Richard Wagner (1813-1883)
Parsifal, Opera in 3 Acts
Parsifal: Lauritz Melchior (tenor)
Kundry: Kirsten Flagstad (soprano)
Amfortas: Friedrich Schorr (bass-baritone)
Gurnemanz: Emanuel List (bass)
Chorus and Orchestra of the Metropolitan Opera/Artur Bodanzky and Erich Leinsdorf
rec. 15 April 1938, Metropolitan Opera House, New York City
Texts and translations not provided
Marston 54008 [4 CDs: 246]

Wagner at the Met has a long and glorious history. From the very beginning, the company has hosted the greatest Wagnerian singers and conductors. A concert at the end of the first season included Winkelmann, Materna and Scaria, the first Parsifal, Kundry and Gurnemanz respectively. In 1885, the Met secured the services of Anton Seidl as conductor. Seidl it will be remembered was Wagner’s chosen apostle, appointed to go and spread the word throughout the world; he had his own lodgings in Wahnfried back in the 1870s. Lilli Lehmann, Milka Ternina, Albert Niemann, Max Alvary and Jean de Reszke were succeeded by the likes of Lillian Nordica and Olive Fremstad in the great roles of Brünnhilde, Isolde, Siegfried and Tristan. The conductors in the pit on these Wagner nights included musicians of the calibre of Gustav Mahler and Arturo Toscanini.

The Met was also the first opera house outside Bayreuth to stage Parsifal. This happened on Christmas Eve, 1903. The work was embargoed in Europe until ten years later. By this time, the Met had established certain rituals and practices for the opera, one of which was its presentation in Holy Week, and on Good Friday in particular. From 1915 this sacred music drama was almost always conducted by Artur Bodanzky, a mainstay of the German repertory who by the end of his career had given 1095 performances at the Met, a record not exceeded until 1988 by James Levine – and he really did exceed it, with over 2500 appearances.

In this release from Marston, we hear the complete broadcast of the 1938 Good Friday Parsifal. It is heard in its entirety for the first time from a hitherto little-known source. An independent New York transcription service company recorded it originally from the live radio feed on 16-inch aluminium-based lacquer-coated discs. They had two decks, so the recording is continuous with side breaks covered. Ward Marston has spent months, if not years, on these records and what we now hear often involved styli changes three times per side (a different one to produce the best sounding results at the outer and inner edges of the record and in its middle). The latest computer wizardry is also helpfully employed in reducing surface noise whilst leaving completely intact and accentuating gently the source material. The results are impressive. Yes, the primitive equipment used leaves much to be desired in the upper frequency range and there is distortion in the signal at times. There is even a portion on CD2 track 2 distorted by someone sending a morse code message on a neighbouring frequency. For the first time, however, we can at last hear an intact Parsifal sung by Melchior and Flagstad, largely free from the most disfiguring cuts and excisions in tolerable sound for the period. The two legendary singers took these roles at the Met perhaps fifteen or so times in the years 1935-41 but this was the only broadcast of the opera ever made.

After the regular 1937/38 season had ended, the company of the Metropolitan Opera toured its usual venues on the East coast and Midwest but came back to Manhattan for three performances at Eastertide. Parsifal was given on Wednesday 13^th April. Bodanzky was poorly and so at late notice the twenty-six-year-old Erich Leinsdorf stepped in for him. On Good Friday itself, Bodansky, although weak and shaky, as Milton Cross tells us during the curtain calls at the end of the second act, was determined to go on. He conducted the first act, then assented to Leinsdorf directing the second, secular act while he rested, then went on to conduct the third. The following day, most of the cast, Bodanzky included came back for Tristan und Isolde. 

For those who care about such things, I timed the three acts (103:50/59:47/67:14). Bodanzky’s edition is not Urtext; he indulges in some trimmings, but these are fewer than in some contemporary readings of the work. What I found most interesting was that in this Parsifal we experience a reading expertly measured, judiciously balanced and carefully shaped in the outer acts. This is at odds to accounts one sometimes reads of him being on the speedy side in Wagner and liberal with cuts. The prelude to Act 1 lasts 15:48, longer than Goodall’s or Knappertsbusch’s. It is a splendid opening but unfortunately, the occluded sound of the discs themselves prevents us from hearing what I believe would have been a magical effect in the house itself. As the solo trumpet supported by half of the violins give the main motif, the other half (both first and seconds) join the violas in those heavenly arpeggios. Surely such is how great cathedrals of sound are constructed by the greatest architects of musical form. Bodanzky paces the prelude expertly. The pauses and gradations of tone and dynamics are wonderful. As he moves through the act and again in the final act of the opera he draws some superb playing from the fine instrumentalists in his band. There is a pinpoint sharpness to his attack of the score and an infectious swell and surge to movement throughout that I find invigorating. I think he clearly loves Amfortas’ music as on one or two occasions I detected him lingering awhile in those parts. Perhaps like me, he was just so captivated by the majestic portrayal of the part by the great Friedrich Schorr. Bodanzky’s Karfreitagzauber is all I hoped it would be. One can tell this musician had spent his whole career with singers. Leinsdorf launches into Act 2 with fire and venom. The young conductor maintains the forward pulse throughout the span, and it is all very impressive, even though I wish he had slowed things down just a fraction for the scene between Kundry and Parsifal at the end.

For me, the greatest performance here is that of the great Danish heldentenor Lauritz Melchior. Perhaps you will forgive me if I set out his credentials for this role. Five characters shaped and moulded him into the great Wagnerian we all know and admire. His English friend Hugh Walpole, three great (and patient) musicians: Victor Beigel who had a studio in London, Franz Schalk of the Vienna State Opera and dramatic soprano turned vocal coach Anna Bahr-Mildenburg. The fifth was his great friend Siegfried Wagner. In 1924 Bayreuth was due to open for the first time since the war. Melchior was there for Siegmund and Parsifal. He in fact sang Siegmund twice in the Covent Garden season that took place in late May and early June of that year. At Wahnfried, Cosima, Wagner’s widow sent her approval down: “Mother said you are good”. Outside in the garden, Siegfried’s English-born wife entertained shady characters in uniform with strange symbols on their armbands. Melchior’s Parsifal was a triumph from the very start. As usual at Bayreuth, the opera was led by Karl Muck and he was singing with Emmy Krüger as Kundry and Richard Mayr as Gurnemanz. One may hear Melchior’s voice in the role at that very epoch, a century ago, as he recorded the two famous solos: “Amfortas! Die Wunde!” from Act 2 and “Nur eine Waffe taugt” from the end of Act 3 on acoustic Blue Parlophones the following winter.

Melchior’s Parsifal was heard at the Met from 1926. He didn’t have a monopoly on the role as it was also taken by Rudolf Laubenthal but it is a perfect fit for him. In the early days, he was usually cast opposite Gertrude Kappel or Frida Leider, but from 1935 the role of Kundry belonged to Kirsten Flagstad. The two legendary singers didn’t get along well off-stage but on it they are a partnership made in heaven. Parsifal doesn’t have a huge amount to do in Act 1. It is known that shortly after he and Gurnemanz make those transformative and transfiguring steps out of the forest into the mighty Hall of the Grail, Melchior would often slope off-stage for a beer and a chinwag with the stagehands as the Knights assembled before Titurel and Amfortas. He was a real character, but surely even he abstained that day. It was Good Friday, after all, and from the curtain timing sheet that Ward Marston helpfully rescued, it was approaching 3:00 pm.

Melchior’s steely powerful tenor with its strong resonant lower register really tells in Act 2. When he first responds to Kundry though, it is with a dreamy incomprehension: “träumend mich einst die Mutter”. He is bewildered, shaking at the sheer beauty of Kundry. Flagstad was in full Arabian garb here by the way, pinks, blues with a gossamer green flowing veil. Melchior conveys Parsifal’s overwhelmed state marvellously. As he begins to understand, we are thrust onto a rollercoaster of raw emotion: “O Tor! Blöder”; just listen to the crescendo he makes on “deiner vergessend?” After Kundry’s kiss opens his eyes completely we hear the classic scene, “Amfortas! Die Wunde!”. It is magnificent, especially the inspired second part beginning at “Es starrt der Blick”. At the end when he seizes the lance and makes the sign of the cross with it “Mit diesem Zeichen bann’ ich deinen Zauber”, one experiences the sheer thrill of hearing a truly legendary artist in one of his great roles. This must be what it felt like to have heard Caruso on this same stage, twenty years earlier.

In the final act Melchior is again peerless. His bright shining tenor is thrilling with abundant tone and stamina. His performance also inspires Emanuel List and they cast a truly marvellous spell on us in that lovely forest meadow, helped by the complementary pacing of Bodanzky back in the pit. Parsifal’s final act as the opera ends is his coming forward out of the darkness with the sacred spear. Amfortas’ wound is healed by the lance that made it, and Parsifal undertakes the office and reveals the Grail. “Nur eine Waffe taugt” has never have been better sung and hearing it in its rightful place as the culmination of Parsifal’s destiny feels very right. As I mentioned before, Melchior recorded it in 1924 and again (with the longer Act 2 scene) in nearby Philadelphia with Ormandy just two days after this performance. Those two 78s were issued over on this side of the Atlantic too as HMV DB3781/3664. I prefer this live version, however.

Kirsten Flagstad’s Kundry, although for me on a slightly lower level than Melchior’s Parsifal demands to be heard. I would sum it up as having a distinct “Sehnsucht” (yearning). As usual she is fearless in attack. She takes the high notes cleanly and hits them dead centre. Her timbre, always distinctive, is well suited to the role, and although she was nowhere near as experienced with it as Melchior was with his, she brings great individuality to it. The long scene between her and Melchior in Act 2 was recorded by Victor in November 1940. Those famous sessions resulted in the complete scene from Parsifal’s “Dies alles – hab’ ich nun geträumt?” to the end of the act. I timed the seven shellac sides conducted by Edwin McArthur at 33 minutes whilst Leinsdorf’s timing of the same scene is exactly a minute longer. Obviously, the Victors sound better but there are compensations in the staged performance.

Flagstad’s “Ich sah’ das kind” is simply beautiful. Paul Jackson in his book “Saturday Afternoons at the Old Met”, although not wholly bowled over by this Kundry, talks of her “seductive fluency of tone and line” in this scene. Her high B flats and Bs later like “clarion bells”. Her “lachte” although bang on the nail, is for me somewhat unnerving and unnatural, I must confess. Lawrence Gilman who reviewed the show for the Herald Tribune said Flagstad was transcendent. Flagstad did sing the role again after the war for Covent Garden and it was broadcast at the time by the BBC. Most of her role in this performance has survived the decades and can be sampled.

Having spent the most time on Melchior and Flagstad I must finally turn to the three other principals. As Gurnemanz, the biggest role in the opera, we hear Emanuel List who was fifty years of age at the time. A proper true and large bass voice, he was a noted Hagen (Götterdämmerung) and Osmin (Die Entführung aus dem Serail). I enjoyed his portrayal of the old knight very much indeed. He is a little husky in places (especially in those long narrations in Act 1) but he has great diction, and he paints a heartfelt, moving picture of the woes of Montsalvat, although Alexander Kipnis and Ludwig Weber would still be my picks though for best Gurnemanz of this era.

In the role of Amfortas we have the legendary Friedrich Schorr. He was just six months younger than List and on that particular afternoon he was in glorious voice. In the splendid booklet notes, Jeffery S. McMillan reminds us that Amfortas is stung as much by the pain of his wound, as the injury and shame of losing the respect of his knightly companions. Listen to CD2 track 6 (8:32) and hear his anguish at those cries of “Erbarmen!”. Elsewhere his smooth noble legato is easy to appreciate in a voice of real distinction based on secure foundations.

Arnold Gabor is impressive as Klingsor. He embraces the full compass of the role from the pain of “Ungebändigten sehnens pein” to the frenzied excitement he conjures at “Ho! Ihr wächter!”. Norman Cordon has a good afternoon too. Starting at 1pm the opera was done and dusted by 5.30pm. The intervals were only fifteen minutes in duration. As usual for the time, there was no applause after the first and third acts, only after the second. It must have been quite an experience and one I feel privileged to have heard fully for the first time thanks to these CDs.

Over twenty years ago, Guild issued a CD of Act 2 from this 1938 performance (review). Several years before that, an inferior source was used to press some LPs, and these were reissued on Myto and Walhall CDs. There is no question that the work Ward Marston has done on the restoration of this performance far eclipses those earlier releases in sound quality. Ward told me he is also very proud of the booklet and the rare beautifully reproduced photographs it contains. 

As usual with Marston, these CDs will not be around forever. Perhaps if you are reading this review in early November there might be time to put it on a little list and who knows, if you are very good, you might find it under the Christmas tree as a treasured gift from a loved one. Wagnerians with a taste for vintage singing would certainly prefer it to socks and slippers any day!

Philip Harrison

Additional cast
Klingsor: Arnold Gabor
Titurel: Norman Cordon
First Knight of the Grail: George Cehanovsky
Second Knight of the Grail: Louis D’Angelo
First Esquire: Natalie Bodanya
Second Esquire: Helen Olheim
Third Esquire: Giordano Paltrinieri
Fourth Esquire: Karl Laufkötter
Flower Maidens:
Susanne Fisher
Irra Petina
Helen Olheim
Hilda Burke
Thelma Votipka
Doris Doe

See also Ralph Moore’s survey for critiques of the issues by Myto (complete) and Guild (Act II and Act III finale).