Richard Wagner (1813-1883)
Siegfried
Siegfried: Wolfgang Windgassen (tenor)
Brünnhilde: Martha Mödl (soprano)
Der Wanderer: Hans Hotter (bass-baritone)
Mime: Paul Kuen (tenor)
Alberich: Gustav Neidlinger (bass-baritone)
Fafner: Josef Greindl (bass)
Ilse Hollweg (Waldvogel) 
Erda: Maria von Ilosvay (contralto)
Waldvogel: Ilse Hollweg (soprano)
Orchester der Bayreuther Festspiele/Joseph Keilberth
rec. live, 12 August 1955, Bayreuther Festspiele, Germany. ADD mono
Profil Edition PH23003 [3 CDs: 231]

In 2006/07, the Testament label issued the Keilberth Ring from July 1955, the very first stereo recording of Wagner’s cycle, with Hans Hotter, Astrid Varnay, Wolfgang Windgassen, Ramon Vinay, Josef Greindl and Paul Kuën. I favourably reviewed that cycle in my survey of the Ring and indeed recommended it alongside Böhm as one of the best live accounts.

Then in 2009, Testament issued Die Walküre and Götterdämmerung from the second Ring, also recorded in stereo the following month but the August Siegfried has remained unreleased until now. It has the same cast as in July, except Martha Mödl replaced Astrid Varnay. However, to my ears this is in mono, but nowhere can I find confirmation of this and it is disingenuous of Hänssler Profil not state it, thereby leaving prospective purchasers to assume that it is in stereo like the two Testament releases. It has to be said that first impressions of the sound are not promising: the usual coughing and scraping and a fuzzy, cavernous, over-reverberant acoustic. The clarity and expressivity of Paul Kuen’s diction and singing are immediate compensations but on Siegfried’s entry, my response to Wolfgang Windgassen’s Siegfried remains unchanged: within the limitations of his voice he sounds to be in good form, but he never really convinces as the naïve hero compared with, for example, Melchior’s ringing virility. Nonetheless, he has moved on in terms of rhythmic accuracy since his first assumptions of the role for Keilberth and Clemens Krauss two years earlier and merits praise for both his sensitivity and stamina in challenging passages such as the Forging Scene, even if I wish he would not resort to guttural noises for emphasis and had a bit more steel in his tone. 

Hans Hotter is in magisterial voice as the Wanderer: magnificently secure and hieratic. The rest of the cast will already be known as among the finest, if not – as with Gustav Neidlinger’s Alberich – the best exponents of their roles

Keilberth’s conducting seems less volatile than Krauss’ and his firm grip on proceedings is apparent throughout; he confers a steady grandeur upon the score which occasionally comes across as a bit stolid but that impression is deceptive because in fact he is faster overall and high points such as the climax to Act I and the final duet are suitably energised.

Given that all the singers here may be heard in other recordings from Bayreuth in that era in similar vocal estate but in better sound, the main interest for this release must focus upon Martha Mödl’s Brünnhilde. The question is, therefore, whether this four-hour mono set is worth acquiring for half an hour of her singing. She later revealed that the high tessitura of the role was uncomfortable for her and that she had to be very careful singing it. First impressions are mixed – there is the thrill of her inimitable, husky, impassioned timbre – almost animalistic in its sensuality – but also the element of scooping and easing into notes carefully. To be fair, her coeval Astrid Varnay shared something of that faut of sliding and both are such splendid artists that to cavil seems churlish. I marginally prefer Varnay’s gleaming, true dramatic soprano to Mödl’s smoky, mezzo-ish tint and singers such as she and Nilsson are fundamentally more heroic than Mödl – but Mödl brings such womanly feeling to her singing, even if she cannot belt out the top notes ending “Heil dir Sonne, heil dir Licht” with quite the same heft. You can, of course, also hear her in Siegfried for both Furtwängler and Krauss in 1953 – and both those recordings have been reprocessed into Ambient Stereo by Pristine.

Ultimately, if you are tolerant of the disappointing yet still acceptable mono sound, acquiring this issue will secure you some of the greatest Wagner singing ever heard – but because we have so many equally impressive recordings from the Bayreuth of the 50s in arguably better sound, it is not without competition.

Ralph Moore

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