Great Wagner singers

[wahnfried]

What is an opera without singers? Same with Wagner. Many people think that singing Wagner is the most difficult thing in opera. Birgit Nilsson once answered the question what for Isolde is important: "Good shoes", because of the length of the opera. Maria Callas, who performed Kundry, Brünnhilde (Valkyrie) and Isolde in the early years of her career always pointed out that Norma is the most difficult role she ever sung.
So maybe it is just a legend? I don't think so. Otherwise we would have had a lot of great Wagner singers today. But this isn't so. It seems to be rather impossible to cast all of his operas in an adequate way (even in Bayreuth).
So, what makes a good Wagner singer? Stamina, endurance, vocal power, flexibility, middle register?
The answer of course is difficult. It depends on the operas. And the fashion of singing changes through the last century so immensly that it is hard to answer.
Maybe we can discuss here several wagnerian icons and their kind of singing.

[wahnfried]

For most Wagnerians Lauritz Melchior is still THE Wagner tenor, a real "Heldentenor". He was one of the rare species who could change from bariton to tenor without shorten his career. But that always provided him with a full, warm and powerful middle register without spoiling his upper register. His voice seems to have no problems tackling all notes Wagner had written (though he always changed a lot of the musical score on his behalf). Only Meistersinger he always avoided to sing on stage. The tessitura of Hans Sachs didn't fit his voice. But his Lohengrin, Tannhäuser, Siegmund, Siegfried, Tristan or Parsifal are quite legendary.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdTt_ST6jAI

[wahnfried]

His greatest rival in those days was Max Lorenz, Hitlers favourite wagnerian tenor. (Lorenz surely was no Nazi, beeing gay and married to a jewish woman, but this verdict of Hitler spoiled a lot of his reputation.) Lorenz and Melchior had the same teacher in Berlin but their voices were quite different. Both were real Heldentenors but Lorenz had the brighter timbre. His kind of singing was full of pathos and often technically not so sublime as Melchior. But he was an extremly expressive singer with an incredible vocal power.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=1N17W94mSt4&feature=related

[Wanderer]

My browser is experiencing problems with Youtube at the moment, which sadly means I can't get to the videos you linked to - although I'll try again later. I am familiar with Max Lorenz, as he plays Siegfried in my recording of Gotterdammerung conducted by Furtwangler. The audio quality of the CD isn't the best, but I recall enjoying his voice. Your details about his personal life and Hitler's opinion of him are interesting!

From clips I've heard, Hans Hotter and George London were both pretty amazing Wotans. According to what I have heard, Hitler also had a high view of Hans Hotter's performances. When challenged about this after the war, Hotter apparently replied that his singing was also appreciated by the Pope!!

Waltraud Meier is one of my favourites. Her Isolde is brilliant. It isn't just the singing either...her expressions and her actions on the stage seem so real. To be honest, though, I've got a feeling that although I've heard some good Isoldes, I'm not sure I've heard a really good Tristan yet. Do you have any favourite Tristans to recommend?

The opera I've been listening to the most lately is my recently-purchased Tannhauser, conducted by Georg Solti. Reading several online reviews, I discovered that a lot of listeners take against Rene Kollo's Tannhauser. This took me aback, because I think he's brilliant! During the singing contest in Act 2, in particular, he is very passionate and, for me, very real.

A lot of people think the general standard of Wagner singing has declined in recent decades. Do you think this is true? I wonder what would be considered the best period for Wagner singing (or Wagner conducting, for that matter!).

[wahnfried]

A lot to answer. :-)

Let me start with the singers. Meier seems to me one of the last great Wagner singers today. She has such a beauiful timbre, warm and erotic, a great technique and is a stunning personality on stage. And it never damages singing if the artist is also intelligent.
She is for me today the best Kundry (though I don't know if she is still singing the part) and the best Isolde. In this opera I heard her live on stage together with Christian Franz who was a great Tristan. But I wouldn't recommend him today. His voice faded away and he is worn out. By the way I can recommend several Tristans, but - alas - they are all dead. I'm not sure we will have a real good Tristan anymore.
The other occcasion with Meier was her Venus next to Kollo as Tannhäuser. Kollo on stage was always a different experience. Recorded one can hear all the flaws in his technique. He never was a real Heldentenor (far away) but a lirico spinto singing the wrong parts. His really big career was possible because of the lack of better alternatives even in those days.
But on stage he was far more brilliant. Beeing a good actor and a most expressive singer he could wiped out all the technical problems he had.

Solti never convinced me, not even his famous Ring. Everytime I heard him life or on records I had the impressions of coldness and calculation. Never letting the music flow, never giving too much emotions, always very self-controlled.

I'm sure the Wagner singing had declined rapidly and frightening. Though every generations had complained about this. But just take the fifties of the last century. Not just alone Traubel, Mödl, Grob-Prandl, Varnay, Nilsson, Callas, probably Borkh and Goltz were capable of singing absolutely great performances of Brünnhilde or Isolde. Lorenz, Suthaus, Vinay, Aldenhoff, Hopf, Windgassen, Beirer and some others were fabulous as Siegfried and Tristan. They all had their merits and their flaws, but they were reliable and fully satisfying. And today? Where is such a large offer of great voices? Listen to Lance Ryan who seems to be nowadays Siegfried no 1. He is miles aways from a technically good Siegfried. And listen to the last Holländer production in Bayreuth. It seems impossible even for an opera like this to find a satisfying cast.

I think the most interesting period of Wagner singing was before and directly after World War II. But it is also a mater of taste. If one likes more the voice of a tenor like Jacques Urlus (considered by many as one of the finest Wagnerian tenors ever) one wouldn't be very happy with this period.

Interesting of course is the question why there is a decline and what about the correlation between tenor voice like Urlus or Klaus Florian Voght and our understanding of the male role in our society.

Hotter and London by the way were great, great Wotans. Hotters timbre is certainly a matter of taste. London is often a bit too dark. (I don't know if he performed Wanderer.) But both left behind absolute landmarks of interpretatons. But don't forget Friedrich Schorr (audible on many MET productions from the "Golden Age") and Ferdinand Frantz who you can hear in Furtwänglers Ring.

[Wanderer]

You are obviously a chap who loves Wagner and knows a lot about Wagner performances . As someone just getting into this myself, I feel very lucky to have you here.

You are right about Waltraud Meier; she's brilliant - possibly the best opera singer I've heard, actually. My only complaint against her is that she is so good that her performances really seem to show up the fact that some of the others she is singing with aren't quite so good!

From what I have seen, there are a lot of different opinions amongst Wagner lovers over what the best recordings are. Solti's Ring is usually rated highly though, so it is interesting you aren't so keen. A lot of people complain the standard of Wagner singing has declined. Is this a phenomenon that has occured across opera generally, or is it something specific to Wagner productions? I would have hoped that, with lots of Wagner productions being scheduled to celebrate the 200th anniversary, we ought to be entering a better period.

George London's story was quite sad; he had to give up singing prematurely because of his health problems. He was a great singer.

Another thing I've noticed, by the way...singers often seem to play roles which seem as though they were meant for much younger people! Maybe this is common in opera, I don't know. Maybe it's just me...but I imagine characters like Isolde, Siegfried and Parsifal to *look* relatively young, and when they're not, it somehow jars with me. Maybe, though, there aren't many younger singers who would be able to perform to the same quality, I don't know.

[wahnfried]

I think there is a decline in opera singing generally. Verdi is absolutely dificult to cast, same with Mozart, Strauss, Bellini, Donizetti and so on. There are a lot of reasons for it.

I'm not sure if it important for me how singers look like. Their character has to be in the throat. And it will be absolutely difficult if not impossible to find a young attractive singer with the stamina to sing Siegfried or Isolde. Wagner singing is a bit like a good wine. It needs time to mature. And unfortunately the body normally then matures also. All of the great Wagner singers of the past were ghastly to look at for lets say Karl Lagerfeld. But I don't share his standards. :-)

Alessandra Marc has got the figure of Claudia Schiffer. But her voice made me cry. Better than vice versa. :-)

[wahnfried]

Another great Wagner singer: Alexander Kipnis, bass.

Like Melchior and so many others he was a member of the now called State Opera House "Unter den Linden", Berlin and has to leave Germany after 1933. He went to New York and prolonged his marvellous career at the Met.

In the first two excerpts, though a bass and not a bariton he succeded as Wotan and Wolfram. Kipnis had not only a wonderful voice with a full. warm timbre, higly expressive, but also an incredible technique. I know only two singers who could perform the trill in the Osmin aria from the "Abduction from the Serail". (Kurt Moll was the other.)

Valkyrie:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=4yZ2Kxb5aT8

Wolfram von Eschenbach
www.youtube.com/watch?v=18HfKxScaYY

And finally ina real bass part - Marke
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZX8Oee8YyWA

And in one of his greatest achievementy as Gurnemanz (with Max Lorenz and Richard Strauss)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZX8Oee8YyWA

[Wanderer]

Oct 16, 2012 19:43:06 GMT wahnfried said:

I'm not sure if it important for me how singers look like. Their character has to be in the throat. And it will be absolutely difficult if not impossible to find a young attractive singer with the stamina to sing Siegfried or Isolde. Wagner singing is a bit like a good wine. It needs time to mature. And unfortunately the body normally then matures also. All of the great Wagner singers of the past were ghastly to look at for lets say Karl Lagerfeld. But I don't share his standards. :-)

Alessandra Marc has got the figure of Claudia Schiffer. But her voice made me cry. Better than vice versa. :-)

When I'm listening to a CD recording, it doesn't matter what they look like, but in watching a DVD it becomes more of an issue for me. I suspect this must be a common problem for people like me who have watched television and film for years and years - and have then suddenly started watching opera and been faced with older singers playing much younger roles!

I have just finished listening to Rienzi, conducted by Heinrich Hollreiser and with Rene Kollo playing the main part. Opinion seems to be divided amongst Wagner fans about Kollo's singing, but personally I like him. He did a decent enough job for me in this, just as he did when I've heard him play Tannhauser and Siegmund. There is a lot of passion in his voice. As an English speaker who does not understand German, I also find him remarkably easy to follow line-by-line when I'm reading the English-German libretto. This may be a superficial way to judge an opera singer, but for me this counts as a definite plus .

The "All macht'ger Vater" in Act 5 was beautiful. Kollo did a good job, but I must admit that the Lauritz Melchior recording is much better.

I found it difficult to adapt to the fact that the Adriano Colonna part is sung by a woman. For me, this ruined the scenes between Adrian Colonna and his sweetheart Irene.

[wahnfried]

I'm not sure but didn't Wagner wrote the part of Adrian Colonna for a mezzo? Here he certainly dealt with the old fasion style from Händel till Rossini with all the altos singing male parts. And didn't want to use a castrato anymore.

One can say a lot against Kollo :-) but nothing against his superb diction.

[wahnfried]

So after all the male singers here is the unsurpassed female wagnerian voice: Kirsten Flagstad.

The video presents her as Brünnhilde at the end of Götterdämmerung, sung in a concert with Furtwängler in wich she also premiered the "Four Last Songs" by Richard Strauss.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ02owjL2Z4

This was rather at the end of her long and glorious career. Flagstad was wellknown for her incredible big voice perfectly suited for wagnerian role. She was capable of filling the whole opera house with a flood of sound. And on the other hand she was praised for her dicton, her subtle interpretations and for her stamina in all of these never ending parts.

One of her most stunning performances was Isolde.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkWjYLv7tzc

[wahnfried]

Here's a different version of the "Liebestod" with Furtwängler. And a comment posted on youtube.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tgn511ceNQ&feature=related

"I heard Kirsten Flagstad sing this with the Dallas Symphony in 1951. It was an experience I'll never forget. She stood like a giant oak tree and the beautiful sound seemed to arise from the earth."

[wahnfried]

And here's another one. Christa Ludiwg. Originally a mezzo she tackled on several occasions sopranos parts. But always excerpts because she was well aware of the damage these parts would meant to her voice.

Her excerts of Brünnhilde and Isolde are really outstanding. But she always resits the temptaption of singing the whole parts. Thank God.

This is such a great performance everyone should hear it. One for the lonesome island.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uxXp-A0YD8&feature=related

Her intelligence, her superb technique, her outstandng beauty of timbre and her expression delivers us with a lot of incredible performances. She truly was an artist of the century.

Ludwig as Waltraute wich was far more in her line.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sz4ykZA6qw4

Or as Ortrud. The only singer I know who could match with Margarete Klose.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0q56PJcTwY

Unfortunately there is no video of her Kundry on youtube. So lets take one from Rienzi.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnyWGsbk8LI