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WAGNER
Ring Cycle
Krauss, Bayreuth 1953
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CLASSIC REVIEW
I find the 1953 Bayreuth Ring conducted by Clemens Krauss and the 1955 Keilberth version to be the most consistently satisfying of all complete live-recorded Rings. The Krauss has been issued quite a few times in decent mono sound but Pristine Audio's restoration of Siegfried and G�tterdammerung (along with the first two operas) brings new clarity and vividness to the sound of these performances. The quality of the orchestral sound is where one hears the most notable improvement; it's less congested, and many previously obscured details emerge.
Comparing the Pristine Siegfried to a copy on Gala, one hears the difference right away. On Gala, the eerie prelude that opens the first act is interrupted by a loud cough (at :02) and a squeak (at :04) followed by a murky, indistinct sound to the low-lying instrumental lines. In the Pristine remastering, there's less surface hiss, the cough and squeak are gone, and one can appreciate the nuanced playing of the opening contrabass tuba solo, a sinister sound that evokes Fafner, the dragon.
Siegfried's first two acts come across particularly well thanks to Krauss's pacing and exceptionally fine playing by the orchestra. He achieves the sense of detailed storytelling in his lively, responsive pacing of Wagner's large structures. The orchestra is always well synchronized with the singers. Climaxes are suitably exciting.
As Siegfried, Windgassen has good musical instincts and enough rich tone and stamina to succeed in this tiring role. At times, there is something a bit thin and vulnerable about his singing that fits well with the character of the young Siegfried, a fool like the young Parsifal, another role in which the young Windgassen excelled. The most rewarding performances in this Siegfried come from the great singing actors Paul Kuen and Gustav Neidlinger, fully immersed in their roles, along with Hans Hotter, a truly great Wotan, captured here in vocally fine condition.
In the sublime third act, the encounters of Wotan and Erda (the excellent contralto Maria von Ilosvay), Wotan and Siegfried, and some of Wagner's most fervent orchestral music in transitions between the scenes are all beautifully done. It's with Astrid Varnay's swooping delivery of Br�nnhilde's first lines, "Heil dir Sonne," that I start to imagine tiny corrections in her pitch in order to enjoy the performance. Turning to the famous 1932 recording with Florence Easton and Lauritz Melchior, one hears a lighter, girlish-sounding Brunhilde. Where Varnay is variable, Easton sings with great accuracy and has secure and radiant high notes. (Melchior offers thrilling, heroic singing of a kind that no other recorded Heldentenor has managed.)
Regarding the remastering of G�tterd�mmerung, Pristine Audio's Andrew Rose writes: "Computer analysis of the tonal response of the entire 4hr 20min recording, a crucial first step in an XR remastering, revealed a basic shortcoming in both the bass and lower midrange and at the very top of the audible range. Using the immortal Solti Decca recording of G�tterd�mmerung as a guide-as well as referencing the previous three Krauss Ring operas released by Pristine-I was able to reequalize the recording to bring out these previously somewhat submerged frequencies, allowing the performance to be heard in its full glory for perhaps the first time."
As with Siegfried, Pristine's remastering of G�tterd�mmerung succeeds at brightening and clarifying orchestral textures. As a musical performance, it's at its most exciting when Uhde, Greindl, and Windgassen are onstage. Two of the three Norns (Von Ilosvay and Ira Malaniuk) sing outstandingly in the opening scene. The weak link in the cast is the unsteady Natalie Hinsch-Gr�ndahl as Gutr�ne. Though I have reservations about the inconsistencies of Varnay's singing, there is much to admire in her Br�nnhilde. She is entirely involved with Wagner's text, is capable of a rich outpouring of sometimes very beautiful tone, and has the stamina required for the role. The Immolation Scene finds her in very good shape. On the other hand, it takes her about 10 minutes to warm up in the Prologue's opening duet with Siegfried.
The glory of the Solti recording of G�tterd�mmerung is the playing and recorded sound of the Vienna Philharmonic, especially the brass. Birgit Nilsson's Br�nnhilde has admirable control of pitch and vibrato but lacks some of Varnay's intensity, and Windgassen, past his prime in the 1960s, husbands his resources. Over the years, the artificiality of the Solti, a studio recording, seems like more of a liability. Both the Krauss and Keilberth Rings have the excitement of being live, continuous performances by an unsurpassed ensemble cast. Krauss may occasionally conduct with more taut control than Keilberth, but the Keilberth version, with much the same cast as the Krauss, is newly available in fine stereo sound. Ring enthusiasts will want to experience all three versions.
ALL FLAC DOWNLOADS OF THIS BOX SET ARE HALF PRICE DURING OUR SUMMER BREAK: KRAUSS Ring
NB. Offer does not apply to CDs or MP3 downloads OR individual operas - this is the entire Ring Cycle only.
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REVIEW
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"The master Stravinsky himself leads a French ensemble in his first recording of the true "enfant terrible" of orchestral scores, and the restoration proves as potent as ever"
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Recording engineers Mark Obert-Thorn and Andrew Rose have collaborated in this "Year of Le Sacre" to restore the 1928 (8-12 November) and 1929 (10 May) inscriptions by the composer of The Firebird Suite and Le Sacre du Printemps, respectively. Had we asked conductors Ernest Ansermet and Pierre Monteux - well known Stravinsky interpreters - their opinion of Stravinsky's conducting talents, it would likely have been derogatory, since Stravinsky likely needed to have taken Nicolai Malko's course for composers who wished to lead their own scores. Often, Stravinsky would defend his slowed-down tempos or simplistic adjustments by stating that his own interpretation was the correct realization of his intentions!
Stravinsky must have chortled as he led the opening measures of Le Sacre du Printemps, recalling how Saint-Saens responded to the opening bassoon at the premier: "What instrument is that?" and walking out. Stravinsky's 1929 rendition is not the first attempt at a recording, since Stokowski and Goossens had already inscribed portions of the score, more or less successfully. But Stravinsky's own Augurs of Spring section certainly grips us with its heaving ostinati and asymmetrical, jarring accents. Given the level of the current restoration, much of the original excitement and disconcerting energy asserts itself, the ferocity of such selections as the Ritual of Abduction's once more shedding the civilized niceties of Classicism. One can imagine the Disney artists in their collective musing about how to "translate" such primitive energy into the popular mind and coming up with volcanoes and dinosaurs. On the other hand, imagining Nijinsky's personal wrestling with the often ungainly score to subdue it to the human form of ballet must have been monumental. The group of movements that ends Part I: The Adoration of the Earth - Spring Rounds, Games of the Rival Towns, Procession of the Sage, and Dance of the Earth - achieves an almost hysterical, pagan energy, only to "end" on an unresolved chord that inaugurates Part II: The Sacrifice.
Somehow, the now-familiar shocks of Part I seem to urge us to perceive Part II as moving faster. The string tremolos and wiry parlando in the Mystic Circles of the Young Girls holds fewer terrors for us, but the eerie qualities still assert themselves. The ensuing triad of movements selects and glorifies the "Chosen One" for ritual sacrifice; and consciously or not, Stravinsky often dips into a psychic arsenal of Russian folk tunes, often in grotesque garb and shattering sonorities. The cumulative intensity of the determined Ancients, in all their wheezy, palsied rhythmic mania, proceeds directly to the Sacrificial Dance, a propitiatory rite to the gods of fertility. Recall the salacious drawings of Wallace Smith for Ben Hecht's Fantazius Mallare - that of the eponymous hero's engaging in sex with the Earth itself - and you glean something of the primal, impolite tumult that Stravinsky unleashed for the world of music and Western Civilization. If even a 1929 recording can generate that kind of power, it must be good. [It's quite amazing for such an old 78, but don't expect a lot at either end of the frequency spectrum...Ed.]
Stravinsky employs his 1911 version of nine scenes for The Firebird ballet for French Columbia, one that incorporates the Berceuse and Finale from his later 1919 arrangement, with somewhat improvised "transitions." The sound reproduction in The Firebird emerges quite vividly, especially in the Straram winds and brass sections. Having been supplied with the descriptive titles of the sequences, we can better follow the plot outline, and Stravinsky's string basses certainly convey the appropriate menace he juxtaposes against the glories of the eponymous firebird. The Appearance of the Firebird and its ensuing Dance grandly involve the divided strings, harp, and shrieking, glistening woodwinds. The Supplication of the Firebird enjoys the "Eastern" grandeur and languor Stravinsky gleaned from his mentor Rimsky-Korsakov.
More than a touch of diaphanous magic infiltrates the two scenes of the princesses, the Game of the Princesses with the Golden Apples, and the Round Dance of the Princesses. The latter seems almost a direct emotional transcription of the slow movement from Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade, the melodies themselves "borrowed" from the same book of Russian folk tunes that Stravinsky's teacher had utilized in his Sinfonietta, Op. 31. Still, excepting a pedant's objections, the essential magic tapestry proves irresistible. The big splash, the Infernal Dance of All Kashchei's Subjects, has all the percussive and pompous vulgarity apt for his malodorous minions. We might detect some imprecision in the ensemble, but the athletic, vigorous color of the movement remains intact. The segue to the sultry Berceuse suits the occasion, and the Straram strings respond well to their slides and shifts of registration in a glowing orchestral patina. The Finale does arise rather out of the hazy blue vacuum, but the harp scale emerges well as the melody gains ever more girth and crescendo; and once the brass and tympani enter, the pageant easily suggests an apotheosis in the best Tchaikovsky tradition.
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CONTENTS
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This Week The Ambient Stereo difference
Pristine More on that new server
Stokowski Renaissance & Baroque Music
PADA Petri's 1959 Emperor Concerto in Santa Rosa
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Real stereo recording in 1944
Complete with real artillery fire in the background!
This week's new release
 | | Moeran |
It's funny how some music goes out of fashion, but later comes back into it. For many years the flowering of British composers of a generally late-romantic leaning in the first half of the 20th century was looked back on, post World War 2, as something of an anachronism with little appeal. Little of the music was performed or recorded, and it was left to a small but dedicated band of enthusiasts to keep the flame alive. Yet in recent years opinion seems to be turning around and enthusiasm growing for the music of composers such as Bax, Bliss, Butterworth, Ireland, Moeran, Warlock, Holst (yes, there is life beyond "The Planets") and others who might be regarded as the First World War generation of composers.  I was reminded of this as I put together notes for this week's new release. Now there's no doubt many of the composers represented here are long past their posthumous period of going out of fashion. But what's happened since Stokowski made these recordings in the early 1950s has been an entire performance revolution regarding early music, and the Historically Informed Performances that have apparently rendered arrangements such as those of Stokowski an historical curiosity. (As an aside to this, I still await historically informed performances of music by Debussy, or Elgar, or any of the other composers of whom we have historically informed recordings, with portamento-heavy and tempo-shifting orchestras that are regarded today as anachronistic, but would be precisely what the composers of 100 years ago were writing for!) Anyway, it was the following paragraph, which I subbed down for inclusion in the CD sleevenotes this week, that sparked the comparison:  | | Lully |
Stokowski was celebrated as a transcriber of music originally written in other forms. His catalogue includes about 200 orchestral arrangements, nearly 40 of which are transcriptions of the works of J. S. Bach. During the 1920s and '30s, Stokowski arranged many of Bach's keyboard and instrumental works, as well as songs and cantata movements, for very large forces as well as just for strings alone. The most famous of them, the Toccata and Fugue in D minor, originally for organ, served as the opening item in Walt Disney's Fantasia and brought this music to a wide audience. Much admired in their day, these transcriptions are again being played now, and conductors such as Wolfgang Sawallisch, Matthias Bamert, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Seiji Ozawa, Erich Kunzel and Jose Serebrier are among many who have performed and recorded Stokowski's Bach transcriptions. These arrangements have been considered by some purists to be bastardizations of the original works, though as Stokowski pointed out, Bach himself was an inveterate transcriber of the music of others, notably Antonio Vivaldi. Today the organ works of Bach are widely heard in their original form via recordings and concerts, much more so than during Stokowski's time. Whether his transcriptions encouraged this resurgence of interest in Bach's organ music is a matter of debate. However, in this context it should be noted that Stokowski was by no means the only orchestrator of
 | | Bach |
Bach's music. Other conductors who have arranged Bach for symphonic forces include John Barbirolli, Dimitri Mitropoulos, Eugene Ormandy, Otto Klemperer, Erich Leinsdorf and Malcolm Sargent, while composers' arrangements include those by Elgar, Schoenberg, Respighi, Reger, Holst, and many others. In general, modern CD recordings of these and of Stokowski's versions have been given a very warm welcome by today's critics. For example, as Raymond Tuttle wrote in Fanfare: "It is worth remembering that many people would never have found a doorway into the world of Bach had Stokowski not put one there for them. Let's not be snobs about it: Stokowski's Bach is musical sorcery of the best sort." Not everyone agrees with Tuttle of course, and the fashion police helped ensure many of these works weren't heard in this form for a very long time. But perhaps Stokowski wasn't well served in the end by the recording technology he loved so much. The broad sweeps of his often lush orchestrations can sound all too hemmed-in and restricted by their mono sound world - they demand room to breathe, space to stretch, stereo to stop them becoming too stifling, in my opinion at least. And of course they were already last year's model even before stereo recording started to make inroads on the commercial musical scene...  | | Frescobaldi |
I write this from very much a personal perspective. When I sat down to assemble the files Mark Obert-Thorn had sent to me for Stokowski's Renaissance and Baroque Concert I admit I found them hard work to listen to. I persevered with them, listening through to each track and making some minor pitch stabilisation adjustments, but to be honest, by the time I'd reached the end of the album I was ready for something else. Not my cup of tea, so to speak. And then, just as I was creating the master files and FLACs to upload to our site I realised that, as of course these were taken from LP recordings, I had Mark's blessing to make an Ambient Stereo version of the release (he prefers his 78rpm work to remain absolutely mono). So I fired up my processors and started to listen afresh.  | | Palestrina |
Wow - what a difference! Could this possibly be the same music I'd cringed through a day earlier? It didn't seem possible that something I'd felt no unmoved by could be so transformed - into something so enjoyable - quite so easily and radically by such a method. By producing an immersive listening experience, rather than the rather "to one side" effect of the original mono, the music came alive, and the arrangements made sense. The Bach in particular is revealed to be truly beautiful in a way I simply hadn't appreciated before. If you're already a fan of this type of thing you've probably already decided to give this album a spin. But if you're like me, somewhat averse to the idea, then take a moment to download our sample here - the Ambient Stereo version - and try and give it a listen that's free from prejudice. You might just be surprised by your response to it.
Pristine Classical - new media server Part 2
| New Server (might look something like this...) |
Last week I outlined the work we'd had to undertake to move all our files to a new server in London. I was full of confidence, having successfully viewed the results of my labours - around 22,500 files in over 3500 directories - sitting waiting to be called upon.
All wasn't quite as it seemed though, and the story of the past week has been weeding out the flaws, finding the missing, replacing the corrupted, and getting service back to normal. PADA subscribers may have noticed some non-working tracks, and there have been a few moments - generally counted in minutes - where nothing appeared to work at all. Such is the nature of the beast! We've updated some 200GB of music files over the course of the last week, after a painstaking process of tracking down and identifying any that looked suspicious. I hope that's the end of this for now, and I've apologised to those few downloaders who've found themselves with non-working ZIP files and got in touch. You should all now have your working copies. I hope those with fast Internet connections are also noticing the significant speed increases we're now able to offer you. It's a delight to see my 20Mbps line actually living up to its potential, with Pristine downloads maxing the line out completely, running around 7 times faster than we were previously able to deliver. And if you've a faster connection than mine then I've no doubt you'll be getting even faster speeds - the uplink from the server offers a massive 1Gbps (i.e. 1000Mbps) bandwidth that's theoretically as fast as our office network - just as long as all the other bits of wire and string between us and you is also up to the task. And so to a couple of weeks away...  | |
Spotted: early Renaissance satellite dish
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of the last week or so, as we've battled to move everything from one continent to another, I must admit I'm looking forward to a two-week holiday more than ever! I will of course be checking e-mails and helping out as and where possible, but for the next two weeks there'll be no new releases from Pristine, and our CD facility will likewise cease operations. CD orders placed from today will be dealt with upon our re-opening on 22 July - be assured though that our newly streamlined service will be able to turn orders around exceptionally quickly when we do start up again! Meanwhile I'll be composing newsletters from the (sea) front which should drop into your in-box at the usual hour next Friday - and the Friday after that, all being well and mobile signals permitting! Then, on our return, I look forward to putting the finishing touches to our new website, as well as offering a new release that couldn't possibly be further removed musically than today's Stokowski release, despite being recorded at pretty well exactly the same time. What is it? You'll just have to wait and see! Andrew Rose
5 July 2013
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Stokowski's unique magic touch with music from the Renaissance and Baroque eras
First digital outings in fabulous new transfers by Mark Obert-Thorn
STOKOWSKI
Renaissance & Baroque Concert
Leopold Stokowski and His Symphony Orchestra Brass Choir A Capella Chorus Charles Courboin, organ J. S. BACH - Siciliano J. S. BACH - Mein Jesu, BWV 487 J. S. BACH - Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor, BWV 582 VIVALDI - Concerto Grosso in D minor, Op. 3, No. 11 CESTI - Tu mancavi a tormentarmi, crudelissima speranza LULLY - Nocturne LULLY - March FRESCOBALDI - Gagliarda PALESTRINA - Adoramus Te PALESTRINA - O Bone Jesu GABRIELLI - Canzon Quarti Toni a 15 GABRIELLI - In Ecclesiis Benedicite Domino
Recorded 1950/52
Producer and Audio Restoration Engineer:
Mark Obert-Thorn
Web page: PASC 391 Short Notes
 | | Gabrielli |
It is worth remembering that many people would never have found a doorway into the world of Bach had Stokowski not put one there for them. Let's not be snobs about it: Stokowski's Bach is musical sorcery of the best sort..
- Raymond Tuttle, FanfareThese recordings of music by Bach, Vivaldi, Lully, Frescobaldi, Palestrina, Gabrielli and Cesti were recorded just as the 78rpm era was moving into the age of vinyl and high fidelity, and captured a style of playing this music that was already beginning to go out of fashion. Sixty years later and people are rediscovering the transcriptions and orchestrations of Leopold Stokowski, making this an ideal opportunity to return to the master himself for these first digital releases of these 1950 and 1952 recordings. Once again, Mark Obert-Thorn's superlative transfers bring out the very best sound quality from these long-lost gems. Notes On this recording  | | Early Italian Music |
This collection brings together three "orphaned" Bach transcription recordings and one entire album (LM-1721, Early Italian Music) which have so far eluded commercial CD reissue. They show Stokowski at a stylistic crossroads between the big-orchestra arrangements through which he brought Baroque works to the masses in the 1920s and '30s and the burgeoning postwar interest in early music in its original (if not yet "HIP") form, a direction the conductor would increasingly take in the 1960s.
The final Gabrielli track posed particular transfer difficulties. On the original LP, it appears to have been pieced together from several takes, perhaps from more than just the one session listed, with differing levels of tape hiss, volume levels and even pitch. I have tried to straighten out all of the disparate elements in the present restoration. The sources for the transfers were "plain dog" first edition copies of the Bach and mid-'50s plum "shaded dog" label copies of the Italian music album. Mark Obert-Thorn
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Egon Petri plays the Emperor Concerto
 | | Egon Petri |
PADA Exclusives
Streamed MP3s you can also download
BEETHOVEN
Piano Concerto No. 5 in E flat, Op. 73, "Emperor"
Egon Petri piano
Santa Rosa Symphony
(conductor unknown)
Live, 10 November 1959
This transfer by Dr. John Duffy
Over 500 PADA Exclusives recordings are available for high-quality streamed listening and free 224kbps MP3 download to all subscribers. PADA Exclusives are not available on CD and are additional to our main catalogue.  Subscriptions start from €1 per week for PADA Exclusives only listening and download access. A full subscription to PADA Premium gets you all this plus unlimited streamed listening access to all Pristine Classical recordings for just €10 per month, with a free 1 week introductory trial.
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