Customer Reviews

Leontyne Price Sings Strauss Arias

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America's "diva di tutte le dive" soprano Leontyne Price rarely sang the German operatic repertoire onstage - "Die Kluge" "Die Zauberflaute"/"Ariadne auf Naxos" - throughout her illustrous and brilliant career. Thankfully, she included arias and scenas in her concerts and recitals, Richard Strauss' "Awakening Scene" (Egytian Helen) and Salome's "Final Scene" most often. Both are included in this vocally sumptuous RCA studio recorded CD collection of Strauss arias. Recorded in '72/73, Leontyne Price's "juicy lyric" soprano had developed into a formidable spinto with a stronger, darker middle, and a powerful, sterling upper register that seemed positioned to delve into the heavier musical waters of R. Wagner & Strauss. However,the American diva resisted the temptation to abandon the glorious legacy of her Italian-based repertoire(where she reigned supreme). In this concert, Leontyne Price's essaying of the "Frau" scene is simply stunning - dramatically urgent - with requisite power in the middle of the voice off-set by the thrust and freedom of her upper register. Indeed, her thrilling high Dflat has not been bettered(equalled by Leonie Rysanek). The Rosenkavalier monologue is sung sensitively with lovely vocal shadings, but lacks the ruminative quality that informs the finest of the Marschallins. Ms. Price sang the role of "Ariadne" onstage with the San Francisco Opera and at the MET successfully (if not definitely). Ariadne's "Es gibt ein Reich" is sung here with a majesterial, dark-toned beauty that glows in the penultimate section of the aria. Strauss' Salome is a 16 year-old woman-child, usually sung by "drammatische sopran" like the great Birgit Nilsson, due in part to the heavy orchestration. In Ms. Price's hands, Salome's tragically premature and short journey to adulthood is vividly captured, the voice cast in silver rather than steel, alternately viperish, kittenish, perplexed, and finally triumphant. The soprano's vibrant tone is lyric in nature, throbbing with appropriate girlishness, largely missing from more noted Salomes. Leontyne Price was the first artist to record the "Guntram" aria. The quasi-Wagnerian music, complete with heavy orchestration, poses no apparent terror for her, as she sings it with remarkable abandon, plush, creamy tone in the middle yielding to a gleaming, ringing climax of laser-like high notes. The excitement is palpable throughout. Finally, we are treated to a Price specialty, "Zweite Brautnacht", an aria that showcases the full arsenal of this magnificent voice. The exquisite vocalism throughout this entire collection reminds the listener of the incomparable soaring beauty, throb, and ease that made Leontyne Price the reigning Verdi soprano of her generation - and a sterling constellation in Strauss' rarified firmament.

A LIITLE OUT OF HER ELEMENT HERE. THE GERMAN ISN'T ALWAYS GERMANIC BUT MISS PRICE ALWAYS GIVES 100% IN MUSICIANSHIP AND CARE. IF YOU LOVE PRICE YOU NEED THIS CD. 5 STARS BECAUSE SHE HAD SOME OF THE MOST GLORIOUS UPPER REGISTER SOUNDS. SHE IS NEVER PHONY. SHE WORKS IT !ES GIBT EIN REICH IS A LITTLE SLOW FOR ME BUT WHO CARES. IT'S THE AMERICAN DIVA ASOLUTTA.

A great recording often manifests silently from inside the genuine humility, even doubts, of the artists laboring to create it. I suspect that is as apt a characterization as any of the effectiveness of this album. Leontyne Price has always been, to my mind, a marvelously transparent singer; one feels immediately her approach, and indeed her own trepidation on the high wire, as it were. This collection of Strauss is a model of that transparency. She is outside her safe zone here, albeit willingly and with customary copious voice, but it is, at least for those intimately familiar with Leontyne Price's voice, a land of no coasting and no boasting. And it is a remarkable triumph, with a fetching choice of material, and an incomparable version of the final scene of "Salome". The quixotic magic of Price's Salome is something to experience, her work with Leinsdorf has never been more collaborative, and the Boston Symphony really sizzles! The superb aria from "Ariadne" is a perfect 'calling up' of the Salome, directly preceding it as it does and alerting the countryside of the imminent eruption of Salome's arresting disintegration to come. Absolutely splendid work from a prima donna of deservedly legendary status, with the additional treat of first-rate orchestral playing.

In this album, the first international black diva Leontyne Price sings German arias by Richard Strauss, a repertory she is not usually associated with. Leontyne Price will forever be lauded for her Verdi and Puccini Italian opera repertoire. But Price sang a wide variety of works, from Samuel Barber, Gershwin, Baroque works, French composers and German composers. Her versatility is prominently showcased in the album "Prima Donna". These arias are virtuosic interpretations and the New Philharmonia does an oustanding job. Erich Leinsdorf championed Leontyn Price more than any other conductor and knew how her voice can be transferred beautifully into recording. The first track is a dramatic and lyric aria from Strauss' last opera Die Frau Ohne Schatten (Woman Without Shadow). From the beginning, she shows command for the German diction and the melodic tone is rich, dark and dramatic. If I'm not mistaken this album was made in the 70's, a period of time that found Leontyne singing with a bigger voice and louder fortissimi, and this without sacrificing the beautiful pianissimi. This is quite evident in the Marschallin's Monologue from Der Rosenkavalier, which Leontyne Price essays with queenly grace, and with an even bigger voice than the more lyric Schwartzkopff, the most famous Marschallin. This is a beautiful aria in which the Marschallin expresses her sadness about growing older. Leontyne has a dark, mature voice that is wholly suited to the character and Price totally gets the part. Her voice is dark chocolate. The rare operas The Egyptian Helena and Guntram are not performed today but demonstrate a powerful musicality and theatrical prowess. Price sings the high tessitura of Helen's aria without any strain. It is smoothly sung and supremely dramatic. It is a fiendishly difficult aria and few singers have actually sung it (Today only Jane Eaglen in the Mozart and Strauss Album sings it). The final scene from Salome is hair-raising and Leontyne's voice raises above the staff and above the orchestra with thunderous power. She never performed Salome (only Maria Ewing is the only black singer to sing the role) and perhaps for good reason since in Price's time the reigning Salome was Birgit Nilsson and it was still very risque to dance in semi-nude costume. While Leontyne Price does not lighten her tone to sound girlish (Salome is a teenager) like some sopranos have done, but she is powerful, visceral and sexually charged. It is a masterpiece. Unfortunately, they didnt add Wagner arias to further show off Price's German repertoire. But Price has sung magnificent Wagner pieces - Sieglende from Die Walkure, the Liebestod from the final scene in Tristan and Elisabeth's Prayer Aria and Hall Aria from Tannhauser. Overall, this is one of Leontyne Price's better recording albums. I would recommend this one along with the Prima Donna Album.

Price didn't sing much German opera but what she did she did right. This CD has made Die Egyptische Helena my favorite aria in all of opera, the near super sonic burst at the end is beyond belief. I've heard many German opera specialists (Rysanek, Schwarzkoph, Voigt) sing this aria and no one comes close to this. This CD is a must have for either Strauss or Price fans.

This has been one of my all-time favorite recordings since I first heard it about 20 years ago. On the LP version, the Four Last Songs were included, but some of the other material was not. These are the trade-offs that happen when LP's are transferred to CD. It's hard to single out the best things here, because four of five of these arias are just about the best available. I guess I am most grateful for the Frau Ohne Schatten excerpt and (especially!) the Guntram aria. Wow!! The Rosenkavalier monolog is something that is recorded quite often, but it's lovely here. "Es gibt ein Reich", in my opinion the greatest aria Strauss ever wrote, is exuberant. The "Egyptian Helen" snippet does not make a deep impression, but it is really very beautiful and one comes to like it after 10 or 20 hearings. I don't love the opera Salome, and I guess the excerpts here are all I ever really need to hear from that opera. I don't own a lot of Price's recordings, but I would never part with this one...it is that good.

I'd say that the casual listener needs this along with a good recording of "Four Last Songs" and a disc of excerpts from "Rosenkavalier" (Renee Fleming's will do nicely) and you have all the Strauss vocal music you will ever need.

Of course, I could never get along without a recording of "Elektra" on my shelf, but that's a subject for another review...