page_title: Der Rosenkavalier (Edo de Waart recording)
section_title: Critical reception
hierarchical_section_title: Der Rosenkavalier (Edo de Waart recording) / Critical reception
caption_attribution_description: English: Postcard ~1910 Русский: Рихард Штраус, сорокалетний - редкая почтовая карточка ~ 1910 год Українська: Ріхард Штраус, у віці 40 років, поштова картка, 1910 р.
context_page_description: Der Rosenkavalier is a 206-minute studio album of Richard Strauss's opera, performed by a cast led by Jules Bastin, José Carreras, Derek Hammond-Stroud, Evelyn Lear, Frederica von Stade, and Ruth Welting with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra under the direction of Edo de Waart. It was released in 1977.
context_section_description: William Mann reviewed the album on LP in Gramophone in August 1977, comparing it with rival versions conducted by Herbert von Karajan and Georg Solti. Collectors might be lured to the new recording, he thought, by Frederica von Stade's Octavian, "a lovely reading by a favourite young mezzo". Musically, she sang with a tone that was ample, even and focused, and was as meticulous in her ensemble work as a violist in a great string quartet. Dramatically, she was equally effective in every chapter of Octavian's story - her outburst of anger with the Marschallin was "explosive", her banter with Sophie "perfectly delightful", her feigned inebriation as Mariandel "lovely to hear as well as comic". As Octavian's mistress, Evelyn Lear had "a timbre like old gold, a tenderness and teasing humour, many individual inflexions that recall no other Marschallin". Her singing fell short of technical perfection, but her acting was "attractive and skilful" and all her most important passages were executed "beautifully". Ruth Welting was guilty of a few vocal lapses too, perpetrating the occasional "flutter" above the stave, but her Sophie managed to be self-assertive while remaining "sweetly girlish". Jules Bastin endowed Ochs with a voice that was generous and equal to all Strauss's onerous demands. He deserved praise for his "attack and savory resonance, his smooth cantabile and his ripe enunciation of the text", though Solti's Manfred Jungwirth was both more accurate and funnier in his handling of Ochs's peasant idiolect. Derek Hammond-Stroud was a good Faninal overall, even if he sounded too young to be Welting's father and botched one note at his first appearance. José Carreras's Italian Singer was "too noisy". The many minor roles were all performed competently by a legion of Netherlanders. De Waart's Dutch orchestra, likewise, was unequivocally good. Its woodwinds were "crisp and savory", its brass "unusually firm and together and plump", its strings "active" and "stylish". De Waart sometimes set a pace that was too slow - in Ochs's climactic routing or in the duet "Mit Ihren Augen voll von Tränen", for instance - but his preludes were incandescent and his tempi in general "suitable and spirited". "The swagger of Ochs's entry in the second act [and] the elegance of the strings in the Letter Scene" were particularly worthy of note. Philips's production team had chosen to balance singers and instrumentalists without favouring either over the other, and had resisted the temptation to deploy "sound-effects or 'rhubarb' noises". In sum, whether the new album was preferable to its competitors was a matter of personal taste. Karajan's slightly abridged version was "enchanting" and "sparkling"; Solti's, complete, offered "unceasing brilliance" and Régine Crespin's Marschallin; de Waart's, also complete, was "less vivacious" than its predecessors but had von Stade's Octavian and the "confidence and style and operatic personality" that came from its theatrical origins.
   
  George Jellinek reviewed the album on LP in Stereo Review in October 1977. Pre-eminent among its singers was Frederica von Stade, he wrote, "an Octavian credible in all the guises of her mercurial role, who sings bewitchingly and whose warm, creamy tone soars above the staff with radiant ease". Evelyn Lear's resigned-sounding Marschallin was not as compellingly acted as would have been ideal, but was sung "exquisitely" with "many lovely phrases". Ruth Welting's Sophie was technically impeccable and vividly characterized though somewhat cool and thin of tone. As Ochs, Jules Bastin made up for his "limitations in range and resonance" by singing with a legato stylishness and by entirely submerging his Belgian identity into that of the Viennese baron. José Carreras was "refulgent" as the Italian tenor, if manifestly challenged by Strauss's climactic high C-flat. Derek Hammond-Stroud and the secondary cast were all at least satisfactory. Conducting, Edo de Waart brought "great affection to this music, along with a light touch, a great deal of tenderness, and, on the whole, just te
caption: Richard Strauss photographed in 1910, one year before Der Rosenkavalier was first performed
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