Joseph Weigl: The Swiss Family

Joseph Weigl (Composer), Uri Rom (Conductor), Orchestra Dreieck (Orchestra), Marillia Vargas (Performer), Olivia Vermeulen (Performer), Petri Pöyhönen (Performer), Robert Maszel (Performer), Roman Payer (Performer), Stephan Bootz (Performer), Tobias Müller-Kopp (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Marillia Vargas, Olivia Vermeulen, Petri Pöyhönen, Robert Maszel, Roman Payer, et al.
• Orchestra: Orchestra Dreieck
• Conductor: Uri Rom
• Composer: Joseph Weigl
• Audio CD (July 18, 2006)
• Number of Discs: 2
• Label: Guild
• ASIN: B000CR5Q7I
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,115,323 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Beethoven and Schubert Loved It. You Will Too !, December 23, 2009

By 

James S. Eisenberg - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Joseph Weigl: The Swiss Family (Audio CD)

This work is a charmer by any standards. Beethoven considered it to be one of the great masterpieces of his day. It is a delightful example of the singspiel.

The tunes are gorgeous and the orchestration just about perfect. Although there is an awful lot of spoken dialog, the work is a winner.

The plot is about an extremely homesick Swiss family living in Germany. To cure their daughter's madness, a fake Swiss village is constructed. It is slight, it is absurd, and it is genuinely touching.

The cast is a strong one, especially Marilia Vargas as Emmeline, the daughter.

(Somewhat oddly, her "mad scene" is a spoken Melodrama with a virtuoso part for clarinet. I am willing to bet that when composer Weigl created an Italian adaptation some years after the premiere, this passage was sung !)

Uri Rom is the excellent conductor.

The sound recording, notes, texts and translation are exemplary as we have come to expect from the Guild label.