Richard Strauss (1864-1949)
Vier letzte Lieder TrV 296
Capriccio: Final Scene TrV 279
Rachel Willis-Sørensen (soprano)
Sebastian Pilgrim (bass)
Gewandhausorchester Leipzig/Andris Nelsons
rec. 2021, Gewandhaus, Leipzig, Germany
German texts & English translations included
Sony Classical 19439921722 [45]

You might almost regard this disc as an addendum, albeit on another label, to the big collection of Strauss orchestral works that Andris Nelsons recorded with the Boston Symphony and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig (review). However, the purpose of this release is to showcase the American soprano, Rachel Willis-Sørensen. I don’t think I’ve encountered her before, but I see she impressed one of my Seen and Heard colleagues in Strauss’s Feuersnot in Dresden back in 2014 (review). I learned from the booklet that among her other Straussian achievements she has sung the Marschallin; indeed, it was Andris Nelsons who conducted when she made her debut in that role at the Royal Opera House.

From the outset of ‘Frühling’, the first of the Four Last Songs, I noted the rich warmth of her voice; the sound is certainly opulent, though her vibrato is on the generous side and that tends to cloud the words. Doubts began to set in during ‘September’; the opulent approach seemed to me to be rather unvarying. That said, the last two lines (‘Langsam tut er die müdgeword’nen Augen zu’) are beautifully delivered. Here and elsewhere, Nelsons and the orchestra support their soloist gorgeously and the golden horn solo in the postlude to ‘September’ ravishes the ear.  In the third song, ‘Beim Schlafengehen’, I feel once again that Willis-Sørensen doesn’t make enough of the text.  At the end of the second stanza, at the words ‘wollen sich in Schlummer senken’, should there not be a sense of the voice sinking down (as the text indicates) in preparation for the wonderful violin solo? I don’t really get that in this performance. Willis-Sørensen’s delivery of the final stanza is impassioned. The performance of ‘Im Abendrot’ is a good one. Nelsons and the Gewandhaus orchestra impart a golden glow to the opening and when Willis-Sørensen begins to sing she does so expressively. In the dying phrases of the solo part, she controls her voice expertly; then the orchestra takes over for a gentle, beautiful traversal of the postlude.  

I admired some aspects of Rachel Willis-Sørensen’s performance – and the orchestral playing is superb throughout – but I was left with a feeling of wanting more. Completely at random, I took down from amongst the umpteen recordings of these songs on my shelves the fairly recent version sung by Lisa Davidsen (review) and Dame Kiri Te Kanawa’s second recording (from 1990) with Sir Georg Solti – in passing, I note that Ralph Moore said in his survey of recordings of these songs that he preferred Dame Kiri’s earlier version from 1979. It didn’t take me long to find in both of these versions – albeit in different ways – things that are missing from the Willis-Sørensen recording. Davidsen’s voice is more focused – the fact that her vibrato is less obvious helps in this regard – and her tone is much more varied, as is her expressive range. She also makes more of the text, I believe; for example in ‘September’. It’s also noticeable that in the next song Davidsen is one of those sopranos who is able to take that glorious phrase ‘Und die Seele unbewacht’ in a single breath. Te Kanawa, too, is more attentive to the words and their meaning and the creamy sound of her voice is a pleasure in itself. Unsurprisingly, without harrying the music, Solti brings more urgency to the conducting than Nelsons does – though I hasten to say that I like Nelsons’ way with the score. 

I was pleasantly surprised, then, to find that Rachel Willis-Sørensen is, to my taste, much more successful in the Closing Scene from Capriccio. I infer from the booklet that she has not yet sung the role of the Countess Madeleine on stage, but she has performed this scene in concert and throughout this performance I thought that she was properly ‘in character’. She’s suitably lively in her exchanges with the Major Domo. Then, in the following episode, where she reads Olivier’s sonnet, she invests words and music with a greater range of expression and tonal variety than I experienced in the Four Last Songs. Thereafter, she conveys well her inner turmoil as she tries to arrive at a preference for one of her suitors. I enjoyed this part of the programme and my enjoyment was enhanced by the lustrous contribution of the Leipzig orchestra under Nelsons’ assured direction. Out of interest, I dug out Renée Fleming’s 1998 Decca disc ‘Strauss Heroines’ on which she sings this scene, amongst other things. Fleming’s voice is sumptuous but her vibrato is less obvious than is the case with Willis-Sørensen. As a result, the care that Fleming takes over the text is even more apparent than I found with her fellow American, though I hasten to say again that Willis-Sørensen’s performance is a fine one. Fleming’s conductor is Christoph Eschenbach; he’s rather expansive in his approach and I prefer Nelson’s more incisive conducting. I also have a definite preference for Walter Berry as Fleming’s Major Domo; Sebastian Pilgrim is a bit too ponderous in his exchanges with Rachel Willis-Sørensen.

So, this disc is a case of the proverbial ‘game of two halves’. In his useful booklet essay, Roger Pines says “Singers excelling as Madeleine also generally do so in the Vier letzte Lieder”. I’m not sure that this disc proves that point, though appreciation of the human voice is notoriously subjective and other listeners may find much more in the performance of the songs.  I enjoyed the performance of the Capriccio extract but I’m afraid that Rachel Willis-Sørensen’s account of the Four Last Songs is not one that makes it into the pantheon alongside previous distinguished versions, such as the two already referenced and those by the likes of Lisa Della Casa, Soile Isokoski, Sena Jurinac or the adorable Lucia Popp. In both items, the playing of the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig is top-drawer and Andris Nelsons is a fine accompanist.

The recorded sound is good, as is the documentation albeit the booklet is one of those cursed by miniscule font size. The playing time is decidedly ungenerous; there would have been ample room for, say, a selection of orchestral songs.

John Quinn

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