Features:
Description:
For complete enjoyment of an operatic scene or lieder recital, the visual element is almost as important as what you hear; the singer's facial expressions and body language are an essential part of the performance. This disc, compiled from television broadcasts in 1959 and the 1960s, supplies, delightfully, the visual element unfortunately missing in audio recordings of three of the greatest German singers of the 20th century. Everything on this disc is a treasure. Schwartzkopf is shown in the heart-breaking end of Act I in Der Rosenkavalier; it does not surpass her complete recording of the role with Von Karajan (available on VHS), but complements it with another view of one of her great moments. Seefried is totally charming, with vivid facial expressions and silvery tone, in five songs of Richard Strauss and three of Gustav Mahler. And Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau is in his vocal prime for Mahler's Songs of a Wayfarer. A very substantial bonus presents Fischer-Dieskau and pianist Gewrald Moore in four songs of Schubert, including a bone-chilling "Der Erlkönig" that requires the singer to use three contrasting voices. --Joe McLellan
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