Wagner's Valhalla

[Solitary Wanderer]

  Wait 'till you get to the end of Twilight of the Gods (Gotterdammerung)  !

  marvin

Nearly there!

Watched Gotterdammerung Act.2. last night.



Great scene with the Vassels chorus and the plotting for Siegfrieds Tod.

[Chaszz]

Whoa! I stopped watching this thread for a long time, because it was frozen at page 5 [at "You're welcome, Yasser"] for several months. But it is sure lively now...

A few comments for the people who are relatively new to Wagner:

Do not neglect Lohengrin and Tannhauser. Some devotees make a big deal about the difference between these 'operas' and the mature later 'music dramas' and important differences there may be. But I listen to Wagner primarily for the music and the music in these two is simply wonderful, scene after scene of inspired melody and variation. They both well repay attentive listening. 

Thielemann's conducting IMO puts him in the top rank of Wagner conductors of all time. We are lucky to live while such an important Wagner conductor is alive. A huge prize will be his Ring recording which I hope and expect the fading titans of the record industry will somehow find the wherewithal to record and release.  (As an aside, the masters of the record industry remind me of the gods of Valhalla awaiting their deaths.)

A terrific Wagner conductor to explore is Karl Muck, who worked at Bayreuth in the generation right after the composer's death. His limited recordings consist of some excellent tracks from 1927, with sound that is simply astounding for the time, now reissued on CDs. There is an Act III of Parsifal that is truly great. He seems to me to be very tuned into Wagner's intentions and mystique, perhaps because he was there near the beginning.

[PSmith08]

Ah, Karl Muck. Really one of the great ones. In addition to Parsifal, there are some other recordings - all of which are astonishing for their fleet tempi. Of all my versions of, for example, the Siegfried-Idyll, Muck comes in the fastest at 17:34. Compare that to Celibidache's 23:47 or Glenn Gould's 24:32. Only Otto Klemperer (18:00) comes close to Muck. That's fast.

[uffeviking]

Thielemann's conducting IMO puts him in the top rank of Wagner conductors of all time.

Have you had a chance to listen to the webcast of this year's Bayreuth Ring with Thielemann conducting? Mind blowing! I have listened to a lot of the Trauermarsch but his tops them all. Yes, is it's a tad longer but every note is chiseled clean and perfectly by the outstanding musicians at Bayreuth under his direction.

For a comparison I listened to Levine conducting it and it's mushy, fuzzy and maudlin.

[Chaszz]

Have you had a chance to listen to the webcast of this year's Bayreuth Ring with Thielemann conducting? Mind blowing! I have listened to a lot of the Trauermarsch but his tops them all. Yes, is it's a tad longer but every note is chiseled clean and perfectly by the outstanding musicians at Bayreuth under his direction.

For a comparison I listened to Levine conducting it and it's mushy, fuzzy and maudlin.

I was unable to listen to this Ring, but another member has kindly offered to send me download links of recordings of it. I await them fervently.

I also hope he'll conduct Wagner sometime soon at the Met or elsewhere on the East Coast where I can attend and hear him in person. It's as if Muck, Furtwangler or one of the other immortal Wagner conductors were walking among us!

[marvinbrown]

Whoa! I stopped watching this thread for a long time, because it was frozen at page 5 [at "You're welcome, Yasser"] for several months. But it is sure lively now...

A few comments for the people who are relatively new to Wagner:

Do not neglect Lohengrin and Tannhauser. Some devotees make a big deal about the difference between these 'operas' and the mature later 'music dramas' and important differences there may be. But I listen to Wagner primarily for the music and the music in these two is simply wonderful, scene after scene of inspired melody and variation. They both well repay attentive listening. 

  Yes I totally agree that Lohengrin and Tannhauser are not to be neglected.  Although it is difficult to neglect Lohengrin..... well with the very popular "here comes the bride" melody from Elsa's marriage to Lohengrin.

  marvin

[uffeviking]

I was unable to listen to this Ring,

And if the mail is late or you are having problems with your friend's URL's, those performances are being repeated. Scroll down a bit and you'll find it.

http://www.operacast.com/bayreuth07.htm

[Solitary Wanderer]

Watched Gotterdammerung Act.3. last night.

Finished!

Well, the complete Ring cycle was an awesome experience. Epic, dramatic, exciting, moving...etc.

It was great for me to hear where various orchestral pieces that I've been listening to for years, like Entry of the Gods into Valhalla, Ride of the Valkyries, Forest Murmurs, Siegfried's Rhine Journey and the Funeral March, fitted into the whole drama. I loved the Mets staging of it; the sets and costumes were incredible.

I'm keen to re-watch it again

But I'll explore some of Wagner's other music dramas first

[PerfectWagnerite]

/quote]

Unlike most other Eurotrash performances of this work, the Met had the budget to stage the work properly instead of using fake costumes that are frankly embarassing.

[Anne]

SW,

Glad you liked it.  I enjoy the way Wagner takes a long time to wind down the music.  I need every minute to come back to earth after that terrific journey.

[Solitary Wanderer]

SW,

Glad you liked it.  I enjoy the way Wagner takes a long time to wind down the music.  I need every minute to come back to earth after that terrific journey.

Yep, loved every minute of it. Wish I'd discovered it 20 years ago

[uffeviking]

Unlike most other Eurotrash performances of this work, the Met had the budget to stage the work properly instead of using fake costumes that are frankly embarassing.

May I ask you if you have seen in it's entirety, not single photos or even uTube, the productions of Pierre Audi in Amsterdam; the 1976 Patrice Chéreau Bayreuth production; any Jürgen Flimm Ring; how about the Harry Kupfer production, the one from Bayreuth, or the revised one in Berlin? 

[PerfectWagnerite]

May I ask you if you have seen in it's entirety, not single photos or even uTube, the productions of Pierre Audi in Amsterdam; the 1976 Patrice Chéreau Bayreuth production; any Jürgen Flimm Ring; how about the Harry Kupfer production, the one from Bayreuth, or the revised one in Berlin? 

I have seen the awful Boulez/Chereau (who hasn't). They made us watch that garbage when I took an opera class in college. I would not wish that on anybody. Yes I have seen 10-15 minutes clips at a time on Youtube of some of the others. I don't even know which production they are but they are equally awful. There is one when after Donner struck his hammer he falls flat on his back, and the Heda Hedo was sung like "Celeste Aida". There is another one where I actually watched in the store for a good 20 minutes because it happened to be on. The one where Bruennhilde woke up looking like she is a mental patient waking up in an asylum. I can't imaging watching any of these for 15 hrs.

[uffeviking]

Thank you for your opinion, which turned out exactly as I expected it would.

[Chaszz]

Article on Wagner in the London Times. A good summation of some of the reasons for his importance and continuing popularity at a time when the classical music establishment in general is worried about becoming irrelevant. When some of the uninitiated read and digest it. it may help make it even harder to get tickets to the perfromances!

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/article2181464.ece

[David Zalman]

I have seen the awful Boulez/Chereau (who hasn't). They made us watch that garbage when I took an opera class in college. I would not wish that on anybody. Yes I have seen 10-15 minutes clips at a time on Youtube of some of the others. I don't even know which production they are but they are equally awful. There is one when after Donner struck his hammer he falls flat on his back, and the Heda Hedo was sung like "Celeste Aida". There is another one where I actually watched in the store for a good 20 minutes because it happened to be on. The one where Bruennhilde woke up looking like she is a mental patient waking up in an asylum. I can't imaging watching any of these for 15 hrs.

Apropos the above, this might be of some interest:

http://www.soundsandfury.com/soundsandfury/2007/08/oh-dear-wagner-.html

[PerfectWagnerite]

You are referring to the Mac Donal article here I think which I read with great interest. Thanks for the link.

[David Zalman]

You are referring to the Mac Donal article here I think which I read with great interest. Thanks for the link.

I was referring both to that article and to the one on staging Wagner's operas, both of which articles are linked in the post I linked above.

[PerfectWagnerite]

Bear with me for a second. The link you gave points to a page with a two paragraph article on Wagner and an embedded link to the Mac Donald article. Am I missing something?

[Haffner]

I have the Solti classic "Ring...", the Hvk "Rheingold", and the Boulez DVDs, and even up against them I thought the Levine was just fine.

Like many others, I wasn't thrilled with Jerusalem and Behrenson the dvd,  but they pretty much got the job(s) done.

I don't know...the Solti is such a fantastic performance, it can easily overshadow the others, in my humble opinion.