From: conrad@brahms.udel.edu (Jon Conrad)
Subject: Re: The best Tristan und Isolde
Organization: University of Delaware
Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1992 16:29:57 GMT

In article <BxnvyM.JG6@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu> smitra@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (Sami Mitra) writes:

>In article <BxMGF1.F59@news.udel.edu> conrad@brahms.udel.edu (Jon Conrad) writes:

>>In article <BxMBEp.6pM@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu> smitra@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (Sami Mitra) writes:

>>>	Alas, if only the sound were better on the 36/37 Beecham/Reiner
>>>recording. ...

>>Try to get a Flagstad/Melchior TRISTAN if you can; THAT's how the music
>>should be sung.  ...

>This recording, which I referred to with the dual dates and composers 
>because it is one ( because of a unique botch-job my HMV) with such
>characteristics, is a Flagstad/Melchior Tristan. 

Yes, I understood this, though my rather terse response makes it sound
as if I don't.  I have to hear this HMV despite the botch-up.

By the way, Musical Newsletter (a great quarterly that came and went in
the 1970s in the space of 7 years) had a great two-part article by David
Hamilton called "Tristan in the Thirties" in which he took a close look
at all (then) surviving recordings from the time and examined what they
told us about the work, the singers, and performance practice of that
era.  He also rated the relative sound quality of each, and offered a
valuable listing of cuts and alternatives employed.  Many libraries have
this.

>This recording also has some, then standard, now terrible, cuts. What
>really bugs me is that Tristan's delirious ranting has a big cut.
>Melchior was really in the full swing of things that night, as always.
>What a pity!

What a shame they weren't recording complete Bayreuth performances back
then!  Bayreuth, with its strict "no cutting the Master" policy, was
almost surely the only place where Melchior sang Tristan uncut.  And he
grew increasingly inclined to lighten his labors as the years went on.

[I present my dream TRISTAN cast of today, including Nadine Secunde.]

>Jon, where can I hear Secunde? I have heard wonderful things about her.
>I wish someone would make a recording with her, and get on with it. Or 
>maybe a Met broadcast. 

She has made 2 commercial recordings so far:  Chrysothemis on the Ozawa
ELEKTRA is a role she does often, but I feel it's too high to show her
to best effect.  She is quite spectacular on the DG FIERY ANGEL, and I
recommend this recording for showing her vocal beauty as well as her
musicianship and dramatic insight.  The Barenboim/Kupfer RING from
Bayreuth will soon appear on videodisc and CD; she sings Sieglinde.  She
told me a couple weeks ago (we're old Indiana classmates) that she was
not caught at her very best as she hadn't quite shaken a cold, but the
video will still show some of what she's about.

She was to have made her met debut in TANNHAEUSER a year ago, but had to
cancel due to the arrival of her second child.  And now that she has 2
small children, she and her husband want to stay close to home in
Wiesbaden for a few years most of the time.  However I can report that
in the 1995 Seattle RING, she has committed to sing not only Sieglinde
but the SIEGFRIED Bruennhilde.  How can I wait??  I am going to try to
get to Wiesbaden for that '94 Isolde.  I think that music will fit her
voice like a glove.  (She's had a healthy fear of the heavy roles for
years and has been postponing them; but it's getting to be time for
them, you can't postpone them forever if that's what your voice was born
to do.)

>I agree with all your choices, but would like to 
>add two more names to the wish-list. Though, Siegfried Jerusalem says he
>doesn't really want to I wish he would sing Tristan before his voice goes
>the way of Peter Hofmann. He has been the most impressive Siegfried and
>Parsifal of late.

He IS doing Tristan, at the new Bayreuth production next year!  He and
Waltraud Meier.  I dunno....  I saw his first Siegfried (just the
younger one, in '88) at Bayreuth, and was mightily surprised and
impressed.  But I think he'd have been wiser to keep it in the friendly
spaces of the Festspielhaus.  I don't hear quite the same distinction in
his Met performances of the role, or in his recording with Haitink.
Still, with the right preparation, he could be an interesting Tristan.

> 	And how about Jessye Norman? She was rather impressive in a 
>live performance of the Liebestod with Mehta a couple of years ago in
>a NYPO concert. And she does have the voice.

She's decided against it, as I said.  In some respects she does have the
voice.  I find something lacking in her Wagnerian singing, though,
that's hard to pin down.  It's like she's this awesome "voice machine"
rather than a human participant in the drama.  I miss the variety and
nuance I've come to expect; the total lack of portamento is one aspect
of this.  I don't know; maybe I'm being hypercritical.

Jon Alan Conrad