I was so much looking forward to re-acquainting myself with these classic performances made when della Casa was in her glorious prime, the voice glowing, creamy and ideally produced, that I listened with a growing consternation to what has happened to the sound. Were the old LPs really as glassy and hard as they now seemed to my ears in their CD format? Well, I got out my fairly worn pressing of the Arabella duets and the much more recent reissue of the other items in the LP Grandi Voci series. My ears hadn't deceived me. A quick A-B comparison showed the LPs to be warmer fuller and less restricted. Decca tell us in the well-prepared booklet (here they have stolen a march on EMI) just how much care they have taken over these transfers (indeed I am told that they have gone back to the original tapes), so the unsatisfactory results mystify me.
Happily, the voice is less affected by the digital remastering than the orchestra, so that we can enjoy anew the perfect placement, pitching and movement of the youthful della Casa's voice. She is also adept at characterization, catching without fuss the paradox of Arabella, reticent yet playful, coquettish yet sincere. She is better partnered by Gueden, who is a clear, silvery Zdenka, than by Schoeffler who was a little past his best for Mandryka, though his tone is still hearteningly warm. In the Capriccio finale, as Gerd Uekermann writes in his perceptive notes, della Casa combined the aristocracy of manner needed for Madeleine with ''a slight hint of ironic wistfulness''. Her performance rather puts in the shade such recent interpreters as Soderstrom and Lott—though not della Casa's coeval, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf. She also soars magnificently in Ariadne's great paean.
Della Casa's famous, trail-blazing version of the Four Last Songs, sung in their written rather than printed order, suffers least from the technical troubles mentioned above. Indeed, this is a perfectly acceptable refurbishing. Ueckermann makes out a strong case, one I agree with, for the soprano's unaffected, unforced, swift reading, perfectly matched by B6hm's taut accompanying. He suggests that the music is quite poignant enough without there being any need to indulge in slow speeds. Indeed, nowhere is Adagio or Largo mentioned by the composer. Some find della Casa cool, even matter of fact in this music, but I find the soaring, ecstatic tone a thing of continuing joy composed, steady singing of calm beauty—while finding a different, warmer pleasure in the Jurinac version which I so praised when it was recently issued for the first time by EMI ((CD) CDH7 63199-2, 1/90).'