Walküre in 1976. Rysanek, Vickers, Roberta Knie, Hans Sotin, Ruth Hesse and Clifford Grant.
I did standing room for each performance; I was more enthusiastic then.
It was a production where the mortals were the Gods. NOT to belittle the others...
but the Rysanek/Vickers element was a pretty sizzling example of 'it does not get better than this'.
At one performance, as Siegmund pulls it out and Leonie Sieglinde let's out her famous multi-layered-with-meaning-shriek, staggers backwards in awe, ecstasy and general OMGodness.....
Well, there was a tree stump coffee table in exact center stage.
It seems that Mrs. Hunding was so in the throes that she must have forgotten herself because over she went.
Backing into the coffee table, she did it with such force that what we saw was a near perfect cartwheel of legs and skirt in the air in flamboyant, wild, circular motion.
The audience did a collective gasp, heard over the orchestra, and down she went.
Thankfully she was not hurt and, stage animal that she was, she instantly came crawling into an on her knees position at said coffee table, ready for more of what ever Siegmund had to offer.
She turned that near disaster into an 'in the moment' bit of colossal proportions.
Wagner - Walküre - Sieglinde - la Rysanek !
A really fine presentation, David.
Thank you.
Thanks for sharing that epic bit of opera insanity with us!
Just listening to the van Zweden Die Walker. Its a belter! Great singing and characterisation plus a wonderful flowing accompaniment from Van Zweden and the HKPO.
The Van Zweden Ring is superb for a newer recording.
My discovery of the ring was through the Karajan version, and I must say that to this day, after many more Rings, Gundula Janowitz remains the ideal Sieglinde for me. What she does with the O hehrstes Wunder in the third act is just amazing and since then, every time I hear it elsewhere, I can't help but be a little disappointed....
I believe the steerhorns in Hagen's call to the vassals were made specially for the recording.
My three rings are historical recordings from the 1950s. Furtwängler and La Scala, which is the weakest of the three. Keilberth 1953, released by The Intense Media at a very low price. It features Hans Hotter, Martha Mödl and Wolfgang Windgassen, among others. One of my best value for money buys ever. And the 1956 Bayreuth conducted by Hans Knappertsbusch, about the finest you can get, with Hotter, Varnay and Windsgassen.
I'll have to add more to my collection, provided the price is within reach.
Wow. This Passion for Music 🙏🏻
I can't understand Wagner nuts who must hear every Wagner recording. Whenever I re-listen to my 10 least favorite Ring Cycles, just to remind myself why they're so bad, I always vow to myself never to listen to them again for at least the following 3 months.
Hehreste Wonne...:-)
Wait, you own 10 least favorite Ring Cycles?
A very interesting video! I just listened to The Ring Cycle for the first time, and I'm very much interested in listening to it again, and in other versions. Out of personal curiosity, how do people tend to feel about Swarowsky's Ring? I found the entire recording in my local library, and I thought it was very good. Though I'm not familiar with opera or Wagner, so what do I know? Very informative video!
The Membran release of the Rome Furtwangler sounds OK to me - at least no worse than others from that era. But the Milan one is probably beyond hope - only worth dipping into to sample Flagstad's Brunnhilde.
I have (for the last few years, at least) favored Knappertsbusch when it comes to re-listening, but I'm speaking as someone who hasn't actually buckled down and listened to the entirety of Keilberth's.
15:43 Gordon Parry, I think. An electronic and musical genius.
I have a number of complete Rings, including all 3 of Keilberth's ('52, '53, and '55), both Furtwänglers, Knappertsbusch '56, Kraus, Böhm, the Met from Bodanzky and Leinsdorf, various individual recordings of the operas, and probably more that my aging brain isn't recalling. And though dismissed by Mr Hurwitz, my favorites feature Melchior, Flagstad, and Marjorie Lawrence, not necessarily all in the same production.
I don't think a Melchior Flagstad ring even exists... Luckily I can count on Keilberth 52. Criminally underrated
No, of course there is no complete Ring with Melchior and Flagstad. I wasn't very clear with that comment, Although, Richard Caniell has created a Dream Ring with Melchior and Flagstad on the Immortal Performances label, if you want to dive into the creative imagination and ears of Mr. Canielle. It's a worthwhile experience if you're not orthodox about your live performances.
It may have been necessary to record these Met 1930s Wagner recordings in cut versions, but today we can only get "what's left", and the cuts are too much for us not to turn elsewhere. I, too, am grateful for the snippets we have. .
I just began listening to Solti. I had just planned to sample the Vorspiel of Das Rheingold for now. I just can't stop listening. I guess I'm going to listen to the whole opera.
Yes, the Vorspiel of Das Rheingold does NOT have an off-ramp!
@@dennischiapello7243 Indeed. I didn't spot any off-ramp later on either. So, I listened to the whole Rheingold with just one short break in the middle. There are so many powerful and memorable moments; I now feel like my ears are full of ringworms.
I own both the Karajan and the original Solti with the Culshaw hard bound book on LP, that is a story in itself as I found the Solti box set sealed, unopened at a record dealer where I normally would purchase rock, jazz more contemporary music. I came in to pickup an order and as I left I couldn't believe my eyes, the box set sitting on a shelf. It just came in from a larger purchase the store made. Prior to that, I've seen three sets; one loaned to me and two others for sale that were in terrible shape. Sometimes things just fall into your lap. Have you ever heard the Esoteric Audio reissue on SACD(ESSD-90021~34) of the Solti? I understand that it's the best sounding set out there but perusing eBay they go for thousands of dollars.
I think I am in all of the 'cults' mentioned at the outset and begin to doubt my sanity. I am told therapy is to buy box sets frequently.
Dear Mr Hurwitz, Many thanks for your regular educational and entertaining recommendations of recordings, both of the so-called 'standard repertoire' and of more esoteric but very enjoyable works. I have the complete Solti Ring on Decca and John Culshaw's 'Ring Resounding' published account of the recording sessions. With a little more free time now on my hands, I am keen to acquaint myself with The Ring but feel I need a good guide in book form. As I'm not a trained musician, I'd prefer something accessible to the ordinary listener, without too many score excerpts interspersed throughout the text but perhaps a little more expansive than the notes and expanatory CDs in the box. Although it is outside your usual remit in these videos, I wonder whether you could suggest a suitable book to ease me in to both the plots and music (or would you simply rely on the resources provided and 'dive in')? With very best wishes from Oxford, UK.
Dive in. The time you spend reading could be much better spent listening. The music itself educates you.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Many thanks for your most kind advice, which I shall take without further delay. Solti et al., here I come! 🙂
What a pity you wouldn't give us your favourite and the objective best 2nd Norn ... so disappointing! 🤣
My main issue with the Patrice Chereau production was that it was the first ever broadcast Ring and should have been more traditional for those who had loves the work for years. Instead of the magical, legend, he gave us modern drek.
Daniel Barenboim's 1992 Bayreuth Laser Ring on DVD is my favourite recording. Sounds incredible, with a fantastic cast, especially Anne Evans as Brunhilde. Sotli's Ring has that 1950s Alfred Hitchcock movie music sound which I find off putting and I don't like the addition of the sound effects. Also Hans Hoffer sounds like he has a cold and they should have stuck with George London from Rheingold.
Thanks for this! I really like 1956 Knappertsbusch. You are right about Stewart. George London as the Rhinegold Wotan with Solti is fabulous. Curious as to your opinion on Levine on DG?
See above.
My Ring recordings go back to the 1930’s Potted ring on HMV Black Label, ( Pearl reissue on CD and Original 78 rpm-records)the conducting being shared between Albert Coates, Leo Blech, and Heger? The La Scala Ring is ok if you get a cleaned up version of it. It has more fire than the Rome Ring. As far as “Modern” Cycles are concerned I’ve always had a great love for the 1966 Bohm Cycle ( I’ve owned this on Vinyl and now have it on CD) I prefer the Solti Cycle to the Karajan Cycle. I also rather like the ENO recording in English under Goodall. I’m a great Rita Hunter fan.
Pristine Classical's remasters of the Furtwangler Rings are quite good, makes them far more listenable than the other versions I've heard. Although not enough to make them the recommended choice for beginners, but I do think the 1950 La Scala performance especially is artistically great enough to spend the extra money. It's the second Ring I generally reach for when I'm in the mood for a listen, which is pretty darned often.
As for which Ring is the first one I reach for, I actually go for Bohm over Solti. When I was first getting into opera, I did what everyone does and got the Solti first, and didn't really care for the work. I find Solti's habit of turning the dial to 11 at every moment of the opera a little wearying and as a result, I found the work kind of bombastic and square. Solti's Ring reminds me of some of my classmates in grad school who had a habit of highlighting virtually every line on the pages, so you'd look at their books at the end of the term and nothing was really highlighted because everything is highlighted.
Wagner didn't really click for me until I got the Bohm Ring, and to this day, I still find it much more enjoyable to sit down for 15 hours of Bohm's, although I do enjoy many 15 minutes sections of Solti's. You're exactly right that the Bohm is just thrilling, exciting, dramatic, overall just a fantastic theatrical experience. And the singing is slightly better at the edges for Solti with some of the casting of some of the small parts (Joan Sutherland as the forest bird!) but the casting of the major parts are equally strong I think, and Nilsson herself thought her performance of Brunnhilde better on the Bohm than the Solti.
I'll turn to Solti or Karajan if I felt like listening to a highlight (especially an orchestral highlight) but if I feel like listening to the whole cycle, most of the time, it'd be the Bohm.
The Keilberth is very good but I found the more I listened to Astrid Varnay, the less I enjoyed her performances, to the point now where I find her actively distracting and annoying. She has this habit of scooping up to the note, which she deploys as more of a tic rather than an interpretative tool, and I find I never want to listen to her anymore. I just find myself shouting at my stereo for her to just sing the notes as written.
Interesting that you mentioned Jaap von Sweden's Ring as being similar to von Karajan's. Not only did von Sweden use a lieder singer (Goerne) for Wotan, so did Karajan, with Fischer-Dieskau.
Something you might have mentioned in recommending the Solti Ring as the hands-down best choice for a first recording, is the whole Culshaw-Ring-Resounding-Stereo aspect, with every special effect following Wagner's specifications to a T: the full set of precisely tuned anvils, authentic alpenhorns, an enormous thunder machine, and on and on. Those might be non-musical factors, but as you point out, Wagner was a man of the theater, and he pulled out all the stops in The Ring.
What are the studio recordings of the Ring Cycle?
I will now date myself and say that when I was finally able to purchase my first Ring cycle, there was Solti and there was Karajan (brand new) - and that was it. The general opinion among my music student peers was that Solti had the better singers, but that Karajan had worked magic with the orchestra. Choose your poison! I took Karajan at the time, but later got Solti and others (including Böhm).
Sorry to say this, but I cannot share your opinion about Barenboim. I have heard him conduct a number of times with various orchestras and was at the Staatsoper Berlin for his Ring (soon after his Bayreuth Ring). For whatever reason, he leaves me absolutely cold whatever he conducts. So if he‘s conducting, I don‘t go. Chacon à son goût, as a relatively famous person in a relatively famous opera/operetta has been known to sing.
Hi David, I have just discovered your channel and would like to say how much I have enjoyed what I've seen and heard so far. In 2004 I attended the State Opera production of the full cycle in Adelaide, South Australia as conducted by Asher Fisch. The whole endeavor was recorded and released on the Melba Label on SACD Hybrid CDs. The production was engineered by the same people who were later responsible for the marvelous recent Naxos Hong Kong edition. Have you heard it? The Walkure in particular is excellent.
Welcome aboard! No, I have not heard the Melba recordings.
Great videos David, and they have really helped me build my collection. Could you finish off the Vaughan Williams Symphonies you have done 1, 4 and Job but would love to know your views on the rest.
I'll get there eventually. Got so many to do!
While not Ring related, I read about a Wagnerian insult which is, " May you be stuck in a performance of Parsifal.... without a sandwich!".
I am one of those opera lovers who values highly, maybe even most highly, the theatricality of an opera. If the conducting is dull or weird in a bad way, I just cannot abide any recording of Wagner's Ring (or almost any other opera), If the sound is so dismal that it breaks the theatrical connexion with the work, I'll listen it once and let it gather dust for the rest of my life. Alas, Furtwängler and some other famous and wonderful conductors end up covered in dust due to that very regrettable factor. Regarding videos, if the costumes and setting are bizarre and betray the vision of the composer and librettists, no matter how good the singing and conducting, how marvellous the recorded sound, that, too, goes even faster into the bust-catching piles.
“Cultists are nuts”. 😂😂😂😂. Couldn’t agree more. Grew up with the Solti Ring which has spoilt me for any others. The dream cast cannot be even closely matched today and Culshaw’s production/engineering is legendary.