Our Summer BAL 37: Strauss Four Last Songs

[Stanfordian]

I have collected a number of recordings of this excellent work.

The accounts that I play the most often are:
Anja Harteros and Mariss Jansons
Michaela Kaune and Eiji Oue

I also admire:
Jessye Norman and Kurt Masur
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and George Szell
Renée Fleming and Christian Thielemann
Lucia Popp and Klaus Tennstedt
Kirsten Flagstad and Wilhelm Furtwangler
Karita Mattila and Cladio Abbado

Disappointed with:
Soile Isokoski and Marek Janowsk
Anna Netrebko and Daniel Barenboim

[gurnemanz]

I have collected a number of recordings of this excellent work.

The accounts that I play the most often are:
Anja Harteros and Mariss Jansons
Michaela Kaune and Eiji Oue



I also admire:
Jessye Norman and Kurt Masur
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and George Szell
Renée Fleming and Christian Thielemann
Lucia Popp and Klaus Tennstedt
Kirsten Flagstad and Wilhelm Furtwangler

Disappointed with:
Soile Isokoski and Marek Janowsk
Anna Netrebko and Daniel Barenboim

Just booked for Fleming at Oxford next year. Not many tickets left.

I also got the excellent Elisabeth Meyer-Topsøe when it was recommended by Cali above (and much admired by Alan Blyth in Gramophone)

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

The 4 Last Songs recording isn't available on youTube, but Forumistas wishing to sample Elisabeth Meyer-Topsøe's artistry in Strauss have these tantalizing examples:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aofdJ-ewpII

... which lead me to wonder what an injustice it is that this artistry isn't more widely recognized (I'd never heard of her before Cali's post) and better represented on record.

[Stanfordian]

Just booked for Fleming at Oxford next year. Not many tickets left.

I also got the excellent Elisabeth Meyer-Topsøe when it was recommended by Cali above (and much admired by Alan Blyth in Gramophone)

Hiya gurnemanz,

Thanks for the tip. I don't know the Elisabeth Meyer-Topsøe. I would have wondered how this orchestra coped with Strauss's music.

[Lordgeous]

I hope the winner of Cardiff Singer of the World (name escapes me) might record it one day. Acknowleging that one might want a more 'mature' singer with more 'life experience', her glorious voice and soaring high notes would surely suit this wonderful music?

[Padraig]

Lovely songs - I've loved them forever. I have to say they improve with age - my age.

[Barbirollians]

I was just looking at Janowitz's wikipedia page - having gone there after rushing to listen to her Porgi Amor after hearing the very odd performance in the Currentzis version . It suggests that in an article for Vanity Fair which is no longer available it seems online that no less than David Bowie described her Four Last Songs as one of his 25 records of all time !

It has been republished by VF

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2016/04/david-bowie-favorite-albums

[Barbirollians]

I have managed to get a copy of the Steber/Levine version on VAI . Coupled with some rather dimly recorded extracts from Die Frau ohne Schatten . It is very good quite dramatic( rather than ethereal as in Janowitz) but very well sung and accompanied .