Customer Reviews

Beethoven: Fidelio

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Source: Live 1950 performance at Salzburg. This famous performance has circulated for years in pirated form. Here it appears in respectable publication--or at least as respectable as Od'O gets.

Sound: OK for its time and place. For you delicate souls who must hear DDD clarity or suffer the vapors, walk away right now. This is not for you. For those of you interested in art, be warned that Flagstad's voice simply overwhelms the capacity of the recording system from time to time. Accept that and move on.

Documentation: Not up to Od'O abysmal standards. No libretto. Nothing on cast members, conductor, orchestra or circumstances of the recording. Track list omits timings and fails even to identify the singers. Disc 2, track 11, as shown above in the Amazon track listing, appears as "Entr'acte." So it is, and then some, for in accordance with the practice of the day, Furtwaengler gives a barn burning performance of the Leonore Overture No. 3.

This is Furtwaengler's Fidelio, which is to say that it is a great Fidelio. This is the ultimate Romantic take on the opera, utterly at variance with the dry and spare style of performance that is now, alas, fashionable. Listen here to one of the greatest of the great conductors in full command of every nuance of the score.

Three members of the cast are certainly as good as any who ever recorded Fidelio, and possibly better. Flagstad is her incomparable self. Elizabeth Schwarzkopf and Anton Dermota are simply unbeatable as Marzelline and Jaquino, the secondary soprano and tenor.

The other three main principals are more problematic. Julius Patzak is Florestan, the much-abused hero who does not appear until Act II. Patzak was a renowned lieder singer whose operatic career began with Tamino and Don Ottavio, soared to Rudolfo and Turiddu, triumphed in the operettas of Strauss and Lehar, and finished with Herod. His performance is intelligent, skillful and well thought-out. The only problem with Patzak in Fidelio is simply that he does not have enough voice. Florestan is not a man, he is Beethoven's symbol of suffering humanity. In the final scene of Act II, when Florestan sings the praises of Leonore before all the massed voices--"Retterin, Retterin des Gatten sein"--Patzak can't bring it off. He sounds more like Woody Allan than humanity liberated.

Paul Schoeffler, like all the rest of this cast, was a stalwart of the Vienna State Opera. I saw him do a terrific Hans Sachs in San Francisco during the sixties. A natural-born Don Alfonso for "Cosi fan tutte," he lacks the bite for that heart of darkness which is Don Pizarro. Josef Greindl, on the other hand, was opera's resident cave man. His huge, dark, mean-sounding voice is utterly at variance with the weak but vaguely benevolent Papa Rocco. When Schoeffler and Greindl sing together, as they often do, it sounds as though they have mixed up their parts.

The Vienna State Opera Orchestra and the chorus must have been magnificent in the pit and on the stage. The recording suggests this, but doesn't do them full service.

Five stars for Furtwaengler, Flagstad, Schwarzkopf and Dermota.

This 1950 Salzburg performance has been around for decades, but this is the cleanest recording I've heard. The performance is stunning. Flagstad was entering the final phase of her career, but the voice is magnificent: warm and wonderfully powerful. The rest of the cast is absolutely first rate, with Schwarzkopf an unmatchable Marzellina. Furtwangler is at his legendary finest. Nothing but a plot summary accompanies the discs, not even the fact that one of the Lenore overtures is used to bridge the two scenes of Act II. Nevertheless, this would be a bargain at three times the price.

Opera d'Oro has become the best source for off-label versions of famous live performances. That's certainly the case with this Fidelio. Here are Furtwaangler's four recordings of the opera:

August 3, 1948 - Salzburg Festival. Erna Schluter, Julius Patzak, Lisa della Casa, Ferdinand Frantz.

August 5, 1950 - Salzburg Festival. Kirsten Flagstad, Julius Patzak, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Paul Schoeffler.

October 12, 1953 - Vienna State Opera. Martha Modl, Wolfgang Windgassen, Sena Jurinac, Otto Edelmann.

October 13-17, 1953 - Studio Recording, same cast as Oct. 12th performance.

Pride of place has always gone to the 1950 Salzburg performance on EMI, which features Flagstad's authoritative, if mature-sounding Leonore and a fervent, poetic Florestan from Patzak. How is Opera d'Oro's reissue compared to the offical one from EMI? It's in almost as good sound -- closely miked mono that puts the orchestra a bit too far away but captures the voices with satisfactory fidelity. Compared to the 1953 studio version, there's added dramatic tension from the live setting in Salzburg (where Furtwangler led the same production of Fidelio, with varying casts, in 1948, 1949, and 1950), even though the first twenty minutes feel painfully slow to me. Only the great singing cast saves the performance from periodically sinking under Furtwangler's extremely broad pacing, which would have left lesser performers gasping for breath.

For me, it's a toss-up between this recording and the other staged one from 1953, which is a shade faster but not cast quite as strongly. If you search on the used market, it's possible to find both at bargain price, making it unnecessary to choose. In terms of sound and Furtwangler's mesmerizing interpretive gifts, they are very similar.

The is Fidelio pure and unobstructed by excluding Leonore's overture (Klemperer & Co.), text cutting (Bernstein & Co.) and other absurdities. The magic of the orchestra is so totally Furtwanglerian - from listening to many versions of this opera, most with better recording quality, I am still totally captivated by this conductor far surpassing any other in bringing the music and spirit of Beethoven to us; the tempi are just perfect, the fortissimi and pianissimi, the nuance, the gentleness and anguish and thunder - all is done in superb manner.

For example, listen to the Quartett "Mir ist so wunderbar" Nr. 3 (track #4 on CD1) - it is sung and played with the extraordinary homage to the source of its influence, the "canon" quartet "E nel tuo, nel mio bicchiero" from Mozart's "Cosi fan tutte"; each voice is entering in the same marvelous turns.

Next, Leonore's aria in E major "Komm, Hoffnung" (track #10) opens as Fiordiligi's aria "Per pieta, bel mio, perdona" in the same key; the effect of Kirsten Flagstad unique voice coupled with Furtwangler's handling of the orchestra is incomparable.

And the Leonore overture, together with the opening Fidelio overture are played magnificently; this performance dates to August 1950, and it set the highest standard of playing this symphonic opera.

It would be fitting to mention some facts on these overtures.

There are four overtures to the work, three entitled Leonore (Nos. 1, 2 and 3) and one Fidelio. The Leonore overtures are incorrectly numbered. The No. 2 was given at the original performance and is, therefore, No. 1. The greatest and justly the most famous, the No. 3, is really No. 2. The so-called No. 1 was composed for a projected performance in Prague, which never came off. The score and parts, in a copyist's hand, but with corrections by Beethoven, were discovered after the composer's death. When it was recognized as an overture to the opera, the conclusion that it was the earliest one, which he probably had laid aside, was bi unnaturally arrived at. The Fidelio overture was intended for the second revision for 23 May 1814 first performance of that version (the original Fidelio had its premier in 1805), but was not ready in time. The overture to Die Ruinen von Athen, Opus 113 was substituted; with the Fidelio overture as we hear in the beginning of the opera today was introduced at the second performance three days later on 26 May 1814.

It must be noted that playing Leonore overture after "O namenlose Freude!" Duett Nr. 15 is by no means universally approved, except for true exceptional conductors who must play it. Some say that Leonore 3 repeats much of the material of the scene it follows; sacrifices the effect of sunshine and of solution which the C major if the final scene can produce with not preceeded by the music in the same key; and that it entirely destroys rge dramatic balance of the whole act. But who are these sayers when Beethoven said to play it? Furtwangler is ever more admired for being true to the composer and the music.

A must-hear for all faithful Fidelio lovers.

Fidelio represented for the most of conductors but specially for Wilhelm Furtwangler, the reaffirmation of the mean values of the humankind , a call to decency in total synchronization with the imperative principles of the Enlightenment, the heroic struggle and mercurial fierceness that nestles under the untamed spirit of the human being. Of course this was an obvious statement in those oppressive years, signed by the opprobrium of the Russian iron's fist as well as the Nazi regime Conductors like Toscanini and Bruno Walter flagged this work in Salzburg and New York respectively as the triumph of the man's will against any other kind of Totalitarian Regime.

This memorable and historical version has several elements that make it absolutely a must-have; the cast, Orchestra, Director and historical moment in which it was performed.

Since I got in LP format twenty years ago until its fortunate release on CD format, this is one of those absolutely necessary recordings to listen and enjoy over and over, because it conjugates grandness and noblesse.