Richard Strauss's house

[Guido]

I have bought this CD too... which track are you referring to?

[jlaurson]

One of the enduring beauties of music, even familiar music, is its capacity to surprise.
For you to hear new things in a song, an aria, an orchestral work that you thought you knew well...

Great Strauss Scenes on Viva La Voce
http://www.weta.org/fmblog/?p=2319

I have bought this CD too... which track are you referring to?

I don't understand your question unless you have not read the article linked to, of which that line is the first sentence. Every track, is the answer, in any case.

[Guido]

Ah sorry! Thought they were your words... didn't realise the link was a link!

[jlaurson]

Ah sorry! Thought they were your words... didn't realise the link was a link!

They are my words. And there is a link. 

[MishaK]

OK, I've tried many times to give it a chance, but I still think Aus Italien is a seroiusly inferior work. It's like Strauss is trying to be Respighi, but not quite succeeding at it. Respighi is still the better Respighi.

[Guido]

Asbolutely. It's hardly considered to be one of his best is it.

[Guido]

Strauss' Songs for Bass and orchestra are absolutely incredible. I actually prefer them to the ones for women's voices! Yes I know that sounds mad (and I except the Vier Letzte from that) but it's true. In the operas, the music for the girls is always better than for the boys, but here, in his op.51 and 44 we get things that we never see in the operas from the men - pure pathos and power and gravitas. So wonderful.

The recording by Andreas Schmidt is sublime and contains 3 of the 4 that make up op.44, and op.51 (and two lesser songs op.33). Der Einsame is simply ravishing, and Notturno has a unique atmosphere and profound strangeness that shows an aspect of Strauss that is rarely put on display - a sort of silvery, diamond edged hardness, a craggy, harsh, moonlit ladscape in sound. Das Thal I'm slightly less enamoured with, but is still impressive and of high quality. The fourth is recorded on a complete Strauss Orchestral Songs set, but I have all the others, and its very expensive just for one song! One day, one day. Andreas Schmidt was already known to me from his truly wondrous recording of Schoeck's Elegie which is desert island listening for me - one of the greatest vocal masterpieces for male voice.

[mjwal]

That A. Schmidt CD is unfortunately not available in Europe, as far as I can see, pity, because like you I love the Elegie, Guido. A remarkable bass song by Strauss you hardly ever see recorded is "Im Spätboot" (Op.56/3) - I only have it on LP with Alsen/Raucheisen. There seems to be a recording by Hotter/Klien - must get!

[Guido]

You can get it in Europe, thaugh it's pricey:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mahler-orch-Berio-R-Strauss/dp/B000003F9F/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1296066390&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.fr/Orchestral-Lieder-Mahler/dp/B000003F9F/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1296066495&sr=1-1

[Lethevich]

Does anyone knows the difference between his Le Bourgeois gentilhomme and Der Bürger als Edelmann?

[Scarpia]

Does anyone knows the difference between his Le Bourgeois gentilhomme and Der Bürger als Edelmann?

I think the original idea was to have an opera performed within a play, which flopped, then he extracted the opera as an independent piece.  I don't recall which was witch. 

[MishaK]

Does anyone knows the difference between his Le Bourgeois gentilhomme and Der Bürger als Edelmann?

Same thing, German title. Since the reference is to an original play by Molière (and the inspiration and excuse for the neoclassical approach is the original incidental music by Lully for Molière's play), the title is usually given in French, though sometimes German editions refer to it by the German translation. 

[Lethevich]

Oh, thanks. The movement names looked familiar, I guess BBC Legends were trying to be esoteric

[knight66]

Not all of the songs we now hear in orchestral guise were orchestrated by him. Some he authorised to be filled out and I think some were orchestrated after his death. But I have never read anyone suggesting they can tell by listening which fall into the latter two categories.

There is at least one version of the Four Last Songs to which Malvern has been appended, but I really don't think it will catch on. The traditional four in the traditional sequence have such a cohesive feel of completeness. It is however, a beautiful and delicate swansong.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hserED_9paA&feature=related

The song is lovely and seems to look back at both Zerbinetta's aria from Ariadne and to Alban Berg - Die Nachtigall.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTgy_oOvsPE&NR=1

Mike

[jlaurson]

Vocal CD Pick of the Week: Diana Damrau's Strauss Sublime

http://www.weta.org/fmblog/?p=3057

[Guido]

I really don't like Damrau here - the phrasing is so lumpy, a tiny vibratoless sound bulges suddenly to a full dramatic wobble. Alternatively girlishly breathless and then rather matronly. The vibrato is more under control than I've heard it recently actually, but it's not very beautiful to my ears.

[knight66]

Guido and I have a very similar puzzlement over what makes this singer so successful. To my ears she is pretty much a non starter in the historixcal line of Great Strauss/Mozart singers.

I wonder if it is really Thielemanns contributions that weighted the balance with Jens?

Mike

[jlaurson]

Guido and I have a very similar puzzlement over what makes this singer so successful. To my ears she is pretty much a non starter in the historixcal line of Great Strauss/Mozart singers.

I wonder if it is really Thielemanns contributions that weighted the balance with Jens?

Mike

No. I really think Diana Damrau is the greatest Strauss soubrette / coloratura soprano there is or ever was (in the time of recordings that allow judgement). I love Thielemann's Strauss contributions, of course, but I've heard Damrau live enough to know that the two factors are not the same. She can make herself heard in any acoustic, too... even at piano and pianissimo... (for example at the performance of the songs on this disc in concert in the difficult Philharmonic Hall in Munich) so the 'tiny sound' might be an impression gathered from the CD, but does not jibe with reality.

Guido's comments baffle me completely, because I know that one need not understand the text she is singing (communicating, really; because she completely nails every song or aria) to come to the same conclusion as I. I can't think of any critic-acquaintances, from voice-fetishists to those who focus primarily on the theatrical aspect, who disagree wither. Of course it's ultimately a personal choice, but her quality as a singer is for all practical purposes out of the question. Ever even heard, much less experienced, her Zerbinetta? Strauss composed that role for her.

[knight66]

I have heard her on disc and DVD. Sorry, I don't buy into what cannot be denied; unless she is somehow different live and the recorded sound is not representative. Having read Guido for some time and learned to trust his ears, I am not about to take on board that he or, for that matter I, can't tell a good voice from a great one.

I don't think this is merely a matter of taste. I find imperfections in the voice, I intensely dislike the vibrato. It is not always in evidence, but I don't see how it helps Mozart, and the disc of her Mozart arias is rattling with it. It is partially in evidence in the Strauss I have heard, she is fine when it is under wraps, but Sophie is traditionally a role for a specific kind of voice. That does not include one with an edge to it or noticeable vibrato, as against vibrancy.

Mike

[Guido]

No. I really think Diana Damrau is the greatest Strauss soubrette / coloratura soprano there is or ever was (in the time of recordings that allow judgement). I love Thielemann's Strauss contributions, of course, but I've heard Damrau live enough to know that the two factors are not the same. She can make herself heard in any acoustic, too... even at piano and pianissimo... (for example at the performance of the songs on this disc in concert in the difficult Philharmonic Hall in Munich) so the 'tiny sound' might be an impression gathered from the CD, but does not jibe with reality.

Guido's comments baffle me completely, because I know that one need not understand the text she is singing (communicating, really; because she completely nails every song or aria) to come to the same conclusion as I. I can't think of any critic-acquaintances, from voice-fetishists to those who focus primarily on the theatrical aspect, who disagree wither. Of course it's ultimately a personal choice, but her quality as a singer is for all practical purposes out of the question. Ever even heard, much less experienced, her Zerbinetta? Strauss composed that role for her.

I can't agree that she's the best ever Strauss Soubrette/coloratura - just examples that immediately spring to mind: of recent people in this category I much prefer Barbara Bonney as Sophie (a far more beautiful voice in my opinion, both technically and in the basic timbre) and Kathleen Battle as Zerbinetta (both are gorgeous Zdenkas too), and of the previous generation there're just so many fine ones - I adore Rita Streich as Zerbinetta on the famous Karajan/Schwarzkopf Ariadne for instance, and feel she completely outclasses Damrau vocally.

I don't actively dislike Damrau, but I certainly don't think she's one of "the greats". She's a good actress, I agree with that at least. The "tiny" sound is more in the colour of the voice - those toothpastey bulges from a "white" vibratoless note, to full matronly vibrato as I said - not at all attractive to my ears. The Zerbinetta aria on her COLORaturaS album is so exaggerated both musically and in her rendering of the text, that it sort of ruins it for me. Just after the start of second section which starts "So war es mit Pagliazzo", the lines

Doch niemals Launen,
Immer ein Müssen!
Immer ein neues
Beklommenes Staunen.
Dass ein Herz so gar sich selber,
Gar sich selber nicht versteht!

are a classic example of this unpleasant use of vocal colour. I speak German, so that's not at all the issue!

You can't control what sounds attractive to you in the same way that you can't help who you find attractive! But these are my thoughts for what its worth and I'm glad that Mike's ideas chime with my own here.