The welcome rediscovery and consequent reissue of Seefried's recordings continues with this essential disc, a 'must' for anyone who loves her—and who dares say they do not? In these wonderfully immediate and faithful transfers (apart from the occasional bit of almost inaudible print-through found on some early tape recordings) of performances made between 1946 and 1953 in Vienna and London, Seefried is heard at the peak of her powers, when her voice was at its freshest and easiest. There is no sign of the slight strain in her highest notes that affected her after about 1956 in the tracks here.
I was taught to appreciate Mozart's songs through the long series of 78s (practically all given two stars in the old Record Guide—Collins: 1951) she made for Columbia, rejoiced when they reappeared in the dying days of LP and am now delighted that they come up newly minted on CD. As Peter Branscombe put it in Song on Record 1 (Cambridge University Press: 1986), they are ''unbeatable for generosity of response and heart-warming charm''. Whether the mood is happy, reflective or tragic, Seefried goes unerringly to the core of the matter. Here we have the archness of Die kleine Spinnerin, the naughty exuberance of Warnung, the deep emotion of Abendempfindung and Ungluckliche Liebe. Happily the choice of songs here is quite different from that of 1957 on the two-disc DG reissue (7/93). Three ariettes are charmingly done (one, ''Ruhe sanft'' from Zaide, was not published until 1987, when it appeared on LP). They are delightfully accompanied.
There is a substantial supplement to the Mozart items. We are offered five Schubert songs of the same vintage, including an unsurpassed Auf dem Wasser zu singen, so airy and natural; a pure, elevated Du bist die Ruh and a poised, ravishing Nacht und Traume. The lullabies of Flies, Schubert and Brahms are all vintage Seefried. The 1946 and 1948 Wolf items were left unpublished at the time—goodness knows why. They are a real treasure trove: a sorrowful, plangent account of Das verlassene Magdelein (perhaps the most compelling interpretation of all here; unutterably moving), an enchanting, spontaneous Elfenlied (with Gerald Moore marvellously delicate in this). For the most part, Moore is in attendance to complete one's pleasure in an irresistible and generously filled disc: another feather in Testament's cap.'