Here, at long last, is the uncut Die Frau ohne Schatten, every note of it, for the first time on disc. Bohm's two recordings (for Decca—nla, and DG) were savagely cut, as are most stage performances (including Sawallisch's at Munich this summer). In fact, the complete work cannot have been heard very often since 1919. Clemens Krauss conducted it uncut in Munich in 1939, and I doubt if anyone else has until now. One can understand why it is cut in live performance, but it should not be, all the same. Some fine music in Acts 2 and 3 will be unknown to most people until now.
The role that always suffers most is that of the Nurse, ostensibly because some of Hofmannsthal's most abstruse text is put into her mouth. It emerges here, in Hanna Schwarz's glorious performance, as one of Strauss's most memorable creations for the female voice, and if there were no other reasons (which there are) for hailing this EMI achievement, the Nurse would be enough.
This is a studio recording and has all the merits of the best of its kind. Balance is admirable, the off-stage voices are atmospherically recorded and the playing of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, which Sawallisch chose in preference to his own opera orchestra, is magnificent. One is convinced, after listening to these discs, that this is Strauss's grandest and most ambitious, if not his most consistent, score, and that the beauty and imaginative genius of the orchestration are unsurpassed in all his music. There is a Mahlerian sound-quality in the chamber-music textures and in the use of the celesta, glass harmonica and other exotic instruments.
But Bohm's 1977 Viennese performance on DG, issued in 1986, has the inestimable thrill of having been recorded live and, for all the cuts, errors and stage noises, it is more exciting, just as Kempe's 1954 Munich live performance (not generally available) is incomparably lyrical, with Rysanek at her best as the Empress. The Bohm also has Birgit Nilsson in wonderful form as the Dyer's Wife. I cannot hide some disappointment with Sawallisch's choice of Ute Vinzing for this rewarding and demanding role. She characterizes it well, sounding all too shrewish at times, but there is a wobble and the tone lacks the radiance which should be there for her reconciliation with Barak. He is sung extremely well by Alfred Muff who is in turn genial, rough, tender, mystified and compassionate, a performance near to ideal vocally and dramatically.
Nor can any admirer of this opera fail to be entranced by Cheryl Studer's Empress. She is delightfully light and airy in the coloratura of her first entrance and gradually, as the drama deepens, gains in richness and passion—lovely singing and interpretation. Rene Kollo as the Emperor is, well, Kollo, which means some of it is good and some coarse and ill-considered, but where it matters most, in his two big arias, he comes up trumps.
Great care has been taken with the smaller roles such fine singers as Marjana Lipovsek, Jan-Hendrick Rootering, Paul Frey (a better choice as Emperor?) and Julie Kaufmann contributing their artistry to the whole splendid enterprise. The highest honours, though, must go to Wolfgang Sawallisch himself, whose passionate devotion to Strauss in general and to this opera in particular results here in a notable milestone in the gramophone's operatic progress.'