Wagner - Mastersingers

Product Details

Artist : Richard Wagner
Format : Box set
Binding : Audio CD
EAN : 0095115314821
Label : Chandos
Number of Discs : 4
Product Group : Music
Release Date : 2008-06-30
Running Time : 292minutes
UPC : 095115314821

ASIN : B001ANZQZU

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Editorial Reviews

Review

The resounding success of Reginald Goodall's Mastersingers led to his conducting an 'English' Ring at the London Coliseum in the 1970s. That Ring started me recording opera in English so I am thrilled that we have been able to add The Mastersingers to our Opera in English catalogue - alongside Goodall's Ring. --Sir Peter Moores

Product Description

For the first time ever, the legendary centenary production of Wagner's The Mastersingers, conducted by Reginald Goodall is released as a 4-CD set on Chandos Opera in English. Broadcast live on the BBC from Sadler's Wells Theatre on 10 February 1968 Goodall conducted a cast of such luminaries as Alberto Remedios, Norman Bailey, Derek Hammond-Stroud, Gregory Dempsey, Margaret Curphey and Ann Robson. Following the live broadcast the recording sadly disappeared into the archives and has since become one of the most talked about lost performances. Music-lovers have regularly contacted Chandos requesting its release on Opera in English and it is one that Sir Peter Moores was determined to make happen. It even led to an appeal for indivduals recordings of the broadcast! This 4-CD set has subsequently been re-mastered from a BBC Radio live broadcast and is released at the price of 3 CDs. The sound quality reflects the fact it is a 1968 live recording and some deterioration is evident although this does not detract from the fantastic performance value. A popular comic opera The Mastersingers is an ensemble opera in a sense which Wagner s other operas are not. Yet, despite its comic opera standing, it is in fact a deeply spiritual work. Wagner wrote, it is impossible that you should not have sensed, under the opera's quaint superficies of popular humour, the profound melancholy, the lament, the cry of distress of poetry in chains, and its reincarnation, its new birth, its irresistible magic power achieving mastery over the common and the base.

Customer Reviews

The best 'Mastersingers' I have ever heard. (2008-08-30)

Usually I find the orchestration of this opera a bit over-rich, thick and stodgy but not so with Goodall. He thins out the texture wonderfully while revealing the counterpoint far clearer than ever before. Here it has such air and space to breath, and instead of being heavy and bourgeois it is light and lyrical.He achieved much the same thing with 'Parsifal', in the Sadler's Wells version, and transcendance too, and I look forward eagerly to the release of this in the near future.

'Meistersinger' in English: Good News, Bad News -- Mostly Good (2008-08-03)

This is a much-talked-about live recording, long thought lost, of a BBC broadcast in 1968 of an English-language production of Wagner's 'Die Meistersinger' from the Sadler's Wells Opera (now called the English National Opera). It was conducted by Reginald Goodall who was all but unknown then but who soon became known and much lauded for his conducting of Wagner's operas. It has an all-English cast, all but one of whom were singing their roles for the first time; the exception was Norman Bailey, who had sung Hans Sachs in Germany (in German, of course). First, the bad news: Sound quality is not the best. There is some tape hiss, occasional poor balances, a good deal of stage noise (my goodness, you can really hear a lot of clumping around in the last act entrance of the apprentices!), and somewhat dodgy stereo separation. Early on Norman Bailey's voice is rather woolly, although it improves and his vocal acting is marvelous. Margaret Curphey's Eva can turn acidulous, but she is terrific in the last act Quintet. There are some cuts -- primarily a verse from David's first act catalog of tones and from Beckmesser's second act song. The orchestral playing is not always as suave as one might hope. And, of course, there will be those who will be put off by this quintessentially German opera being sung in English. And indeed the translation, by Frederick Jameson (with some changes by Norman Feasey and Gordon Kember) has a few thee's and thou's that make it sound a bit old-fashioned. Still it is an effective translation and it sings well. Any negatives are outweighed by the good things in the recording. Bailey's Sachs is effective -- and he has the best diction of anyone in the cast; he is human, affecting, suitably humorous, gruff, tender or serious as needed. The David of Gregory Dempsey is one the best I've ever heard. Derek Hammond-Stroud plays Beckmesser as a bit of a caricature, but he sings the music rather than sketching it as many Beckmessers do. Alberto Remedios is one of the best Walthers on record. His tone is meltingly lyrical and he is actually able to sing softly when required, unlike some. He is ardent, heroic, and naïve in turn. His Prize Song is magical, aided significantly by Goodall's rapturously paced conducting. Noel Mangin's Pogner is excellent in his long aria. The rest of the mastersingers are at least adequate or, as in the case of David Bowman as Kothner, much better. Ann Robson is a younger-sounding Magdalene and she sings well. Stafford Dean, then quite young, is a marvelous Nightwatchman. The chorus is sterling from their very first notes at the end of the overture to the paean to Sachs that closes the opera. The real hero of this performance is Goodall. This is a leisurely-paced 'Mastersingers' but there is never a lull or longueur. Rhythms are well-sprung and the quieter or more lyrical moments are breathtaking, as in the Act III prelude and the last act Quintet. He can build up real excitement, too, as in the overture and the third act entrance of the apprentices and mastersingers, not to speak of the riot that ends Act II. The boxed 4CD set is being offered for the price of 3CDs and it includes a complete libretto. This will probably not be anyone's only 'Meistersinger', but it certainly belongs on the shelves of those who love this opera and have other recordings of it. Scott Morrison

The holy grail of opera recordings (2008-07-04)

The previous review sums it all up. The conducting, playing and singing is sublime. The recording/ remastering quality for a radio broadcast is brilliant.I played all 4 cds in one sitting the day I bought it.The only slight negative is the singing in an english translation it does take a bit getting use to (the composer probably would turn in his grave)If you want to have only one recording of this great masterwork it is well worth considering

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