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VIENNESE OPERETTA GEMS (1927-1949) |
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Composer: |
Emmerich Kalman, Robert Stolz, Richard Heuberger, Franz Lehar, Karl Millocker, Carl Zeller, Carl Michael Ziehrer, Franz von Suppe, Johann Strauss II, Nico Dostal |
Artist: |
Jussi Bjorling, John Dickie, Gabriele Fontana, Ingrid Kertesi, Lotte Lehmann, Andrea Martin, Lauritz Melchior, Jarmila Novotna, Helge Rosvaenge, Marcel Wittrisch, Richard Tauber, Elisabeth Rethberg, Elisabeth Schumann, Erna Berger, Karita Mattila, Julius Patzak, Hilde Gueden, Charles Kullman, Zsuzsa Csonka, Janos Berkes, Rohangiz Yachmi, Josef Hopferwieser, Brigitte Karwautz, Alfred Werner, Hjordis Schymberg, Erich Majkut, Erich Kunz, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Dusolina Giannini, Elsa Kochhann, Walther Ludwig, Lillie Claus, Franz Volker, Gitta Alpar, Herbert Ernst Groh, Joseph Schmidt, Anni Frind, Ana Maria Martinez, Nicolai Gedda, Carlotta Vanconti, Vera Schwarz, Grete Merrem-Nikisch, Karin Branzell, Waldemar Stagemann, Hermann Prey, Lucia Popp, Rudolf Christ, Emmy Loose, Anton Niessner, Joseph Schmidinger, Otakar Kraus, Ester Rethy, Leonardo Aramesco, Rupert Glawitsch, Lina Dachary, Alain Vanzo, Anita Ammersfeld, Aime Doniat, Rita Streich, Karl Donch, Helmut Krebs, Hanns Lange, Franz Boheim, Luise Martini, Maria Ivogun, Waldemar Staegemann, Michael Suttner, Erika Koth, Klaus Florian Vogt, Gertrud Burgsthaler-Schuster, Karel Stepanek, Lea Seidl, Gyula Csonka, Monica Sinclair, Jorg Schneider, Peter Anders, Daniel Behle, Kristiane Kaiser, Willy Ferenz, Erich Paulik, Barbara Fleckenstein, Andreas Gotz, Sylvia Schwartz, Simona Bruninghaus, Stefanie Ruckel, Atzuko Suzuki, Philipp Borner, Marian Kindermann, Robert Andrej Augustin, Georg Liener, Valentin Radutiu, Nata Tuscher, Stefanie C. Braun |
Conductor: |
Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Franz Lehar, Lawrence Collingwood, Ulf Schirmer, Herbert von Karajan, Laszlo Kovacs, Adolphe Sibert, Steven Mercurio, Anton Paulik, Alfred Walter, Walter Goehr, Herman Weigert, Frieder Weissmann, Ernst Hauke, Nils Grevillius, Johannes Wildner, Hansgeorg Otto, Karl Alwin, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Otto Ackermann, Leo Blech, Walter Schultze, Georgie Stoll, Werner Schmidt-Boelcke, Studio conductor, Paul Burkhard, Andreas Kowalewitz |
Choir: |
Berlin State Opera Chorus, Bratislava City Chorus, ORTF Lyric Chorus, Philharmonia Chorus, Bayer Radio Chorus |
Orchestra: |
Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, MGM Studio Orchestra, Vienna State Opera Orchestra, Munich Symphony Orchestra, Munich Radio Orchestra, Slovak State Philharmonic Orchestra, Kosice, Hungarian Operetta Orchestra, Prague Philharmonia, ORTF Lyric Orchestra, South West German Radio Symphony Orchestra, Nils Grevillius Orchestra, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Philharmonia Orchestra, Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra, Berlin State Opera Orchestra, Berlin Deutsche Opera Orchestra, Studio orchestra, Salonorchester Alt Wien |
Lyricist: |
Ernst Marischka, Julius Brammer, Richard Genee, Ludwig Herzer, Fritz Lohner-Beda, Leo Stein, Paul Knepler, Alfred Maria Willner, Victor Leon, Alfred Grunwald, Bela Jenbach, Robert Bodanzky, Ignaz Schnitzer, F. Zell, Carl Haffner, Moritz West, Leopold Krenn, Heinrich von Waldberg, Carl Lindau, L. Held |
Label: |
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Catalogue No.: |
8.110292 |
Format: |
CD |
Barcode: |
0636943129227 |
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VIENNESE OPERETTA GEMS
Original Recordings 1927-1949
Mythical Vienna and operetta have long been synonyms and our
brief survey of the Viennese Operette therefore appropriately begins with
well-known samples from the landmarks of the Viennese ‘Waltz King’ Johann
Strauss II (1825-1899). Strauss was already a fęted exponent of Viennese dance
music before he turned to operetta, with Indigo, in 1871. He was born, spent
most of his days and died in Vienna where, with the exception of Eine Nacht in
Venedig (Berlin, 1883), the premičres of his operettas all took place. His
masterpieces and the quintessence of the Viennese genre, Die Fledermaus and Der
Zigeunerbaron date from 1874 and 1885 respectively. From the former comes Rosalinde and Alfred’s Act 1 ‘Drinking
Duet’ (featuring Frankfurt-born tenor Franz Völker (1899-1965), an intermittent
star of the Vienna State from 1931 to 1950) and the maid Adele’s coquettish Act
2 Mein Herr Marquis (sung here in the true soubrette style by Merseburg-born
soprano Elisabeth Schumann, 1888-1952); from the latter, Barinkay’s swaying
opening waltz, crowned with a telling top C from the still underestimated
American tenor Charles Kullman (1903-1983), an erstwhile star of the Berlin
State, is followed by the Act 2 duet with Saffi and some caressing mezza-voce
for which the Swedish Jussi Björling (1911-1960) won world renown.
In
parallel with, and often rivalling, the younger Strauss, a constellation of
other composers active in Austria and Germany continued the trends originally
set by Offenbach, introducing ad hoc in response to popular demand more of the
traditional ‘Viennese’ elements of comedy and Singspiel. Among the most
prolific of these was Franz von Suppé (really Francesco Ezecchiele Ermenegildo,
Cavaliere Suppé-Demelli, 1819-1895). An aristocrat-turned-conductor of Dalmatian
origin, Suppé penned more than 200 works for the stage, including thirty-odd
light operas and operettas of which several enjoyed high popularity in Vienna.
His 1860 work Das Pensionat has, rightly or wrongly, been pinpointed as ‘the
first Viennese operetta’, but his most enduring success was Boccaccio (1879),
from which comes the superbly lyrical Hab’ ich nur deine Liebe, seamlessly
delivered by Vienna-born star tenor Julius Patzak (1898-1974).
Prominent
in the next generation, and all Austrians, were Karl Zeller (1842-1898; born at
St. Peter-in-der-Au), Richard Franz Joseph Heuberger (1850-1914), Karl
Millöcker (1842-1899) and Karl Michael Ziehrer (1843-1922), the last two both
natives of Vienna. An official in the Austrian Ministry of Education, music for
Zeller was only a hobby until his greatest success, Der Vogelhändler, was given
in Vienna in 1891. Initially a civil engineer, Heuberger turned to music in
1876 following his appointment as chorus-master of the Vienna Gesangverein. A
noted music critic, editor and sometime professor of music at the Vienna
Conservatoire, his sole operetta success, Der Opernball, was first heard at the
Theater an der Wien, in 1898. The son of a Viennese jeweller, Millöcker was
variously a flautist and conductor before being appointed, at Suppé’s
recommendation, musical director of the Theater an der Wien, a post he held
from 1869 to 1883. In its superbly integrated blend of burlesque and romance,
his greatest success Der Bettelstudent (1882) has been rated the Viennese
counterpart to Lecocq’s French opérette masterpiece La fille de Madame Angot.
Self-taught, from 1863 Ziehrer toured Austria and Germany with his own dance
orchestra before promoting popular concerts in Vienna. The composer of about
600 marches and waltzes he also wrote operettas, his most celebrated Die
Landstreicher (1899).
By
the second decade of the last century Viennese operetta was dominated by two
figures, both Hungarians by birth and ancestry: Franz (originally Ferencz)
Lehár (1870-1948) and Emmerich (originally Imre) Kálmán (1882-1953). A native
of Siófok, Kálmán studied with organist-composer Hans Koessler in Budapest and
settled in Vienna where he wrote a succession of tuneful Viennese-style
operettas, beginning with Ein Herbstmanöver, first given in Budapest in 1908.
While his subsequent Vienna successes include Die Csardasfürstin (1915), Die
Bajadere (1921 – in the Act 1 finale Hungarian soprano Gitta Alpár (1903-1991)
is joined by Swiss tenor star of German radio Herbert Ernst Groh, 1905-1982)
and Die Zircusprinzessin (1926), his finest and most often performed work,
Gräfin Mariza (Vienna, 1924) contains several rousing tunes, not least Komm’,
Zígan’ (a fine vehicle for Belgian-born star of the Berlin State Opera, Marcel
Wittrisch, 1903-1955).
Born
in Komórom, like his father before him Lehár served for a time as a military
band-master. Earlier, he had studied violin, piano and composition at the
Prague Conservatory and harmony and counterpoint, privately, under Zdenko
Fibich and Antonin Dvorˇák. His first opera, a flop, was produced at
Leipzig in 1896 but by 1903, when he took up the musical directorship of the
Theater an der Wien, he was already famed for his popular waltz ‘Gold und
Silber’ Op.75. In 1905, after five moderate operetta successes, his fortuitous
assumption of a libretto rejected by Heuberger altered the dir-ection of
Viennese operetta. Die lustige Witwe first ran at the Theater an der Wien in
1905 for a record-breaking 483 performances. From 1907 it ran in London for 778
and on Broadway for 416 and by 1909, when it hit Paris, it had sparked new
crazes in women’s fashion and altered global trends in operetta writing.
Lehár’s
subsequent hits included Der Graf von Luxemburg (1909) and Ziguenerliebe (1910
– its tenor solo is sung here with panache by the Romanian Joseph Schmidt,
1904-1942), in addition to several vehicles for Linz-born tenor Richard Tauber
(1891-1948), including Paganini (1924 – from this the solo Liebe, du Himmel, is
sung by the Viennese star of more recent revivals, Hilde Gueden, 1917-1988),
Friederike (1928), Schön ist die Welt (1930 – in this Tauber’s partner was
Gitta Alpár and Giuditta (in this, Lehár’s swansong attempt at opera-writing
staged at the Vienna State Opera in 1934, Tauber shared the honours with
Czechoslovakian opera soprano, and subse-quent singing film-actress Jarmila
Novotná (1907-1994).
During
the 1930s, with works by Robert Stolz (1880-1975), Nico Dostal (1895-1981) and
others, Viennese operetta made its first entrées into the new medium of the
film musical. Scion of a musical family, Dostal first worked in Berlin as a
conductor and arranger. He also wrote for stage and film before his first
operetta success, Clivia, was premičred in Berlin, in 1933, starring his
wife-to-be, the Viennese coloratura Lillie Claus. Among his subsequent
successes were Die Vielgeliebte (1935) and Monika (1937 – filmed in 1942 as
Heimatland, its hit-song is sung here by the Bohemia-born star of the Berlin
operetta stage Anni Frind, 1900-1987). Although only one of his stage works
(Liebesbriefe, 1955) was premičred in Vienna, all are moulded in the Viennese
tradition. His last operetta, Rhapsodie der Liebe, was first heard in Nuremberg
in 1963.
A
pupil of Robert Fuchs in Vienna and Humperdinck in Berlin, Graz-born Robert
Stolz started his musical career as a répétiteur. A fine pianist, he won early
note as a conductor (including the premičre of Lehár’s Die lustige Witwe). For
twelve years musical director at the Theater an der Wien, by 1940 he had
emigrated to the USA, returning to Vienna only in 1946. His work in the genre,
however, endured until 1969, long after the heyday of the Operette was past.
Marked by a characteristic penchant for the nostalgic and languid, Stolz’s
anachronistic but highly popular works in the Viennese idiom, which were
variously mounted in Budapest, Berlin, Vienna, London and Zurich, include Der
Tanz ins Glück (1920), Venus in Seide (1932) and Zwei Herzen im Dreivierteltakt
(1933). Outstanding among his many film-musical successes were Das Lied ist aus
(1930), Liebeskommando (1931) – both featuring Wittrisch – and Zauber der
Bohčme, a 1937 re-vamp of Puccini’s opera with extra material by Stolz
(including Ich liebe dich) originally conceived for Polish opera and film tenor
Jan Kiepura (1902-1966) and his Hungarian soprano spouse, Marta Eggerth (born
1912).
Peter Dempsey, 2003
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