BaL 9.10.21 - Lehar: The Merry Widow

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I have Von Matačić and Gardiner, and both are superb. Schwarzkopf may not be my favourite soprano, but she certainly does the honours here.

[BBMmk2]

Seems to me a new recording is needed.

[gurnemanz]

Seems to me a new recording is needed.

There is one: Marlis Petersen as Hanna Glawari with Oper Frankfurt under Joana Mallwitz.

It's been well been well received - Presto

And in an Amazon review, apparently from one of our members.

[BBMmk2]

There is one: Marlis Petersen as Hanna Glawari with Oper Frankfurt under Joana Mallwitz.

It's been well been well received - Presto

And in an Amazon review, apparently from one of our members.

Ah yes! Thanks to Member Master Jacques!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

The Merry Widow doesn’t have an overture but, as with G & S operettas others have filled the perceived void. When I conducted this work in its “amateur” version, there was a rather good overture included. Am I right in thinking Karajan has one on his DG recording?

[makropulos]

The Merry Widow doesn’t have an overture but, as with G & S operettas others have filled the perceived void. When I conducted this work in its “amateur” version, there was a rather good overture included. Am I right in thinking Karajan has one on his DG recording?

It's a very interesting business, though I doubt if I'll have time to say much about it on Saturday. The 'overture' is a bit of a bugbear of mine with The Merry Widow. Karajan doesn't add one –he starts at the start, as it were –but Robert Stolz's Decca recording does (one of Stolz's own devising). There was also Lehár's ownoverture written for the 400th performance (but very rarely used again in the theatre) and played by the Vienna Phil at Lehár's 70th birthday concert. It's a nice concert piece, but I think it really slows things up in the theatre (and on records). If it's Lehár's own, then I agree it is rather good –but also that it doesn't really belong to the opera.

[Barbirollians]

It's a very interesting business, though I doubt if I'll have time to say much about it on Saturday. The 'overture' is a bit of a bugbear of mine with The Merry Widow. Karajan doesn't add one –he starts at the start, as it were –but Robert Stolz's Decca recording does (one of Stolz's own devising). There was also Lehár's ownoverture written for the 400th performance (but very rarely used again in the theatre) and played by the Vienna Phil at Lehár's 70th birthday concert. It's a nice concert piece, but I think it really slows things up in the theatre (and on records). If it's Lehár's own, then I agree it is rather good –but also that it doesn't really belong to the opera.

Looking forward to this .There was an interesting Gramophone article about Viennese operetta in which the Australian director Barrie Kosky slagged off all the late 1940s early 1950s recordings on EMI - entirely without justification as far as I could tell.

[CallMePaul]

Apart from hearing the Wiljalied on the radio, my first acquaintance with this work was in 1995, when my then girlfriend sang in the chorus of an amateur production in Sale. The Hanna in this production was particularly good. Not long afterwards I bought the JEG/VPO recording, although it is not a work I listen to often.
By the way, am I correct in saying that every staged production, professional or amateur, in this country has used an English translation and we await a staged production in the original language (I think there has been at least one concert performance in German)? If so, is this because Glocken Verlag and the Lehar estate insist on the work being performed in the vernacular? I believe that the work is now out of copyright so perhaps it is time to put this right?

[Ein Heldenleben]

I’d forgotten what a beautiful voice Elizabeth Harwood had - even though I saw her plenty of times at Covent Garden. Those top notes….
Didn’t one wag describe the Karajan Recording as “ the Merry Widow to the tunes of the Brahms German Requiem .”? It sounded pretty fine to me …

[Ein Heldenleben]

I love the mandolin in the Wilja Lied . Up there with Das Lied Von der Erde and Deh Vieni mandolin stakes? Good to hear it so prominent in the Matajic / Schwarzkopf recording.
Here I take issue with the legendary direction Eric Morecambe gives to Andre Previn re the Grieg Piano Concerto “ when it comes to the big tune easy on the banjos - not too much of that oom Shang a Shang “

So Karajan is “ too slow “ …the wag was right then?

[Darloboy]

Although operetta is not really my 'thing' albeit, there are some fine tunes and songs in many of them! I will listen with interest - principally because of the reviewer. Always excellent for my money. One thing for sure is that I would NEVER contemplate giving house space to Schwarzkopf. That voice...


[/B]

You won't be pleased with this week's winner...

[Ein Heldenleben]

You won't be pleased with this week's winner...

Matajic winning this was about as predictable as the current supply chain crisis …but considerably more welcome.

[LHC]

Matajic winning this was about as predictable as the current supply chain crisis …but considerably more welcome.

The two alternatives for the Schwarzkopfphobic amongst us both sounded very good to me. The Wallberg recording has a fine cast and the excerpts played were lovely.

[Ein Heldenleben]

The two alternatives for the Schwarzkopfphobic amongst us both sounded very good to me. The Wallberg recording has a fine cast and the excerpts played were lovely.

Yes to be honest there were no excerpts I heard that I couldn’t live with . Even the rejected Karajan..

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

A worthy winner.

So what’s wrong with Schwarzkopf’s voice? As with all good singers, it’s a Marmite thing. But I suspect it’s her vowel sounds that sometimes puts people off. Some of them sound decidedly ugly, even though the control of vocal tone is exemplary.
Just my thoughts, of course.